Building Intercultural Understandings Through Global Literature

Abstract

Learn how to use global literature to help students understand their personal cultural identities, their responsibility to take action in their worlds, and how to express these understandings in art.

“Nobody Spoke Like I Did”: Picture Books, Critical Literacy, and Global Contexts

“…Although there has been extensive research and many teaching ideas for exploring literature that presents diverse cultures and communities (Martens et al., ), developing global literacies also includes teaching our students to be critically reflective as they engage not only with written text but with images, audio, video, and interactive technologies. The following section considers how young readers engage with a picture book, drawing on data from a pilot research project about assessment and multimodality.…”

“…Cartwheel wraps herself in the comfortable blanket of her first language, but as the story unfolds, she slowly learns to speak English and weaves a second blanket which provides her with a new stability and a strong sense of her own well-being. Although there has been extensive research and many teaching ideas for exploring literature that presents diverse cultures and communities (Martens et al, 2015), developing global literacies also includes teaching our students to be critically reflective as they engage not only with written text but with images, audio, video, and interactive technologies. The following section considers how young readers engage with a picture book, drawing on data from a pilot research project about assessment and multimodality.…”

Values and Intercultural Experiences Through Picture Books

“…In the difficult path toward interculturality and inclusion, different authors have recognized the great power of literature (Gilmore & Howard, 2016;Kim, Wee, & Lee, 2016;Monoyiou & Symeonidou, 2016;Wang, 2014;Yulita, 2017). According to Martens et al (2015), through reading literary texts, students acquire the necessary skills to learn how to respect, accept, and appreciate diversity as something positive for the collective development of the group. More specifically, picture books are considered one of the best means to promote underlying values in intercultural education because they are open to the imagination and require meaningful thoughts and a capacity for deep reflection (Encabo Fernández, López Valero, & Jerez Martínez, 2012).…”

The Teaching of Children's Literature: A Case Study of Primary Teachers' Pedagogical Content Knowledge

“…Research by Sanacore (2013) asserted that personal reflection and meaning-making could be made through the use of literature. Hsieh and Matoush (2012) Texts that represent the cultural backgrounds of readers have also been found to be of value in assisting readers to be able to see themselves in the literature, prompting them to both develop a positive sense of self, learn about themselves, and build intercultural understanding (Barrera & Garza de Cortes, 1997;Jiménez, 1997a, b;Jiménez, Moll, Rodriguez-Brown & Barrera, 1999;Mallan, Henderson, Cross, & Allan, 2014;Martens, Martens, Doyle, Loomis, Fuhrman, Furnari, & Stout, 2015;Nieto, 1997). Mallan (1999, p. 201) agrees, stating that "picture books offer readers the opportunity to understand themselves and their world" and although the simple inclusion of literature will not necessitate greater skill or self-understanding, their careful use can stimulate interest "into their content and form which may result in the reader making a series of intellectual, emotional and perceptual shifts".…”

“…Children's literature, in contemporary times, is thought to reflect "the myriad of cultures in our diverse global community" (Yenika-Agbaw, 2013, p. 233 (Norton, 1990), becoming aware of diversity (Martens, Martens, Doyle, Loomis, Fuhrman, Furnari, & Stout, 2015;Tunnell, Jacobs, Young, & Bryan, 2012) and decreasing negative stereotyping in order to develop readers' understanding of other people and cultures (Noll, 2003). An Australian example by Fogorty (2010) is Fair skin black fella, a picturebook that shares the experiences of a young girl and her community, who learn that Indigenous identity transcends skin colour, and is more importantly about culture and country.…”