[Discussion] Multiculturalism Yes, Particularism No

[Paksoy, Hb]

 Chronicle of Higher Education
>From the issue dated October 24, 1990



POINT OF VIEW
Multiculturalism Yes, Particularism No
By Diane Ravitch 


The controversy at Stanford in 1988 over changes in a required course in
Western culture has grown into a national debate about the issue of
multiculturalism. College campuses, school districts, and even state boards
of education are presently examining what is taught and asking whether the
history and literature that are offered reflect accurately the different
cultural strands in our society and our world. 

Unfortunately, the Stanford battle cast the argument in the wrong terms.
Defenders of the existing Western-culture course opposed those who advocated
adding works by women and members of minority groups and thus created the
impression that Western culture excludes the voices of people who are
female, black, Hispanic, and Asian. That image is, of course, ridiculous; we
need only look around to see that all of these groups are very much part of
Western culture and that their members have made important contributions to
its literary and historical traditions. 

The debate over multiculturalism follows a generation of scholarship that
has enriched our knowledge about the historical experiences of women,
blacks, and members of other minority groups in various societies. As a
result of the new scholarship, our schools and our institutions of learning
have in recent years begun to embrace what Catharine R. Stimpson of Rutgers
University has called "cultural democracy," a recognition that we must
listen to "a diversity of voices" to understand our culture, past and
present. Teachers of history and literature have discovered that it is not
very difficult, in fact that it is rewarding, to broaden their perspective
beyond the one that they learned when they were in school. 

Of course, students should still study Western culture, and they should
learn about the emergence of the democratic ideology and the concept of
individual freedom that have been so crucial in the history of the world.
But they must also learn about the cultures of Asia, Africa, and Latin
America. These all represent complex civilizations, containing many cultural
groups and different languages. 

But today, when educators argue about multiculturalism, they are usually not
talking about disciplined study of other major civilizations. They refer
instead to American culture, which, because it is ours and because it is
relatively new, is vulnerable to reconstruction, deconstruction, and
revision. From which perspective should it be taught? Who should be
included? 

The real issue on campus and in the classroom is not whether there will be
multiculturalism, but what kind of multiculturalism there will be. Two
versions presently compete for dominance in the teaching of American
culture. One approach reflects cultural pluralism and accepts diversity as a
fact; the other represents particularism and demands loyalty to a particular
group. The two coexist uncomfortably, because they are not different by
degree. In fact, they are opposite in spirit and in purpose. 

The pluralist approach to American culture recognizes that the common
culture has been shaped by the interaction of the nation's many diverse
cultural elements. It sees American culture as the creation of many groups
of immigrants, American Indians, Africans, and their descendants. American
music, art, literature, language, food, clothing, sports, holidays, and
customs all demonstrate the comingling of diverse cultures in one nation.
Paradoxical though it may seem, the United States has a common culture that
is multicultural. 

The particularist approach to American culture can be seen most vividly in
ethnic-studies programs whose goal is to "raise the self-esteem" of students
by providing role models. Such courses are animated by a spirit of
filiopietism and by fundamentalist notions of racial and ethnic purity.
Students are encouraged to believe that something in their blood or their
race memory or their cultural DNA defines who they are and what they may
achieve. Particularists seek to attach their students to their ancestral
homelands as the source of their personal identity and authentic culture. 

The pluralists promote a broader interpretation of common American culture
by recognizing first that there is a common culture, and second that it has
been created by many different groups. At its most basic, our common culture
is a civic culture, shaped by our Constitution, our commitment to democratic
values, and our historical experience as a nation. In addition, our very
heterogeneity sets us apart from most other nations and creates styles of
expression that the rest of the world perceives as distinctively American.
The pluralists seek due recognition for the ways in which the nation's many
racial, ethnic, and cultural groups have transformed the national culture.
They say, in effect, "American culture belongs to all of us, and we remake
it in every generation." The cohesive element in the pluralistic approach is
the clear acknowledgment that, whatever our differences, we are all human.
The thread that binds us is our common humanity, transcending race, color,
ethnicity, language, and religion. 

Particularists have no interest in extending American culture; indeed, they
deny that a common culture exists. They do not appeal to the common good,
because their idea of community is defined along racial or ethnic lines.
They reject any accommodation among groups, any interactions that blur the
distinct lines among them. They espouse a version of history in which
everyone is either the descendant of victims or of oppressors. By doing so,
ancient hatreds are fanned and recreated in each generation. 

There is not a fine line that divides pluralism from particularism; they are
as different as secularism and sectarianism. The pluralist approach to
teaching culture accords with traditional academic ethics, in that students
learn to approach their subject with a critical eye. They learn about the
subject, and they know that they may criticize its strengths and weaknesses
without offending the professor. For example, in a traditional academic
setting, the object of learning about Confucianism or Islam or Judaism is to
study its history and philosophy, not to become an adherent of the faith.
Similarly, there is a valid place for special courses and programs in black
studies, women's studies, gay studies, or any other kind of cultural
studies, so long as they are taught critically and not as doctrinal faiths. 

By contrast, particularism has spurred a separatist ethic in higher
education. In the particularist classroom, students are taught to believe in
the subject, to immerse themselves in its truths, and to champion them
against skeptics. They are taught to believe, not to doubt or criticize. In
this sense, particularism resembles a religious approach to teaching.
Students are taught a faith, and the professor expects them to believe what
he or she believes. In this sense, particularism resembles a sectarian
approach to teaching. 

On our campuses today, courses in black studies, Asian studies, and all
other special cultural studies should welcome all students, not just in
theory but in fact. The severing of such courses from established
disciplines probably encourages separatism and ideological extremism. All
too often, even though the catalogue implies that such courses are for
everyone, the particularism of the professor or the department may
discourage students who are not members of the in-group from signing up. The
tendency to turn such courses into separatist enclaves violates a major
purpose of higher education, which is to broaden one's understanding of the
world. No special status should be accorded to students who are of the group
being studied, nor should scholars be expected to specialize only in the
culture of their ancestors. 

The essential difference between pluralism and particularism is that the
former actively combats ethnocentrism and the latter purposefully teaches
it. Ethnocentrism is the specter that has been haunting the world for
centuries -- causing war, injustice, and civil conflict. Ethnocentrism tells
people that they must trust and accept only members of their own group. It
tells them that they must immerse themselves in their own culture and close
their minds to others. It says to members of the group that they have
nothing in common with people who are of a different race, a different
religion, a different culture. It breeds hatred and distrust. 

Ethnocentrism has no place in our schools and institutions of higher
learning. Academic institutions have an obligation to introduce students to
a larger culture than the one they learned at home. 

The purpose of education is not to reproduce and reinforce the prejudices of
our inherited culture. Education must prepare people to live in a world of
competing ideas and values, to be able to work with people from different
backgrounds, to be able to question their own beliefs. 

The novelist Salmon Rushdie's recent comments are germane to the ongoing
debate about multiculturalism. This past summer, he published an essay
called "In Good Faith," his reflections on the events that forced him into
isolation. Mr. Rushdie wrote that those who oppose his novel "are of the
opinion that intermingling with a different culture will inevitably weaken
and ruin their own." He goes on to say: 

"The Satanic Verses celebrates hybridity, impurity, intermingling, the
transformation that comes of new and unexpected combinations of human
beings, cultures, ideas, politics, movies, songs. It rejoices in
mongrelization and fears the absolutism of the Pure. Melange, hotchpotch, a
bit of this and a bit of that is how newness enters the world." 

True believers in all societies have never been comfortable with the kinds
of ideas and activities found in the university. They have seen the
university as a citadel of doubt, skepticism, non-conformity, unorthodoxy,
and dissent; a place where young people learn to question the faith of the
elders; a safe haven for those who criticize the conventional wisdom. 

And so it should remain. 

Diane Ravitch is a historian of education at Teachers College, Columbia
University, and the author of several books, including The Troubled Crusade:
American Education, 1945-1980. Her latest book, The American Reader, will be
published this fall by HarperCollins.