DOCSLIB.ORG

Multicultural Education in Social Studies Textbooks in South Korea and the United States: A

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Multicultural Education in Social Studies Textbooks in South Korea and the United States: A Multicultural Education in Social Studies Textbooks in South Korea and the United States: A Comparative Analysis Younghan Kim A dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy University of Washington 2013 Reading Committee: Geneva Gay, Chair Stephen T. Kerr Nancy E. Beadie Program Authorized to Offer Degree: College of Education ©Copyright 2013 Younghan Kim University of Washington Abstract Multicultural Education in Social Studies Textbooks in South Korea and the United States: A Comparative Analysis Younghan Kim Chair of the Supervisory Committee: Professor Geneva Gay College of Education Today, globalization has increased cross-border migration in many countries. The public school classroom in the United States has been getting more diverse, linguistically, culturally, racially, and ethnically. Classrooms in South Korea are also becoming linguistically, culturally, racially, and ethnically diverse because of the fast growth of immigration since the 1990s. In nation-states, implementing theories, practices, ideals, values of multicultural education in curricula is a responsibility for the wellbeing and academic success of all children. This dissertation examined how social studies textbooks in South Korea and the United States implement suggestions that multicultural education scholars recommend for cultural pluralism, educational equality, and social justice to reduce gaps between theories and practices. Five social studies textbooks were analyzed. Since the Seattle (WA) Public Schools recently adopted only one textbook for use in 2012-2013 in regular U.S. history classes, History Alive! Pursuing American Ideals was analyzed. Two 䀑ᠢ⭡ [Korea History] and two ⭡䅁.◭䄉 [Society & Culture] texts randomly selected from the approved list by the South Korean Ministry of Education were analyzed as the combination of the two subjects is more equivalent to U.S. history. This study found the selected textbooks did an inadequate job of adopting multicultural education theories suggested by scholars although there are minor differences among the three sets of textbooks. Although there are not many, few stereotypical images are still found in all three sets of textbooks. Textbooks are dominated by stories of mainstreamers in each country. The coverage of ethnic minorities is often limited to roles and topics related to racial issues such as discrimination. There are no stories of how different minority groups interact with each other, and there is practically no contemporary coverage of social actions by ethnic minorities for social justice. Table of Contents List of Figures ................................................................................................................................ iv List of Tables .................................................................................................................................. v Chapter I: Introduction .................................................................................................................... 1 Significance of Demographic Changes in South Korea .............................................................. 1 Significance of Demographic Changes in United States ............................................................ 4 Purpose of Study ......................................................................................................................... 5 Conceptual Framework ............................................................................................................... 7 Multiple Identities.................................................................................................................... 8 Culturally Responsive Curriculum .......................................................................................... 9 Critical Skills ......................................................................................................................... 10 Chapter II: Review of the Literature ............................................................................................. 12 Cultural Pluralism and Identities ............................................................................................... 13 Educational Equity and Culturally Responsive Curriculum ..................................................... 20 Social Justice and Critical Skills ............................................................................................... 26 The importance of Textbooks ................................................................................................... 32 Textbook Analysis in the United States .................................................................................... 35 Textbook Analysis in South Korea ........................................................................................... 38 Chapter III: Research Methodology.............................................................................................. 40 Content Analysis ....................................................................................................................... 40 Research Questions ................................................................................................................... 41 Setting and Sample .................................................................................................................... 43 i Coding and Analyzing ............................................................................................................... 46 Analysis of Illustrations ......................................................................................................... 46 Analysis of Narrative Text .................................................................................................... 48 Chapter IV: Findings..................................................................................................................... 49 Use of Multiple Identities .......................................................................................................... 49 Overall Demographics of Representation .............................................................................. 53 Imbalances ............................................................................................................................. 63 “With Other Race” Photos and Stereotypical Illustrations .................................................... 70 Culturally Responsive Contents ................................................................................................ 76 Ethnicity................................................................................................................................. 77 Race and Racism ................................................................................................................... 80 Immigration and Immigrants ................................................................................................. 84 Diversity ................................................................................................................................ 91 Assimilation ........................................................................................................................... 95 Discrimination ..................................................................................................................... 100 Prejudice .............................................................................................................................. 105 Critical Skills ........................................................................................................................... 108 Chapter V: Summary, Discussion, and Recommendations ........................................................ 121 Summary ................................................................................................................................. 121 Discussion ............................................................................................................................... 124 Significance ............................................................................................................................. 129 Limitations of the Study .......................................................................................................... 131 ii Recommendations for Future Research and Practices ............................................................ 132 Final Statement ........................................................................................................................ 134 References ................................................................................................................................... 136 Appendix A: Sample Codebook for Analysis of Illustration ...................................................... 152 Appendix B: Sample Codebook for Analysis of Narrative Text ................................................ 153 iii List of Figures Figure 1-1. Four Stages of Multicultural Society 6 Figure 1-2. Conceptual Framework 7 Figure 3-1. The Purpose of Study 41 Figure 4-1. Workers in Boulder (Hoover) Dam 55 Figure 4-2. Immigrants 56 Figure 4-3. A Newly Appointed Japanese Supervision Officer, Terauchi Masatake 60 Figure 4-4. UN Soldiers Landing at Incheon 61 Figure 4-5. Chinese Intervention 61 Figure 4-6. Soviet Soldiers Entering Korea after WWII 61 Figure 4-7. U.S. Soldiers Entering Korea after WWII 61 Figure 4-8. The Protectors of Our Industries 71 Figure
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Acculturation
    CHAPTER 4 ACCULTURATION Vignette: “Call me ‘Jessie,’ not ‘Josefina!’” Generational Differences and Acculturation Defining Acculturation Acculturative Stress Early Definitions Acculturative Stress and Reason for Acculturation, Assimilation, and Segmented Migration Assimilation Measuring Acculturation Models of Acculturation Levels of Acculturation Ethnogenesis Chapter Summary Emphasis on the Individual Key Terms The Role of Social Context Learning by Doing Biculturalism Enculturation Suggested Further Readings V I G N E T T E “C all me ‘Jessie,’ not ‘Josefina!’” Josefina was born in Chicago’s heavily Latino Little Pilsen neighborhood. Carlos and Maria, her parents, left Puerto Rico in their early 20s and met in Chicago while working at a factory. Carlos and Maria miss the island and their relatives and Puerto Rican food. Fortunately, Little Pilsen had a good number of markets that sold all the food staples that Carlos and Maria missed including plantains (Continued) 99 100 –G–THE PSYCHOLOGY OF ETHNIC GROUPS IN THE UNITED STATES (Continued) and gandules. Carlos often expresses concern for how his kids are not as respectful and courteous as he had been as a teen and blames the American culture for having spoiled his children. He always speaks in Spanish to them and he is often accused by the children of being old-fashioned. Maria speaks English more fluently than her husband and feels perfectly comfortable among her White friends as well as among her Latino neighbors. Josefina is fully bilingual, having learned Spanish at home and English while attending school. She is as comfortable eating rice with gandules as a hamburger at the fast food outlet.
    [Show full text]
  • Sequestered Inclusion: Social Service Discourses and New Latino Diaspora Youth in the Shenandoah Valley
    SEQUESTERED INCLUSION: SOCIAL SERVICE DISCOURSES AND NEW LATINO DIASPORA YOUTH IN THE SHENANDOAH VALLEY A Dissertation Presented to the Faculty of the Graduate School of Cornell University In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy by Elizabeth Esther Phelps May 2015 © 2015 Elizabeth Esther Phelps SEQUESTERED INCLUSION: SOCIAL SERVICE DISCOURSES AND NEW LATINO DIASPORA YOUTH IN THE SHENANDOAH VALLEY Elizabeth Esther Phelps, Ph. D. Cornell University 2015 Abstract: This dissertation explores ethnographically the impact of discourses of belonging and exclusion in a New Latino Diaspora (NLD) city located in the heart of the Shenandoah Valley, Virginia. Young NLD adults in Rocktown, Virginia, experience a form of sequestered inclusion shaped by racializing narratives based in nativist hostility as well as by implicit deficit narratives embedded in humanistic multiculturalism. Based on more than twelve months of ethnographic field work (and over six years of ordinary life in Rocktown), this dissertation explores how advocates, activists, and their allies in the social service and educational institutions in the Rocktown area have institutionalized processes of inclusion over a period of fifteen years both with and for NLD youth. These processes have been constrained by the paternalistic and reductive discourses that frame youth both as inherently needy and as a resource that benefits the receiving community. NLD youth themselves recognize their own specific needs and contributions, but resist the reductionism and racializing tendencies of these discourses. Within this context, a small group of young NLD activists formed to support and promote the DREAM Act (for Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors), both capitulating to and contesting dominant discourses and constructing a narrative frame for belonging on their own terms.
    [Show full text]
  • Multiculturalism and Integration Tariq Modood 1 July 2011
    ROBERT SCHUMAN CENTRE FOR ADVANCED STUDIES MULTICULTURALISM AND INTEGRATION: STRUGGLING WITH CONFUSIONS Tariq Modood University of Bristol © 2011 Tariq Modood This text may be downloaded only for personal research purposes. Additional reproduction for other purposes, whether in hard copies or electronically, requires the consent of the author(s), editor(s). If cited or quoted, reference should be made to the full name of the author(s), editor(s), the title, the research project, the year and the publisher. Published by the European University Institute Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies ACCEPT PLURALISM 7th Framework Programme Project Via dei Roccettini 9 50014 San Domenico di Fiesole - Italy www.accept-pluralism.eu www.eui.eu/RSCAS/ Available from the EUI institutional repository CADMUS cadmus.eui.eu Tolerance, Pluralism and Social Cohesion: Responding to the Challenges of the 21st Century in Europe (ACCEPT PLURALISM) ACCEPT PLURALISM is a Research Project, funded by the European Commission under the Seventh Framework Program. The project investigates whether European societies have become more or less tolerant during the past 20 years. In particular, t he project aims to clarify: (a) how is tolerance defined conceptually, (b) how it is codified in norms, institutional arrangements, public policies and social practices, (c) how tolerance can be measured (whose tolerance, who is tolerated, and what if degrees of tolerance vary with reference to different minority groups). The ACCEPT PLURALISM consortium conducts original empirical
    [Show full text]
  • What Biculturalism Is and Why It Matters
    Multicultural Identity and Experiences: Cultural, Social, and Personality Processes Verónica Benet-Martínez ICREA1 and Universitat Pompeu Fabra To appear in K. Deaux & M. Snyder (Eds.), Handbook of Personality and Social Psychology. Oxford University Press. 2nd edition. Date: December 2016 1Catalan Institution for Research and Advanced Studies 1 Abstract This chapter discusses the cultural and social-personality psychological processes involved in multicultural experiences and identities, and the societal factors which influence these phenomena. To do so, relevant findings and theories from the subfields of acculturation, sociology, cultural, social, and personality psychologies are reviewed and integrated. The chapter includes sections devoted to defining multiculturalism and its components at the individual, group, and societal level, explaining the links between multiculturalism and related constructs such as acculturation and interculturalism, and synthesizing the fast growing literatures on cultural frame-switching, individual differences in multicultural identity, and outcomes resulting from multicultural identities and experiences. The chapter concludes with a discussion of future challenges and needed directions in the psychological study of multiculturalism. Key words: Multiculturalism, multicultural, biculturalism, bicultural, interculturalism, intercultural, acculturation, bicultural identity integration, identity, ethnicity, culture 2 Multiculturalism: Cultural, Social, and Personality Processes “Each day I am reminded of
    [Show full text]
  • The New Philosemitism: Exploring a Changing Relationship Between Jews and the Far-Right
    The New Philosemitism: Exploring a Changing Relationship Between Jews and the Far-Right Hannah Rose CONTACT DETAILS For questions, queries and additional copies of this report, please contact: ICSR King’s College London Strand London WC2R 2LS United Kingdom T. +44 20 7848 2098 E. [email protected] Twitter: @icsr_centre Like all other ICSR publications, this report can be downloaded free of charge from the ICSR website at www.icsr.info. © ICSR 2020 The New Philosemitism: Exploring a Changing Relationship Between Jews and the Far-Right Executive Summary About this Report • This report views emerging cooperation and changing attitudes of the populist radical right towards Jews as a new wave of Philosemitism. • This new wave of Philosemitism is not a genuine and sincere positioning, but a strategic tool used by the far‑right in order to present itself as liberal and mainstream, gain support and engage in a ‘divide and conquer’ tactic among minority communities. Far-right Reframings of Jewishness • A shift from antisemitism to philosemitism has originated from a fundamental re‑imagining of Jewishness, where Jews and Judaism are understood through far‑right framings in order to legitimise existing ideologies. For example, by seeing Jews as European, pro‑Israel and anti‑Muslim, the far‑right allows itself to align philosemitism to its own interests. • In this way, deliberately positive sentiments of Jews based on stereotypes are rooted in the same processes as antisemitism, whereby the two phenomena are two sides of the same coin. • Strategies of ‘Collective Action Framing’ are used to impose a Christian‑derived framing of Jewishness onto Jewish people • ‘Frame Extension’, in the case of the radical right’s understanding of Israel as a European frontier against the Arab world, is used to expand far‑right ideology beyond its primary interests in order to appeal to a wider audience.
    [Show full text]
  • Islamophobia in France: a Struggle Between Religious and National Identity
    Islamophobia in France: A Struggle Between Religious and National Identity Master’s Thesis Presented to The Faculty of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Brandeis University Graduate Programs in Global Studies Kristen Lucken, Advisor In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Master of Arts in Global Studies by Killian Jampierre May, 2019 Copyright by Killian Jampierre © 2019 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS To Mike, thank you for putting up with the late nights of typing and keeping a smile on my face through the entire process. To Mom and Lolly, thank you for always encouraging me to achieve my goals and helping me along the way. I would not be where I am today without you. And thank you to all my friends and family who have supported me over the years. I would also like to acknowledge and give special thanks Professor Kristen Lucken, whose help, guidance, and devotion to my research goals made this project possible. And finally, to the 2019 Global Studies Master’s Cohort, thank you for your friendship throughout this project. iii ABSTRACT Islamophobia in France: A Struggle Between Religious and National Identity A thesis presented to the Graduate Program in Global Studies Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Brandeis University Waltham, Massachusetts By Killian Jampierre The purpose of this paper is to outline preexisting measures and current events in France that indicate the existence of anti-Muslim sentiment within the state. The ultimate goal of this paper is to determine the multifarious causes for Islamophobia in France while disposing of falsely perceived motivators for this phenomenon.
    [Show full text]
  • “We Wanted Employers, but We Got People Instead”: Racialization of Immigrant Ethnicity and Occupational Attainment in the Western U.S
    “We Wanted Employers, But We Got People Instead”: Racialization of Immigrant Ethnicity and Occupational Attainment in the Western U.S. Labor Market By CARLOS BECERRA THESIS Submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree of MASTER OF SCIENCE in Community Development in the OFFICE OF GRADUATE STUDIES of the UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA DAVIS Approved: Luis Eduardo Guarnizo, Chair William B. Lacy Erin R. Hamilton Committee in Charge 2018 -i- ABSTRACT This paper explores how immigrants’ ethnic identification influences their occupational status attainment in the United States West Coast labor market. Data from the American Community Survey from 2008 to 2013 are divided into ethnic categories to compare how immigrant workers fare vis-à-vis US-born workers. It uses educational attainment, immigration status, and English proficiency to predict the variance in occupational status between and within ethnic groups. The analysis is based on a nested three-block ordinary least squares regression (OLS), and an interacted model between the three main predictors and the ethnic group identifiers. The findings confirm the significant effect of education, immigration status, and English proficiency on occupational status scores. As expected, increases in education, holding a legal immigration status, and being fluent in English have positive effects on occupational status attainment, other things being equal. This positive relationship, however, is not equally manifested across ethnic groups. The study reveals that a significant percentage of these predictors’ explanatory power is lost among some ethnic groups, strongly suggesting a patterned and significant effect of labor market discrimination. Contrast analysis of the predictive margins of the four-way interacted model provides further evidence in support of negative exclusionary discrimination against some immigrant groups, especially Mexicans and Central Americans.
    [Show full text]
  • What Does It Mean to Be an "American"? Author(S): MICHAEL WALZER Reviewed Work(S): Source: Social Research, Vol
    What Does It Mean to Be an "American"? Author(s): MICHAEL WALZER Reviewed work(s): Source: Social Research, Vol. 57, No. 3 (FALL 1990), pp. 591-614 Published by: The New School Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/40970605 . Accessed: 26/08/2012 18:49 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp . JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. The New School is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Social Research. http://www.jstor.org WhatDoes ItMean to Be an / "American"?*Xby MICHAEL WALZER / 1 here is no countrycalled America.We live in the United States of America,and we have appropriatedthe adjective "American"even thoughwe can claimno exclusivetitle to it. Canadians and Mexicansare also Americans,but theyhave adjectivesmore obviously their own, and we have none. Words like"unitarian" and "unionist"won't do; our senseof ourselves is not captured by the mere fact of our union, however importantthat is. Nor will"statist," even "unitedstatist," serve our purposes;a good manyof thecitizens of the UnitedStates are antistatist.Other countries, wrote the "American"political theoristHorace Kallen,get theirnames fromthe people, or fromone of the peoples, who inhabitthem. "The United States,on the otherhand, has a peculiaranonymity."1 It is a name that doesn't even pretend to tell us who lives here.
    [Show full text]
  • View Paper As A
    Center for Immigration Studies What, Then, Is the American, This New Man? This publication was made possible by a grant from the John M. Olin Foundation. July 1998 Center for Immigration Studies 1522 K Street N.W., Suite 820, Washington, DC 20005-1202 (202) 466-8185 • fax (202) 466-8076 • [email protected] Compiled and Produced by Einat Sandman ISBN 1-881-290-10-7 1 Center for Immigration Studies 2 Center for Immigration Studies TABLE OF CONTENTS ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ About the authors ○○○○○ 6 ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ Foreword ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ 7 By Mark Krikorian Is There an American People? ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ 9 By Nathan Glazer Response By Orlando Patterson ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ 19 ○○○○○○ Response By Noah Pickus ○○○○○○○○○○○○○ 23 ○○○○○○○○○○○○ Is America Too White? ○○○○○○○○○○○○○ 27 By John Isbister Response By Peter Brimelow ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ 35 ○○○○○○○○○○○○ Response By Linda Chavez ○○○○○○○ 37 Do We Really Want Immigrants to Assimilate? ○○○○○○○○○ 39 By Peter Skerry ○○○○○○○○○ Response By Lawrence Fuchs ○○○○○○○○ 49 Response by John Fonte ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ 53 3 Center for Immigration Studies Is There an American People? Nathan Glazer Respondents: Orlando Patterson and Noah Pickus Nathan Glazer is Professor of Educa- Orlando Patterson is John Cowles Noah Pickus is an Assistant Profes- tion and Sociology, Emeritus at Harvard Professor of Sociology at Harvard sor of Public Policy and Political Sci- University, and co-editor of The Public University. A native of Jamaica, he ence at Duke University. He received Interest. A native New Yorker, he at- received a Ph.D. in sociology from the his Ph.D. in Politics from Princeton tended the City College of New York, London School of Economics, and University. His recent publications the University of Pennsylvania, and Co- came to the U.S.
    [Show full text]
  • Italian American Review Summer 2013 • Volume 3 • Number 2 Italian American Review John D
    Italian American Review SummeR 2013 • Volume 3 • NumbeR 2 Italian American Review John D. Calandra Italian American Institute The Italian American Review (IAR), a bi-annual, peer-reviewed journal of the John D. Calandra Italian American Institute, publishes scholarly articles about the history and culture of Italian Americans, as well as other aspects of the Italian diaspora. The journal embraces a wide range of professional concerns and theoretical orientations in the social sciences and in cultural studies. The full text of IAR issues from Volume 1 (2011) to the present is available online through EBSCO’s “America: History and Life” database (http://www.ebscohost.com/public/america- history-and-life). The IAR is listed in the Modern Language Association Directory of Periodicals. editorial office Editor: Joseph Sciorra, John D. Calandra Italian American Institute Associate Editor: Anthony Julian Tamburri, John D. Calandra Italian American Institute Associate Editor: Fred Gardaphé, Queens College, CUNY Managing Editor: Rosangela Briscese, John D. Calandra Italian American Institute Assistant Editor: Siân Gibby, John D. Calandra Italian American Institute Production Manager: Lisa Cicchetti, John D. Calandra Italian American Institute Book Review Editor: Nancy Carnevale, Montclair State University Film and Digital Media Review Editor: Laura E. Ruberto, Berkeley City College Subscription Manager: Rachel Hoyle, John D. Calandra Italian American Institute Copy Editor: Ernestine Franco, Pern Editorial Services editorial board Richard Alba, The Graduate Center, CUNY Giorgio Bertellini, University of Michigan Donna Chirico, York College, CUNY Simone Cinotto, Università degli Studi di Torino Enrico Cumbo, Michael Power/St. Joseph High School Donna Gabaccia, University of Minnesota John Gennari, University of Vermont Jennifer Guglielmo, Smith College Nicholas Harney, Cassamarca Foundation, University of Western Australia Cover photo: Sabato “Simon” Rodia’s Watts Towers (detail), Los Angeles, 2005.
    [Show full text]
  • The Civil War in Yugoslavia: Do Ostensibly High Rates of Intermarriage Obviate Ethnic Hatreds As a Cause? Andrei Simic, University of Southern California
    The Civil War in Yugoslavia: Do Ostensibly High Rates of Intermarriage Obviate Ethnic Hatreds as a Cause? Andrei Simic, University of Southern California To the Editor: In a letter appearing in the Spring 1994 issue of AEER, V. P. Gagnon, commenting on an article by Botev and Wagner in the special issue "War among the Yugoslavs" (Spring and Fall 1993), disputes the authors' contention that an overall low rate of intermarriage in Yugoslavia as a whole can be interpreted as indicating a lack of social integration. Faulting their methodology, he holds that if we were to consider the percentages of possible cases of intermarriage in given regions typified by ethnically heterogeneous populations, then the incidence of such unions would be quite high. He points out that during the 1980s this was, in fact, the case in the parts of Bosnia and Croatia where the heaviest fighting had taken place. Thus, he concludes that the root of the conflict cannot be "some preexisting hatred, discrimination, or lack of integration," and, therefore, "the causes must be sought elsewhere." While I can readily agree that external forces have significantly contributed to the current chaos, nevertheless, it seems absolutely clear from a preponderance of evidence that interethnic antagonisms have been the primary, if not exclusive, catalyst. The problem with Gagnon's thesis lies not in the statistics he cites, but in their interpretation . There are a number of ways Gagnon's data on intermarriage can be analyzed other than his hypothesis regarding social integration. For instance, he notes that 25% of Croatia's population was comprised of ethnic minorities, and that 16.9% of all marriages were mixed.
    [Show full text]
  • Unity Through Diversity? Assimilation, Multiculturalism and the Debate Over What It Means to Be an American
    UNITY THROUGH DIVERSITY? ASSIMILA TION, MULTICULTURALISM AND THE DEBATE OVER WHAT IT MEANS TO BE AN AMERICAN Douglas F. George, B.S., M.S. Dissertation Prepared for the Degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY UNIVERSITY OF NORTH TEXAS December 2005 APPROVED: George Yancey, Major Professor Philip Yang, Minor Professor David Williamson, Committee Member and Chair of the Department of Sociology Nicole Dash, Committee Member Doug Henry, Committee Member David W. Hartman, Dean of the College of Public Affairs and Community Service Sandra L. Terrell, Dean of the Robert B. Toulouse School of Graduate Studies George, Douglas F. Unity through diversity? Assimilation, multiculturalism and the debate over what it means to be an American. Doctor of Philosophy (Sociology), December 2005, 162 pp., 8 tables, references, 139 titles. In late 20th century America, multiculturalism emerged as a doctrine of equal respect and a popular ideological framework for resolving intergroup relations. Despite its dramatic presence, many sociologists conclude that the rather vigorous and often contentious academic inquiries into multiculturalism left us without a solid understanding of its significance. In this dissertation I examine survey and personal interview data to more clearly identify patterns of ideological support for multiculturalism or assimilation in the U.S. public and to isolate the motivations for their preferences. Findings based on the survey data indicate that, despite multiculturalism's symbol appeal, it does not seem to guide preferences in favor of or opposition to assimilation/multiculturalism among members of most groups. According to the quantitative data, support for intermarriage is one of the few variables that positively correlates with preferences for assimilation.
    [Show full text]