Alex Kolbo
Multicultural Education Portfolio
Kristine Sudbeck
November 30th, 2012
Portfolio Question #1
As I sat, thinking about what my experience was learning about culture and
diversity throughout school I realized, I really can’t think of much. I remember
coming to college and thinking, “Man they sure talk about culture and diversity a lot
here”. Maybe that was just because I didn’t hear it talked about much in elementary
through my high school experience. That made me wonder, “Did I miss out on
something?”
I grew up in Kearney, NE where there is not a lot of diversity to speak of. The
most diversity I encountered was when we played opposing teams like Grand
Island, Lexington, or Omaha South. That was the majority of the diversity I saw
growing up. We probably had about five to six foreign exchange students and
maybe 5 African American kids and a few Hispanic families but that was pretty
much it for our high school of 1,300 students. Kearney did not have a whole lot to
work with for cultural interaction and diversity strengths. The only real positive
cultural asset was that the University of Nebraska - Kearney had a lot of foreign
exchange students going to school there, and they still do.
I know our school probably tried to integrate more cultural and diverse
learning into the curriculum but I think they could have used Kearney’s biggest
asset, University of Nebraska – Kearney, a little more strategically. The only thing I
remember doing for any type of multi-cultural experience project was to go to a
cultural exchange festival at the college. That festival was beneficial to my cultural
experience, but even that was only an optional extra credit project. I wish we could
have had more stuff like that required or even better yet have had them come to our
classes or meet with us so we could interact and learn from them directly 1 on 1.
That could have been a huge addition to my learning experience during K-12, but I
don’t recall a lot of that actually happening.
Classes such as geography and world history allowed me to learn facts,
location and general history about other countries. Where I learned the most about
culture was in my art and art history classes. Art deals with the thoughts and
feelings of people in different times and different places and you can learn a lot
about other cultures through their art. Most of my high school education about
other cultures was facts and historical information.
Outside of school, I learned about diversity and culture through foreign
exchange students that my family hosted as well as some staying with friend’s
families and the exchange students on my soccer team. Those relationships had
conversations and real world interactions are what created the best way of learning
about culture for me. What I learned from them stuck far beyond what any textbook
or lecture taught me. I wish this kind of learning was instilled into our curriculum
so all students could have the chance to be friends with students from different
countries, cultures, or races.
One this I have learned this semester is that curriculum and philosophy of
teaching culture is always changing. History has taught me that we have majorly
improved teaching equality and diversity in our schools for the present generation.
It’s not that hard to notice some generational changes between kids and their
grandparents. Many older generations may not have grown up with curriculum
anything like what we have know for teaching race and culture. For instance, my
grandpa still refers to African Americans as “Blacks”. I have also heard others his age
use worse descriptions just because they were not taught that was wrong/
politically incorrect when they were young.
Time isn’t the only thing that effects multi-cultural education. Location also
has a large influence on how one learns about culture. The racial make up of a
community plays a big part of what type of cultures one gets to interact with and
learn from. People in the mid-west do not have the same opportunities that people
who live on the coasts. A better comparison is rural versus urban areas. Large cities
have a much more diverse population. Just because rural areas have less options
doesn’t mean they can’t learn. A good example is the school from the “Paperclips”
video we watched where they made their own opportunities and created an
experience that was great for the students and the community alike. They had little
to no experience with different cultures, races, or people because of the secluded
small town they were in, but they defied that small road bump to teach their kids
some really valuable life lessons. It is the community’s responsibility to raise their
kids with the chance to be multi-culturally knowledgeable and obtain good values.
I understand that your location in history and location in the country/ world
does affect your view on culture, race, and diversity, but it doesn’t have to limit your
knowledge. It is all up to the teachers, parents, school system, community, and the
learner themselves to take advantage of the opportunities around them, or to create
learning experiences that can give them an appropriate knowledge of culture. I
know my experience was not the best learning experience possible but it is what I
do with it now and what I take away from every learning experience I have that
matters.
Portfolio Question #2
“Cultural differences should not separate us from each other, but rather cultural
diversity brings collective strength that can benefit all of humanity.”
-Robert Alan
Before starting this class I thought I already had a great perspective on topics
of culture, race, diversity, and the like, but I was shown early on in the class that I
still had a lot of room to grow in this area. I have seen parts of my beliefs strengthen
and even some of them change through the course of the class. I have also realized
my potential and power as a teacher to help stop racism and use culture/ race as an
excellent teaching tool. This class also helped me look at my other classes with a
different lens as I discovered relations and applications of what I learned.
In the very first couple weeks our personal knowledge was tested and
challenged as we were reminded, and sometimes even exposed to new knowledge of
America’s past. What I first remember was being shocked during the video “Shadow
of Hate” at all I had forgotten from previous history classes. The video, along with
the readings and discussions in those first 2 weeks, revealed a lot of different topics
in our past that I was not presently aware of. I was surprised at how many other
people groups were oppressed and it was not just African American, and Native
Americans, but there were also the Quakers, Irish Immigrants, Catholics, Chinese,
Japanese, Mexicans, and many other cases of oppression in our nation’s history.
While watching the “Where the Spirit Lives” video about the Native American kids
who were kidnapped and forced to be deculturalized in the Catholic schools, I was
able to get a greater sense of what oppression feels like and how absurd it is. I was
saddened for everyone who has had to go through that, whether it is here in
America or anywhere else around the world.
Over the course of the semester we saw a lot of different examples of what it
looks like for kids to come from different cultures and not have the chance to learn
about their own culture. We also learned about the struggles students have in the
American school system and how it makes it harder to keep their culture because it
tries to teach it out of them. I have learned a lot through videos later in class such as
the one about laws being passed to ban the cultural based learning classes, or the
one about the 18 year old that found out she was undocumented. Through these
videos I have gained a better empathy for kids that were brought here illegally by
their parents. I developed a feeling of responsibility for us as a nation to help them
become educated and excel in life, so they can be an asset for their community. I
didn’t always feel this way but now I see that they did nothing to put themselves in
their circumstances. We should help them cope rather than make it harder for them
to succeed.
I used to believe that the phrases “I don’t see color” and “I’m color blind to
race were smart ways to think about race, but that belief has changed during this
class. Now I just think those are ignorant statements that actually can do more
harm. This point was brought up a lot in the “Angry Eyes” film as well as other films
and reading from the same time in class. If you really think about it, those phrases
are a ridiculous way to handle race. Yo-Yo Ma says, “Our cultural strength has
always derived from our diversity of understanding and experience.” We are to
celebrate diversity and embrace its qualities of culture to make our world a better
place, not to ignore it and act like its not there.
The role I believe I can take now to combat racism and a lack of
understanding for other cultures is by educating, and raising awareness. It’s crucial
for someone to know about other cultures because otherwise they may fear them
and/ or place judgment on them. My art methods teacher, Jean Detlefsen, said it
best when she said, “Fear for something goes away when you gain a knowledge of
it”. She was talking about creativity when she said that but I believe it holds true to
almost any topic. As I have taken what I have learned from this class with me I have
begun to apply it to my other classes like my art methods class. A great
conversation I was able to bring up was where the line is in cultural education
appropriateness in art like with representing/ depicting other cultures. We were
able to discuss how from some examples we thought of where other artists pulled
from other cultures and when it was right and when it was wrong. We decided on
some beliefs like it being great to pull for inspiration from other cultures but not to
claim as being of a culture your not because that could bring on a feeling of
disrespect for that culture.
A great way I learned of someone raising awareness and teaching about
other cultures at the same time was the “Paper Clips” project we learned about. We
wouldn’t have to ever fight racism in our schools or world if we did a better job of
preventing it through education. We need to educate about race, culture, and
diversity. We need to teach equality, awareness, and the strengths and qualities of
diversity and in other cultures. Of course we live in an imperfect world and it’s
going to happen, so when it does, my job as a teacher, as a person of the community,
and as a human is to not be a bystander but one who stands up and stops acts of
racism. This goes for everyone to take responsibility in seeing that all who are apart
of the human race are treated equally.
Portfolio Question #3
Our media these days have a great power that allows them to effect and even
control much of our world’s psyche and what people believe. Its not that we
purposely let them control us but a lot of times we subconsciously learn by what the
media is putting out in our everyday view. It’s learned by repetition. It is my belief
that most of what we know about stereotypes and racism is learned from movies,
television, magazines, ads, news, and etc. I know everyone is effected by this
whether they realize it or not but for me, this class has helped me to recognize
racism that used to get passed me unnoticed.
A few examples I found to help illustrate what I have learned from this class
are these two add campaigns: one for a foreign toothpaste company, and the other
for a liquor store. I would have viewed both of these commercials differently back
before this class than how I would take them if I saw them on T.V. now. The
toothpaste commercial says in its YouTube description that it is not racist but is
about how “we should not be deceived by looks”. First of all, if they have to come
out and say that, then there is a problem. Secondly, if that’s what they were going
for then there were a whole lot of things they should have avoided to stay clear from
making a racist remark. They could have stayed clear of the topic of race in general
and made the subject something else. There were a lot of degrading references
there too that I couldn’t have just been reading to deep into and making a bigger
deal of nothing. They depict the man climbing a pole like an ape climbs a tree trunk.
Even his gestures and movements off the pole are very ape like. Also he doesn’t talk
(maybe this is a coincidence) to make him look even dumber. They also use
stereotypes to further carry their character to make people want to judge him by his
appearance. Before this class my views towards this commercial would pretty much
be the same. However now I might feel even more disgusted at the outright
straightforward racism displayed in the ad.
The second example is a set of commercials that also plays with stereotypes
and crosses some boundaries as well. Before this class I would have just thought
these were some funny commercials but now I see the out right racism through
playing with stereotypes of African Americans. It reminded me of our conversations
in class about “When is it ok to use the “N” word?” and “Who is ok to use it?” It’s not
ok to pretend to be apart of someone else’s culture when you are not of it. If they
want to say, do, or make fun of something about their cultural that’s ok but
outsiders would be crossing the line into racism if they did that.
I as a designer know that sometimes one makes mistakes by adding
something into a design by accident. The good intentions were there and it seemed
like a good idea until the negative meaning or be controversial subject is pointed
out. Our media doesn’t always seem to be doing it by mistake; they need to be
striving to keep racist comments out of public view. They have a very big
responsibility because of the great influence they have on the thinking of people in
our world. I feel like now I will be noticing this kind of stuff more often and will be
able to help combat this type of poor behavior.
Video Links:
Toothpaste commercial
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=byok6vipekQ
Chicago-Lake Liquor Ads
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=QzScjI78dWI
Portfolio Question #4
In thinking about my Creative Expression of what I learned in the class I
decided to express what it means to my future. I wanted it to show what kind of
effect the class had on my career and my job as being an art educator. A class
always means more when I can find a way for it to be relevant. This class has helped
show me the importance of education students about culture and other races,
ethnicities, people groups, and religions.
Through thinking about this I was able to have a couple different
conversations in art classes of mine (Art Methods, Art in the Community, Art
History) about teaching culture through art. We realized that most of the time in art
history and world history we only learn about what affected us. In art it is all about
European Art even though there is four other continents of art going on. In world
history it is all about how different wars and major world events affect us. There is
little taught about the whole world as a community.
This is why I choose to make a piece that represents me painting a picture for
my students of all the world’s art and not just focusing on us. On each continent I
painted something that represents their art history (Of course I had to simplify by
only doing one piece per country). I had to do a little research because I had a hard
time thinking of what was important to show for some of the other countries and it
was hard to pin point down to just one piece. It helped me to remember, every
continent and every country is filled with a rich diversity of culture, race, and
history.