Culture

Culture is defined as “a set of learned beliefs, values, symbols, and behaviors, a way of life shared by members of a society. (Sadker and Zittleman 60)” Culture is a broad term that covers a very wide range of things. There is a National Culture and then there are also microcultures or subcultures. Culture can be related to class, religion, or sexual orientation. Each culture or subculture is made up of values and behaviors that make it different from another culture or subculture. A culture can be the same or different in each nation or community. Within a community the population may share some cultures and values but also have completely separate and different cultures in each family.

“The willingness of people to understand and appreciate different cultures, races, and ethnicities is often at the heart of the diversity issue in the United States.” (Sadker and Zittleman 60)

A challenge for educators is to make sure each student in your class understands and appreciates the differences within these races, cultures, and ethnicities. And to make sure each student despite their ethnic background achieves their full potential in learning.

Statistics:

“Hispanic, Native American, and African American students score consistently lower on standardized tests than do their Asian and white classmates.”

“Almost half of the nation’s historically under-resourced populations, Hispanic, African American, and Native American, are not graduating from high school.”

“In Houston, Oakland, Cleveland, and New York, with large populations of poor students and students of color, between 60 and 70 percent of the students do not graduate high school.”

“Students from low-income families are six times more likely to drop out of school than the children of the wealthy.”

All pulled from (Sadker and Zittleman 60)

Teaching culture in your classroom

Three types of cultural literacy

1. Mainstream- Culture from one viewpoint

2. Marginalized- Culture from multi viewpoints

3. Critical- How to evaluate the different viewpoints of culture

In order to teach students to see culture in a marginalized view meaning to view culture from different perspectives we need to teach them how to be critical of it. This means they will know the right questions to ask. Ex: “Who said it? Who is serviced by this perspective? Who is marginalized? Who has been left out in telling their side of the story?” (Aldridge and Goldman 176)