Friday, January 30, 2009
Monday, January 19, 2009
Culturist Philosophy!!!
Please comment!! As I post this I am off to the Obama inauguration with the Hindu Jewish Alliance to promote awareness of Islamic aggression. I'll be back Wednesday and respond to your comments then. Enjoy!!!
Our 20 Arguments Against Multiculturalism
Readers of this blog DAMIEN, EMPEDOCLES,DUCKY, Z and I came up with a list of arguments against multicultural education (ME). The list below makes it clear that we must stop multiculturalism and replace it with culturism. These arguments provide important intellectual weapons in this battle.
#1 – ME is offered as the cure for America’s having been an especially racist nation. Our accomplishments far outweigh our sins. ME slanders our good name.
#2 – ME greatly diminishes critical thought by greatly distorting global history and underplaying the lack of cohesion in western history.
#3 - ME has us sloppily making amends to people who we never discriminated against in any meaningful sense. We need not feel guilty to cultures that were not here to be discriminated against.
#4 – ME doesn’t really believe diversity is real. Multiculturalism teaches that, deep down, all cultures basically advocate variations of secular humanism.
#5 – ME allows Islam to use the schools to inculcate our children with their doctrine.
#6 – ME teaches that total equality is the natural state. ME then uses our inequality to argue for “social justice.” This implies we are unjust and need redistribution of wealth to correct for all existing inequality.
#7 – By teaching that our society is racist and unjust, ME turns resistance to participating in our society into a virtue. It thus especially hinders the education of minorities.
#8 – In a desire to create ethnic pride, ME falsifies the anthropological record. Early cultures were very violent. This misreading makes us cynical about progress and America’s historical mission.
#9 – ME blinds us to real evils in the world. It says that since all cultures are equally worthy of praise, attempts to distinguish between cultures is irrational racism.
#10 – ME becomes hypocritical the minute it makes any judgments. It thus undermines attempts to teach values.
#11 – Because western civilization has had an enormous influence on the world, ME teaches our culture is uniquely bad for disturbing indigenous cultures. Supporting western culture then becomes synonymous with advocating white supremacy.
#12 – ME denies that we have a core culture and thus undermines teaching western history. This makes us vulnerable to having no common cultural language to draw upon and encourages the forgetting of our heritage.
#13 – ME actually only acknowledges liberal values. Christian disagreement with gay marriage cannot be celebrated.
#14 – Undercuts schools’ universal and historic mission of socializing youth into the society in which they will live their lives. Schools thus lose their purpose.
#15 – Undermining our pride in our culture decreases our citizens’ desire to protect it. ME thereby puts us in a weak position in competition with cultures that create fanatical pride in their culture.
#16 - ME teaches that your ancestors' culture determines your identity and views. It thus diminishes freedom.
#17 – ME routinely confuses culture and race. It thus inhibits frank and realistic discussions about diversity.
#18 – ME divides us.
#19 - ME undermines critical thought by telling us we must celebrate all cultural attributes.
#20 – For all of the above reasons, multiculturalism threatens the survival of western civilization.
Culturism is the opposite of multiculturalism. It counters all of these grave evils. We need to identify as culturists to save western civilization.
PLEASE GO TO ISI's AMAZING LECTURE COLLECTION AND WATCH THEIR DEBATE OVER MULTICULTURALISM at http://www.isi.org/lectures/lectures.aspx
#1 – ME is offered as the cure for America’s having been an especially racist nation. Our accomplishments far outweigh our sins. ME slanders our good name.
#2 – ME greatly diminishes critical thought by greatly distorting global history and underplaying the lack of cohesion in western history.
#3 - ME has us sloppily making amends to people who we never discriminated against in any meaningful sense. We need not feel guilty to cultures that were not here to be discriminated against.
#4 – ME doesn’t really believe diversity is real. Multiculturalism teaches that, deep down, all cultures basically advocate variations of secular humanism.
#5 – ME allows Islam to use the schools to inculcate our children with their doctrine.
#6 – ME teaches that total equality is the natural state. ME then uses our inequality to argue for “social justice.” This implies we are unjust and need redistribution of wealth to correct for all existing inequality.
#7 – By teaching that our society is racist and unjust, ME turns resistance to participating in our society into a virtue. It thus especially hinders the education of minorities.
#8 – In a desire to create ethnic pride, ME falsifies the anthropological record. Early cultures were very violent. This misreading makes us cynical about progress and America’s historical mission.
#9 – ME blinds us to real evils in the world. It says that since all cultures are equally worthy of praise, attempts to distinguish between cultures is irrational racism.
#10 – ME becomes hypocritical the minute it makes any judgments. It thus undermines attempts to teach values.
#11 – Because western civilization has had an enormous influence on the world, ME teaches our culture is uniquely bad for disturbing indigenous cultures. Supporting western culture then becomes synonymous with advocating white supremacy.
#12 – ME denies that we have a core culture and thus undermines teaching western history. This makes us vulnerable to having no common cultural language to draw upon and encourages the forgetting of our heritage.
#13 – ME actually only acknowledges liberal values. Christian disagreement with gay marriage cannot be celebrated.
#14 – Undercuts schools’ universal and historic mission of socializing youth into the society in which they will live their lives. Schools thus lose their purpose.
#15 – Undermining our pride in our culture decreases our citizens’ desire to protect it. ME thereby puts us in a weak position in competition with cultures that create fanatical pride in their culture.
#16 - ME teaches that your ancestors' culture determines your identity and views. It thus diminishes freedom.
#17 – ME routinely confuses culture and race. It thus inhibits frank and realistic discussions about diversity.
#18 – ME divides us.
#19 - ME undermines critical thought by telling us we must celebrate all cultural attributes.
#20 – For all of the above reasons, multiculturalism threatens the survival of western civilization.
Culturism is the opposite of multiculturalism. It counters all of these grave evils. We need to identify as culturists to save western civilization.
PLEASE GO TO ISI's AMAZING LECTURE COLLECTION AND WATCH THEIR DEBATE OVER MULTICULTURALISM at http://www.isi.org/lectures/lectures.aspx
Tuesday, January 13, 2009
Culturism Versus Multiculturalism in Education
Resolved, multiculturalism is good for higher education. I just watched a terrific debate on this resolution at the amazing Intercollegiate Studies Institute website - http://www.isi.org/lectures/lectures.aspx
Dr. Patricia Bode of Tufts University argues for the affirmative. First, she summarizes the goals of multicultural education (ME).
1) ME tackles inequality and promotes access to education.
2) ME raises the achievement of all students and provides them with an equitable and high quality education.
3) ME it gives students an apprenticeship and an opportunity to become productive members of a democratic society.
Dr. Bode undergirds the assertions with the five dimensions, identified by James Banks, of institutional change necessary for there to be true ME. She does this so we can understand the "socio-political view" of ME.
1) A knowledge construction process by which faculty engage students to investigate frames of reference in order to uncover bias and determine what counts as knowledge.
2) Curriculum integration deals with the extent to which different cultures are used as examples.
3) Equity pedagogy draw from Paolo Friere to facilitate the achievement of all students.
4) Prejudice reduction focuses on racial attitudes and attitudes about bias against ethnic groups, races, sexual orientation, religion and languages and other identities.
5) An empowering school school structure. This includes admission strategies and recognizing that admissions start with grouping and labeling practices in K - 12 and differences in achievement between racial groups there. This is done to ensure all are achieving highly.
ME includes seven characteristics because we are not yet a democratic society with equal access.
1) It is anti-racist education. It comes from the Civil Rights movement and so expands to anti-bias education.
2) It is basic education. It is about all people being able to read and write well.
3) It is especially important for people in dominant groups to undergo this training. It is not just access, it is a pervasive frame of mind that must be inculcated.
4) It is education for social justice. It looks at power structures and how those influence student achievement. ME doesn't just affirm identity and language, it address and confronts issues of difference, power and privilege in school practices and in society by challenging racism and other biases. Affirming identity can help minorities become successful learners, but unless it engages power structures it is unlikely to have a lasting impact or lead to equity and social justice. Socioeconomic structures and "access to things" must be addressed and that must be seen as part of the educational process.
5) It needs to take into account our history of immigration (both voluntary and forced), as well as inequality and exclusion that have characterized our past and present and our educational record.
(I counted five, though Dr. Bode listed it as seven)
Giving us the full list she quickly says, "Identity is important but it is not everything. Race, ethnicity, social class, language use, gender, sexual orientation, religion, ability and other social and human differences, are a major aspect of the socio-political context. It begins with the assumption that Identity frames how one views the world, but does not necessarily determine it."
This is Dr. Bode's closing argument:
"ME is misnamed when said to only refer to studying other cultures or focusing solely on peoples' fixed identities. When ME grounds its practice in strong analysis in relationships among unequal groups in the US, and contextualizes schools and colleges and universities in the broader socio-cultural environment in the US, recognizes the implications of the social construction of race [ME] does not reify identity, does not essentialize culture as a fixed notion and recognizes also the embedded structure of white supremacy in US history and that different political positions that race, ethnicity and class hold in the current social framework regarding influences on academic achievement, when ME addresses social class through analysis of poverty and its causes, proposes strategies to eliminate it, critiques the growing wealth of the few at the expense and impoverishment of the many, and develops a comprehensive analysis of oppression, then ME is good for higher education. Then it is working toward participation in a democratic society for all students."
ANY THOUGHTS? HOW MANY WAYS CAN WE LIST IN WHICH ME IS WRONG?
Dr. Patricia Bode of Tufts University argues for the affirmative. First, she summarizes the goals of multicultural education (ME).
1) ME tackles inequality and promotes access to education.
2) ME raises the achievement of all students and provides them with an equitable and high quality education.
3) ME it gives students an apprenticeship and an opportunity to become productive members of a democratic society.
Dr. Bode undergirds the assertions with the five dimensions, identified by James Banks, of institutional change necessary for there to be true ME. She does this so we can understand the "socio-political view" of ME.
1) A knowledge construction process by which faculty engage students to investigate frames of reference in order to uncover bias and determine what counts as knowledge.
2) Curriculum integration deals with the extent to which different cultures are used as examples.
3) Equity pedagogy draw from Paolo Friere to facilitate the achievement of all students.
4) Prejudice reduction focuses on racial attitudes and attitudes about bias against ethnic groups, races, sexual orientation, religion and languages and other identities.
5) An empowering school school structure. This includes admission strategies and recognizing that admissions start with grouping and labeling practices in K - 12 and differences in achievement between racial groups there. This is done to ensure all are achieving highly.
ME includes seven characteristics because we are not yet a democratic society with equal access.
1) It is anti-racist education. It comes from the Civil Rights movement and so expands to anti-bias education.
2) It is basic education. It is about all people being able to read and write well.
3) It is especially important for people in dominant groups to undergo this training. It is not just access, it is a pervasive frame of mind that must be inculcated.
4) It is education for social justice. It looks at power structures and how those influence student achievement. ME doesn't just affirm identity and language, it address and confronts issues of difference, power and privilege in school practices and in society by challenging racism and other biases. Affirming identity can help minorities become successful learners, but unless it engages power structures it is unlikely to have a lasting impact or lead to equity and social justice. Socioeconomic structures and "access to things" must be addressed and that must be seen as part of the educational process.
5) It needs to take into account our history of immigration (both voluntary and forced), as well as inequality and exclusion that have characterized our past and present and our educational record.
(I counted five, though Dr. Bode listed it as seven)
Giving us the full list she quickly says, "Identity is important but it is not everything. Race, ethnicity, social class, language use, gender, sexual orientation, religion, ability and other social and human differences, are a major aspect of the socio-political context. It begins with the assumption that Identity frames how one views the world, but does not necessarily determine it."
This is Dr. Bode's closing argument:
"ME is misnamed when said to only refer to studying other cultures or focusing solely on peoples' fixed identities. When ME grounds its practice in strong analysis in relationships among unequal groups in the US, and contextualizes schools and colleges and universities in the broader socio-cultural environment in the US, recognizes the implications of the social construction of race [ME] does not reify identity, does not essentialize culture as a fixed notion and recognizes also the embedded structure of white supremacy in US history and that different political positions that race, ethnicity and class hold in the current social framework regarding influences on academic achievement, when ME addresses social class through analysis of poverty and its causes, proposes strategies to eliminate it, critiques the growing wealth of the few at the expense and impoverishment of the many, and develops a comprehensive analysis of oppression, then ME is good for higher education. Then it is working toward participation in a democratic society for all students."
ANY THOUGHTS? HOW MANY WAYS CAN WE LIST IN WHICH ME IS WRONG?
Tuesday, January 6, 2009
Culturist Interview by Paleo
Enjoy the graphics and listen in as Paleo interviews John K. Press about culturism.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)