Reconceptualizing Literacy in the New Age of Multiculturalism and Pluralism (Literacy, Language and Learning) - Softcover

9781930608900: Reconceptualizing Literacy in the New Age of Multiculturalism and Pluralism (Literacy, Language and Learning)

Softcover

ISBN 10: 193060890X ISBN 13: 9781930608900

Publisher: Information Age Publishing, 2000

This book offers a array of essays with challenging ideas and provoking new analyses of power asymmetries, multiple epistemologies and vital con-cerns for the education of a different America, the America of new immi-grants, people of color with other cultures, languages and values. The new American that many want to ignore and is becoming the only America. This book also forces us to reflect on the educational challenges we must face, especially in teacher education and the preparation of intellectual leaders. None of the major agenda items associated with a new era of social justice can be either comprehended or accomplished without a profound understanding of multicultural literacy, and of its relationship to ethnic, racial, cultural and linguistic diversity. While in previous decades we used frequently a rhetoric of multiculturalism (at a safe distance), today we are living multiculturalism and practicing ethnic, cultural and racial diversity in our daily lives as we seek a marriage partner, a business associate, a friend, a church. Most of all, we must live multiculturalism as we go school and see children’s faces. There is no way to escape the reality of ethnic, racial and linguistic diversity as it comes entangled with many other cul-tural and class differences between and within each group we encounter. Suddenly, an abrupt awakening for many mainstream educators, what was peculiar of some areas in the Southwest, has become common scenario in most metropolis and large cities. The present volume brings us face to face with issues and challenges we can no longer sweep under the rug. This outstanding volume lays down a solid general conceptual foundation that permits us to link our theoretical past with the post-modern era. It also provides a clear context for the dis-cussion of contrasting notions of monocultural literacy and the relation-ship of literacy and power. The volume goes on to deal with the relationship of literacy and culture (actually to specific cultures, especially African American). At this point the discourse turns to strategies for incor-porating minority perspectives into the literacy curriculum and including the home cultures of disenfranchised peoples. The last section of the book offers help on the practical issues of teacher education for student popula-tions often ignored, and linkages between schools and homes in order to empower the disenfranchised and isolated.

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About the Author

Patricia Ruggiano Schmidt, a reading teacher for twenty-five years, earned the M.Ed. from University of Massachusetts and Ed.D. from the Reading and Language Arts Center, Syracuse University. Her dissertation entitled, Cultural Conflict and Struggle: Literacy Learning in Kindergarten Program, a classroom ethnography, earned recognition in 1994, from the Interna-tional Reading Association and was published by Peter Lang in 1998. Addi-tionally, Dr. Schmidt, an Associate Professor in the Education Department of Le Moyne College, Syracuse, NY, has authored numerous journal articles related to multicultural literacy. In 1996, she was honored with the Le Moyne College Matteo Ricci Award for service and achievement related to campus diversity. Recently, Dr. Schmidt's research, teaching, and service have revolved around her model known as the ABC's of Cultural Under-standing and Communication. The model is used in teacher education programs, nationally and internationally, to develop home/school commu-nication and culturally sensitive pedagogy. In 2000, Dr. Schmidt received the Minerva Award presented to an Alumna or Alumnus of Potsdam Col-lege for outstanding professional achievement.

Peter Mosenthal is a professor at Syracuse University in the Reading and Language Arts Center. He also is president of Performance by Design, Inc. At Syracuse University, he teaches statistics, educational tests and measure-ment, and writing for professional publication in education and the social sciences. As president of Performance by Design, he works with rural and urban schools (with funding from New York State�s VESID program and with support from OCM BOCES) to enhance students� achievement on state standards assessments in the areas of literacy, social studies, and math. For the past 15 years, he served as a consultant to Educational Testing Ser-vice�s Adult Literacy Learning and Assessment Group. He is co-editor of the Handbook of Reading Research (Vols. 1�3) and recently has assumed the editorship of Information Age�s Language, Literacy, and Learning Series. For this year (i.e., 2001), he is serving as President of the National Reading Conference. His primary area of interest includes developing a K-12 liter-acy curriculum for rural and urban schools districts that integrates assess-ment, instruction and management and that significantly enhances students� literacy achievement through the use of knowledge modeling.

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