Perspectives on Diversity and Culture

Perspectives on Diversity and Culture

The first interview was conducted with a colleague that is a white female, who was born and raised in the local area and in her early sixties.  She moved away when she was married to a soldier and traveled to Germany, several parts of Europe, and around the United States.  She recently returned to her family home in the area three years ago when her parents passed away.  Her response to the question of culture and diversity was surprising to me personally:  

“Well we have no culture and diversity here, I mean locally.  Everyone is blonde haired, blue eyed, Finns, unless you are here with the university (referring to Michigan Technological University).  Because of the university we have some diversity in the town, but the locals don’t really jive with that.”

I had assumed from her travels she would have found an appreciation for the deeper culture she had been raised in and could see the diverse differences with a global perspective.  However, she was only addressing the surface culture, the obvious characteristics, like hair and eye color.  Additionally, she touched on how cultures can clash because of these surface characteristics and lacking a deeper understanding of one another, putting individuals into a social group that may not truly apply (Ngo, 2008).  My colleague judged culture and diversity by race and ethnicity only, neglecting to go deeper into what forms a person’s self-identity.  

The second interview was conducted with my husband, who is a white male in his early thirties and has traveled little outside of the state of Michigan.  However, he does attend the University that was mentioned above in the first interview.  He takes class with instructors and peers from all over the world daily.  His response was:

“I mean culture and diversity is everything. Races, genders, and ways of thinking, it’s everything.” (I questioned whether he believed culture and diversity were the same thing or defined differently.) “They are completely different things.  Culture is everything, diversity is just the variations between cultures.”

My husband defined culture and diversity as a complex component of a person that is “everything”.  He went further than the surface of the iceberg of culture to understand that culture encompasses all aspects that influences a person’s actions and reactions (Laureate Education, 2011).  I chose to clarify the two definitions with my husband because I have noticed that many individuals put these two terms into the same definition.  Personally, I believe they are separate components but interrelated in meanings.

The third interview was conducted with another colleague that is a white female, who has never left the area and in her late twenties.  She responded:

“Culture to me is your costumes and how you present yourself on a day to day basis.   Diversity is your heritage and where your roots are from, like skin tone and language.  While cultural diversity to me is how people celebrate the differences between each other in a positive light.”

My colleague also went deeper when defining culture as the influences that are present daily in a person’s life.  Culture is the unconscious rules that are governing who a person regularly (Laureate Education, 2011).  Interestingly, she defined diversity as a connection to physical appearances and language acquisition.  Again, I’m interested in the different responses when defining these to two terms as one or separate between the interviewees.

My fourth interview was conducted with a retired secondary education special needs teacher, who is a white female and in her sixties.  She gave a short and concise definition:

“Culture is one’s ethnicity and the environment you surround yourself with and diversity is a mixture of many cultures.”

This is the definition I most identify with personally and I think it is because I can tell she has experience defining these terms.  As educators, we must get comfortable with our personal culture and how we will guide children positively when acknowledging and learning about culture and diversity.  “All children need to feel that their families are acceptable to their teachers. That means they cannot get the impression that their family is not normal.” (Gonzalez-Mena, 2008, p. 11).  Educators need to develop a precise definition of culture and diversity that avoids communicating cultural biases made by ourselves, others, and the environment (Laureate Education, 2011).  Keeping to simple and objective perspectives to respect and recognize all individuals.

References

Gonzalez-Mena, J. (2008). Diversity in early care and education (5^th ed., pp 8-13). Boston, Massachusetts: McGraw Hill.

Laureate Education (Producer). (2011). Culture and diversity [Video file]. Retrieved from https://class.waldenu.edu

Ngo, B. (2008). Beyond culture clash: Understanding of immigrant experiences. Theory in Practice, 47(1), 4-11.