Carrie Arnett

No Culture Left Behind

In the world of an American educator, the statement “no child left behind,” is in itself, an American dream.  “No child left behind,” is an ideal concept that all educators strive to accomplish everyday; for if no child is left behind, all children will then have the same opportunities to obtain their own American dreams. Just as Lady Liberty is an icon of freedom, opportunity, and a land filled with hopes of a better future, this statement ideally calls forth those same promising feelings.  However, as seen in much of the multicultural literature presented in this class, many hopes and dreams become lost and are left dangling in front of American immigrants and minorities.  These same problems exist for students in the classroom, as they too are left battling similar situations.  The questions that soon arise must then be answered.  Can a student, by reading multicultural literature, gain insight into his or her own life?  Why is it important to teach the immigrant and minority narrative and why aren’t teachers allowed more freedom to teach this type of literature to students? 

It seems that every year I teach time is always the enemy.  Because teachers are constantly trying to prioritize lessons and units, some texts go unread.  So what happens to these forgotten pieces of literature? They basically get cut and put back on the shelves with the promise of “we will do that next year.”  One thing that I have noticed over the past three years I have taught is that whenever adjustments need to be made, it always seems to be the multicultural literature that gets bumped to the bottom of the priority list.  But by far, the greater problem that I see is that “next year” never comes. 

Excerpts from Eli Weisel’s Night and Maya Angelou’s I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings are often set aside in order to finish other texts such as Charles Dickens’ Great Expectations, a canon-text of dominant culture literature.  Multicultural literature sometimes seems to be viewed as a checklist, and once Martin Luther King’s, “I Have a Dream” speech has been taught, the box is checked and the class moves on to the next piece of curriculum.  I am confused and surprised at how my school district cannot see this ever growing problem.  Since taking this course, I now realize that if teachers do not introduce different cultural narratives, students will be “left behind.”  If teachers only focus on dominant culture literature, many students will feel alienated in the classroom.  Students from different cultural backgrounds need to read literature in which they can relate to.  If a student’s culture is put aside and not connected to what is being studied, they will not feel a relationship to the literature.  Therefore, it is my job as a teacher, to find all different recourses to reach all students.

I am reminded of Paule Marshall’s “The Making of a Writer:  From the Poets in the Kitchen,” whose narrator vicariously escaped by reading books like Great Expectations and Tom Jones.  However, the narrator soon discovers that something in her life seemed to be lacking, or as she states “something I couldn’t quite define was missing” (VA 88).   The narrator, enjoyed reading the previous books, but did not feel a strong connection to them compared to how she felt after reading Paul Laurence Dunbar’s poetry.  His work spoke to her as nothing had before. She felt connected to his literature because she could relate more with his culture, and his experiences that were brought out from his culture. 

Why then do schools often abandon multicultural literature?  My school is 74% Anglo, 5% African American, 16% Asian, and 9% Hispanic.  After looking at these numbers, it seems that most teachers probably, without even realizing it, teach more to the dominant culture.  I am in no way saying that teachers only focus on teaching to one race and culture.  But I am pointing out the reality that this does happen, and as a result, many cultures are left behind.  Furthermore, some school districts are stricter than others. In this regard, many teachers only teach what the curriculum states because of an underlying fear of losing one’s job.

The immigrant and the minority narratives are priceless records that portray struggles that all students can relate to, whether they are immigrants or not. The themes of these stories seem to reach across different social classes, genders, and races.  More students today can relate to literature like, “Soap and Water” “Hunger for Memory” and “Silent Dancing,” than to Great Expectations.  Students identify with stories about alienation, racism, love, and self-identity.  By focusing on themes, one type of cultural literature can thus be linked to another; creating a common bond for all multicultural literature. 

The immigrant and minority narrative can be used in the classroom to show the importance of acceptance, and the harsh realities of rejection into society.  For instance, James Baldwin’s No Name in the Street and Chitra Divakaruni’s “Silver Pavements, Golden Roofs” can be used to focus of the thematic motif of rejection and alienation.  Many people as they assimilate into the dominant culture, including students, yearn to feel a sense of belonging, but instead they find themselves feeling alone in the world.  As a freshman teacher, I know that many of my students experience these same feelings as they make the journey from intermediate school to high school.

In a former research posting, “Breaking the Color Code: African American Assimilation,” I examined how skin color effected the assimilation process for African Americans and posed the question of whether or not the “color code” could be broken.  The research posting gave me the freedom to explore my own interests in the African American assimilation process.  Therefore, I interviewed a woman named Osato Okoradudu, who immigrated into the United States from Benin, Nigeria at the age of 17.  She came to America to become educated and wanted an education more than anything.  Her experiences in the U.S. seem to have many similarities as Sarah’s in The Bread Giver’s.  She too had to over come many family and religious obstacles to become an independent woman.  Looking back, I am now able to understand how acceptance into a new culture plays a significant role in the assimilation process.  This concept forces me to question how acceptance effects education.  The Bread Giver’s would be an excellent piece of multicultural literature to use inside the classroom, in order to portray the American Dream, family issues, and acceptance into society.    

The heart of what I am trying to express is that the best education is not one that is built solely on immigrant literature or minority literature, or even dominant literature.  The greatest education is one that encompasses all three.   By examining the similarities and the differences of all types of literature, the educator and the student both benefit.  This is why I found the organization of our class beneficial.  The organizational breakdown served as a model to imitate in the classroom, for I never felt this course pointing to one particular type of literature over the other.  Instead, the literature seemed interlaced and well infused with all three types of narratives.  By teaching all facets of multicultural literature, the teacher does not simply focus on the differences between cultures; instead, the focus can be shifted to similarities in order to connect one culture to another.  Just like in the story, “Thank God for the Jews,” commonalties are highlighted, creating a connection where one might not have been seen before.  Therefore, if teachers use multicultural literature as a vehicle to connect students from all different backgrounds, many students who might have been “left behind” will not only succeed in the classroom, but outside the classroom as well.