Cultural identity does not have to be created in opposition to others. Too often, cultural identity is based on boundaries and borders rather than on commonalities.
Relying on singular interpretations of potentially biased historians is particularly problematic when issues of power and social control are taken into consideration. American public schools should be especially aware of how knowledge, power, and social control are closely interwoven. Even teachers of young children can become more aware of differential access to social and cultural capital: the means by which the rich become richer. Public schools should promote a cultural identity that is keenly aware of the problems with traditional pedagogy, traditional definitions of "culture," and traditional ways of disseminating culture.
Giroux (1999) notes that educators may need to question the very notion of what constitutes culture: why some works of art, literature, and music are labeled as "high" culture and others as "popular" culture and why the latter is valued more highly by the institutions responsible for creating cultural norms. In fact, public schools should become more self-reflective and self-critical, willing "to provide a better understanding of how power works in and through such contexts while simultaneously opening up imagined possibilities for changing them," (Giroux 1999). Public schools have exempted themselves from this critical role to the detriment of children and the entire society. By taking a more active role in cultural identity construction, educators can encourage their students to become more critical consumers, more media literate, and more in control of their identity formation.
Gender, although not a feature of cultural identity per se, is definitely a facet of every culture. How cultures construct, view, and politicize gender lays the foundation for cultural identity. Public schools should help their students...
Even if these weighty issues are not embedded into public school curricula, they can inform pedagogy. Educators can promote cultural identities that are egalitarian and humanistic.
If constructivism explains how cultural identity is formed, then humanism offers the goals toward which educators should strive. Assuming their critical role in cultural identity construction, educators begin to promote "a fundamental respect for all humans by virtue of being endowed with freedom of will, rational thinking, moral conscience, imaginative and creative powers," (Aloni 1999). Humanism can inform pedagogy on all levels, permitting dialogue that eliminates antagonism, bias, and all forms of inequity. The cultural identity that public schools promote is one that celebrates intelligent and critical debate. Open-mindedness can and should be a core feature of the American identity, which has been traditionally built on high ideals such as freedom, liberty, equality, and justice. Finally, culture "plays a central role in producing narratives, metaphors, and images that exercise a powerful pedagogical force over how people think of themselves and their relationship to others," (Giroux 1999). Educators can engage students, and vice-versa, to collectively create a better society.
References
Aloni, N. (1999). Humanistic education. Encyclopedia of Philosophy of Education. Retrieved Mar 24, 2007 at http://www.vusst.hr/ENCYCLOPAEDIA/main.htm
Giroux, H.A. (1999). Cultural studies as public pedagogy. Encyclopedia of Philosophy of Education. Retrieved Mar 24, 2007 at http://www.vusst.hr/ENCYCLOPAEDIA/main.htm
Mazzotti, T.B. (1999). Constructivism. Encyclopedia of Philosophy of Education. Retrieved Mar 24, 2007 at http://www.vusst.hr/ENCYCLOPAEDIA/main.htm
