The Passions of Pluralism: Multiculturalism and the Expanding Community

Beyond the “decorated landscapes” of educational reform: Toward landscapes of pluralism in science education

“…However, acknowledging gender and cultural ways of knowing in science education is not enough. We must also embrace and value students' unique voices in ways that go beyond the received reforms such as through the arts (Eisner, 2002(Eisner, , 2005Greene, 1993Greene, , 1995Mueller, 2006;Mueller & Bentley, 2005). However, the decorated landscapes of educational reform have historically and continue to marginalize the importance of these expressions of human existence.…”

“…Many feminist scholars (Darling-Hammond, 1998;Greene, 1993Greene, , 1995Noddings, 1999;Thayer-Bacon, 1996 are calling for the renewal of a relational, community emphasis in schools. These scholars agree that school reform efforts are too narrowly focused on student achievement, uniform standards, governance, and accountability.…”

“…They assert that any education that focuses on students' lives must start with the constructs of community. Because learners are embedded, embodied, and situated in gender and diverse cultural milieus, we must be inclusive and continuously aware of every perspective if we wish to fully embrace an education that serves pluralistic communities always-in-the-making (Greene, 1993;Thayer-Bacon, 1996. Thus, we might use Greene's (1995) notion of the social imagination to construct the possibilities of an education with a pluralistic praxis.…”

“…We claim that the landscapes of pluralism should be the main focus of a science education centered on preparing students to make informed choices and fully participate in society in ways that are reflective, reliant, and reciprocal of Earth's many natural environments that sustain life itself. The landscapes of pluralism represent cultures-gender, race, ethnicity, religious background, class, and socioeconomic status-and the diversity of ways in which humans come to know and express their voices (voices of the past, present, and future) as equal stakeholders in democratic life and in the Earth's natural environments: not constituents of one reality but of many equally important realities (Greene, 1993). Thus, we see democracy most aligned with a continuously evolving perspective that values the equal representation and freedom of people as full constituents from within a pluralistic praxis (Ladson-Billings, 2004, 2006a, 2006bPotthoff et al, 2000;Roth & Barton, 2004;Thayer-Bacon, 2000).…”

The Potential of Narrative and Experiential Approaches in Multicultural Inquiries

“…In the field of political science, multiculturalism in Europe, Canada, and the United States is increasingly linked to controversial discussions of democracy in global contexts (e.g., Dyer, 1996). Multiculturalism is of major concern in philosophical debates about cultivating human potential in a global context (e.g., Nussbaum, 1997), expanding notions of community to create spaces for genuine encounters among different people to reach common goals (e.g., Greene, 1993), and understanding the complex, changing nature of contemporary cultural and individual identity (e.g., Taylor, 1994). In women's studies, scholars are using multiculturalism as a lens to understand and critique gender and class issues and to expand women's epistemologies (e.g., Golberger, Tarule, Clinchy & Belenky, 1996).…”