The End of Education

In his vast study of democracy in America, Alexis de Tocqueville concluded that all our political problems end up in the courts. Had there existed a public school system when he wrote, he might have added that all America’s social problems end up in school.

And so begins Neil Postman’s interesting chapter on “The Law of Diversity.”

He states that it is undoubtedly become the job of schools to handle all the various social problems . . . as opposed to simply educate a young person so they can be a successful citizen in our democracy.

While there is no clear answer to whether schools should be doing anything about ‘social problems,’ one thing Postman feels strongly that schools should do is teach diversity.

When I was an undergrad, the multi-cultural/Affirmative Action/diversity movements was at its peak. I recall often learning that I should steer away from the literary canon of the great dead, white writers and try to inject some diversity into my curriculum.

That is not all bad. But Postman worries that the idea of ‘diversity’ is giving way to ‘ethnic pride’ in schools. He believes it is the school’s job to show all students how they fit into the vast multi-cultural mosaic that is American culture. It is NOT the school’s job (nor should it be) to teach minority cultures how the dominant white culture inflicted harm or suppression on them in the past. It should not give minority cultures a sense of separation and ‘otherness.’ If parents want to provide that at home . . . that’s their prerogative. But it shouldn’t be the job of the school or textbook, which I might add it seems to me it has become (through quotas and so on).

Postman defines the study of diversity as “how our interactions with many kinds of people make us into what we are. It is a story strongly supported by the facts of human cultures . . . It does not undermine ethnic pride, but places one’s ethnicity in the context of our common culture.”

I think that is often the goal of schools and textbooks, but often that doesn’t happen. It devolves into the uglier aspects of multiculturalism (such as learning just about what harm one dominant culture did to other cultures that were conquered. I’m not saying don’t learn about that; rather, I’m saying don’t stop there. Keep learning and investigating why it happened, how it happened, and the repercussions).

Here are specific areas Postman believes schools should focus on to teach diversity.

Language

He has an interesting idea: make French the official language in the United States for 15 years. Then make Japanese the official language for the next fifteen. In 30 years everyone would be trilingual. Not bad, eh?

But the importance of teaching language (as well as a greater understanding of our own language) is important for it reinforces the idea of diversity. Just look at our own language and how it is a hodgepodge of dozens of other languages.

Postman gives an interesting example - imagine that four people sit down at a diner for lunch and gave the following orders: First, soup, a cheeseburger with squash, and coleslaw on the side and then tea with cherry pie. The second wants a waffle, a banana split, and coffee. The third wants chili with plenty of pepper and a cookie. The fourth wants a turkey sandwich with gravy and soy sauce and a Coke.

Now, just look at all the different countries and languages covered in those four orders!

In terms of learning an entirely different language Postman notes the benefits. Namely, that you open your mind to another way to see and interpret the world. What a novel idea? And what a vital skill for the 21st century, flat globalized world.

In the end I like what Postman concludes on the matter of teaching diversity through language (as opposed to dealing with ‘social’ problems): “But the point is that our young ought not to be monolingual, and if the schools paid less attention to driver education, and other such marginal tasks, our students wouldn’t be.”

Religion

Here Postman examines the overly politically correct notion of certain groups being offended by Christmas carols being sung in school. Postman, of Jewish heritage, never was offended when he sang Christmas songs in choir. The point is to tolerate, not exclude. Would it be so terrible to sing a Hebrew song or a Muslim song as well? What learning opportunities might exist?

Schools should not exclude religion. Note here that it is not anyone’s job to proselytize. Instead, the job is to educate and understand. Differences of opinion should be tolerated and even encouraged.

But why study religion in public schools -

First, so much of the world and popular culture (art, music, lit) is intertwined with religion.

Second, many of the great religions are “the stories of how different people of different times and places have tried to achieve a sense of transcendence.” That is, they all seek to answer one key question: why? Science and philosophy do the same thing. So why not study religions for this?

Third, through studying religions students gain a greater understanding of diversity. This happens in two ways. First, students will see how different people from different times have tried to explain themselves and their beliefs. Second, students might be shocked to see the similarities in the religions’ explanations.

This would certainly call for tact and care. But what’s wrong with teaching tact and care when examining and studying something. Just watch, for example, FOX News for an example of the opposite of tact and care.

Postman notes that there is no need to dispute the differences of the major religions. Respect and tolerate the differences. Then look at how they overlap. Postman observes: “Is it insulting to reveal that the Jews borrowed from the Egyptians? The Christians from the Jews? Is there any cynicism in revealing that American Indian deities have a special relationship to the earth and sky, not found in Western religions but similar in many ways to ancient Greek deities? Is there anything threatening in learning about the religions of African tribes? Do we endanger anyone by showing that Gandhi’s religious beliefs were influenced by those of Thoreau, and that Martin Luther King, Jr.’s ideas were influence by Gandhi?”

This type of education will lead to a greater level of tolerance that says, “‘If I had been raised as you have, if I had been in your situation, if I had been led to respect the symbols you do, then it is very likely I would believe as you do.’” This doesn’t mean students give up or abandon their beliefs, which is something I think we can all live with and certainly benefit from.

Custom

We do this to some extent already. What person hasn’t been in a class of some sort where certain ethnic foods or traditions weren’t adopted for one class period? This causes different customs to be seen as almost trivial. That is not how to teach or experience customs.

Postman also notes that the study of customs does not need to be confined to far away places and people. Take a survey of the backgrounds of the students in any class (even if they all appear white or black), and you will be surprised to find the different customs and backgrounds. I discovered this when we discussed Christmas traditions prior to reading “The Lottery” (I know - what a juxtaposition!).

Another benefit of studying customs is to see how some become “Americanized” (such as we observed when we watched a 30 Days episode on outsourcing. An American computer programmer, whose job is outsourced over to India, spends 30 days in Bangalore. There he witnesses just how “Americanized” many Indians have become, from major things like women working instead of remaining at home and taking care of their husbands’ families to actually celebrating Christmas). Why and how did this “Americanization” happen? Was it beneficial? Or did it have a negative impact? 

Best of all, maybe there is a custom that is so odd to Americans that it is almost incomprehensible (the idea of the traditional Indian arranged marriage is a good example. Postman offers the example from 1994 when an American student in Singapore was found guilty of an offense and sentenced to be ‘caned’). Here is a great chance for learning. Too often in America we only believe what we want to believe. We now live in such an advanced state of things that if I’m ultra liberal or conservative, I can simply surround myself with just the things I want to hear. I can read just the extreme blogs that tell me what I want to hear. I can watch the news channels or listen to the talk radio stations that tell me just what I want to hear. And when something arises that I disagree with or that challenges my beliefs, it’s a lot easier to ridicule or dismiss it that explore it and learn from it. As Postman puts it, “Before rushing to judgment, one must make an honest attempt to understand, and to teach the young how to understand.”

This ties into several things that I love to teach: To Kill a Mockingbird, Fahrenheit 451, The Jungle, The Crucible, and The Nacirema, just to name a few. Does it ever hurt to find a lens, in this case customs, through which we can not only look at different cultures and their ways of seeing the world, but does it also ever hurt to then turn that lens back on our own customs and culture and ask ourselves, “Are we so sure that we’re doing it right? Or are we so sure that we have everything figured out?”

Art and Artifacts

It’s hard to argue with Postman when he states that art nourishes the soul. And it’s important to remember, as Postman notes, that every time we visit an art center or museum, we must ask what is this place and things in them go about answering this question: What does it mean to be human?

This may seem like a bunch of touchy feely crap. I mean where the hell will you ever see that question on a standardized test? Our curriculum isn’t designed to answer that question.

Maybe that’s we why we have such an entertainment addicted society. I laughed at Grown Ups when I went to see it with my friend last weekend, but I wouldn’t say it nourished my soul the way other pieces of art have. But at least I am given the option of knowing the difference. How many of our students can say that?

Another important element of teaching art and its artifacts is that it allows students to experience different perspectives from different periods.

When I visited the Martin Luther King center in Atlanta, I got a much different perspective from a different period in time than I did from the prisoner of war museum in Andersonville or the museum at Gettysburg. It’s not to say that one perspective has to be cancelled out by another. I think - as does Postman - this is one reason under multiculturalism that we are so quick to condemn the Evil Whiteman for what he did to other cultures. Yes, it was terrible . . . from our modern perspective. And it might be terrible from the past perspective, but let’s try to at least understand that perspective.
Take the issue of the Native Americans. I was always horrified at what the Evil White culture did to their culture. But then my dad said, “Kurt, if we wouldn’t have done that to them, some other country would have done the same thing.” And I think Dad had Russia in mind when he said that. And that made an impression. Would another country have been able to absorb the Native Americans into their culture better than we did (and it’s hard to imagine how someone could destroy a culture more thoroughly than what we did to the Native Americans). But would the Spanish or Chinese or Canadians have done it differently? If so, now that’s another perspective that needs to be examined and learned from. When in our history have other cultures peacefully absorbed another one? Or is it simply in our human nature to destroy other cultures?
All worthy questions to be answered in a class.

This is one reason that Postman proposes having a high school class study museums. Here is his proposed project (notice, not a test!) . . . “students [must] write a prospectus for a new museum in their community. They would be required to indicate what the museum would try to say, as well as what objects of art, custom, and technology would best say it. Such a project might be the final exam of a year-long course devoted to an analysis of whatever museums are accessible in the community.”

Postman brings his chapter called “The Law of Diversity” to a close with this excellent idea: “I am keeping in mind that the purpose of public education is to help the young transcend individual identity by finding inspiration in a story of humanity.”

Now, I can hear the critics saying that this is more touchy feely crap that helped get America in the education mess it is currently in. There is no way designing courses around language, religion, custom, and art & artifacts is going to help us race to the top and rival Asia or India.

Well, maybe it won’t. But maybe it would restore the idea of citizenship to our world. Maybe it would help our students rise above the drama in their lives (or at least put it in perspective) rather than be addicted to it thanks to Facebook, Seventeen, Entertainment Tonight, and texting on their BlackBerries.

I recall something congressman George Miller told the National Press Club when the report “A Democracy at Risk” came out. Miller talked to CEOs to find out what kind of worker they were looking for, they told him that this is what they were trolling the world for: a worker who can work across their company, across the country, across the continents with the most divers workforce in the history of the world to assemble and solve emerging problems with the most diverse client base in the history of the world.

Now I think Postman’s call for schools designed around languages, religions, customs, and art & artifacts could very well provide us with those types of workers. Because stuck in the narrow scope of NCLB and RTTT, our current students are certainly not learning how to become the type of worker Miller calls for. Not unless all those CEOs want students who can do well on standardized tests and learn information quickly and forget it just as quickly in order to memorize more information before forgetting it again . . . Well, you see the vicious circle we’ve created.

I’d like to see us give Postman’s concept a try.