Celebrating Difference, Promoting Equality:

Towards a Framework for lntercultural

Education in Irish Classrooms

Neil Haran and Roland Tormey

This Report was produced by the Celebrating Difference Project, a joint project of the Targeting Educational Disadvantage Programme and the Centre for Educational Disadvantage Research, at the Curriculum

Development Unit, Mary Immaculate College, Limerick.

Acknowledgements The Celebrating Diffe rence Pro ject is a joint project of the Targeting Educational Disadvantage Programme (TED) and

the Centre for Educational Disadvantage Research (CEDR), at the Curriculum Development Unit, Mary Immaculate College, Limerick. The project is managed by Ann Higgins and Roland Tormey. Neil Haran is the Project Officer.

Our thanks are due to many people who contributed to the development of this project through their advice and support.

We would like to acknowledge, in particular, the contribution of: • The Principal and staff of Holy Family Senior Primary School, Station Road, Ennis, Co. Clare;

•The Principal and staff of St. Kieran 's Boys National School, Galvone, Limerick; • The Principal and staff of St. Lelia's National School , Kileely, Limerick;

•The Principal and staff of St. Patrick's Infants National School , Gardiner's Hill , Cork; •The Principal and staff of St. Senan's National School , Templeshannon, Enniscorthy, Co. Wexford .

This report was designed and printed by Snap Printing, Limerick. Editorial assistance was provided by Christine Farget and Fiona O 'Connor.

The project has received funding assistance from the HEA Targeted Initiatives Scheme.

Published by Centre for Educational Disadvantage Research and Curriculum Development Unit

Mary Immaculate College, Limerick

Copyright © Centre for Educational Disadvantage Research , Curriculum Development Unit and the Authors, 2002.

'Fruits' © 1994 Opal Palmer Adisa taken from A CARIBBEAN DOZEN. Reproduction by permission of Walker Books Ltd., London.

'All the Ones They Call Lowly' © 1994 David Campbell taken from A CARIBBEAN DOZEN. Reproduction by permission of W alker Books Ltd., London.

Fruits by Opal Palmer Adisa

mangoes and ripe bananas

jelly coconut and pomegranates

jack-fruit and stinking-toe

june plum and nase-berry

sweetsop and sour-sop

tamarind and jimbeli cane-juice

and coolie-plum star-apple

and custard apple navel orange

and wild cherries

fruits everywhere brimming with life spread out in front of market women

buy some and experience delight

_. ;; t

All the Ones They Call Lowly by David Campbell

Garter snake, garter snake, you hurt no one; You move on so gracefully through the grass. Garter snake, garter snake, I'll be your friend

And not run away as you pass.

Grasshopper, grasshopper hopping so high Away from our crazy feet close to you;

Grasshoppe r, grasshopper, I'll be your friend ; I wish I could hop as high as you .

Speckled frog, speckled frog, I like you r pad; I don't believe I'll catch warts from you .

Speckled frog, speckled frog, I'll be your friend ; Why should I be frightened of you?

W riggly worm, wriggly worm, get back inside -A robin is waiting to take you home;

Wriggly worm, wriggly worm, I'll be your friend ; Above ground you 'll be not alone.

All t he ones that they do call lowly, That do no harm to you or me -

Each will be my secret buddy On grass and water, sand and t ree .

Both poems are taken from A Caribbean Dozen: Poems from Caribbean Poets, edited by John Agard and Grace Nichols ( 1996) and published by Walker Books, London .

. . . the more people who are on the margins the weaker is the centre ... we all have a stake in building a future which respects and celebrates diversity - a generous sharing Ireland that encompasses many traditions and cultures and creates space for all its people.

President Mary McAleese, 24 Febuary 2000 (quoted in Maclachlan and O'Connell , 2000: I)

CHAPTER I - INTRODUCTION : ; >

Why write this Book?

Opal Palmer Adisa is a poet from the Caribbean island of Jamaica while David Campbell is a songwriter and poet from Guyana in South America. Doing intercultural education sometimes means choosing material from all parts of the world - material like these poems.What you see in a poem depends in part on what you bring to it and how you read it. Here is what these poems say to us.

In the poem Fruits, the poet describes the richness and the excitement that is in her home place. The poem presents a positive view of growing up on her island. Some of the fruits, like bananas, are ones we know in Ireland, not because they grow here, but because we import them. The fruit is, therefore, also about the interconnection between her island and our own. In our supermarkets we can choose 'fair trade' bananas, or 'non-fair trade' bananas. Depending on which we choose, the connection between here and there is either fair or unfair. Recently, a student teacher pointed out to one of us that the poem is also about the value of diversity - how great it is to have a choice. The presence in our lives of a diversity of fruits, or clothes or music or attitudes and values adds to the richness of our lives.

In the poem All the Ones They Call Lowly the poet feels a connection with those who are shunned, ignored or misunderstood. He doesn't believe in stereotypes such as 'frogs give you warts', or 'a ll snakes are dangerous'. He feels for those who are in danger from attack or are simply ignored. He never says he feels sorry for them, but he does feel a connection with them. Maybe the poet is imagining himself as a child (the words chosen seem to suggest so). Maybe the child feels that he too, like a grasshopper, is sometimes ignored by big people or misunderstood, like the frog. Maybe that is why he does not want to inflict the same on anyone else.

This publication comes out of two core beliefs. They are (a) that the breadth of human diversity enriches us all, and (b) that injustice to one is a cost to all. John Donne puts it more eloquently: "No man is an Island ... any man's death diminishes me because I am involved in Mankind". Together, these two beliefs - celebrating difference and promoting equality - form the core of what we call either intercultural or critical multicultural education (we will use the terms interchangeably, for reasons we will explain later) . This type of education is currently being promoted in Ireland by a range of bodies including teaching unions and the Department of Education and Science.

We feel that Ireland today needs a framework for doing intercultural education. The changes in Irish society in recent years have highlighted that Ireland is not a mono-cultural society. Some would argue that it never was. Cultural diversity is not, therefore , something we can ignore. Nor can we ignore injustice or discrimination. There is plenty of evidence that some groups do not get to avail of their rights in Ireland. Education is part of how we address this problem. Our primary school curriculum identifies that both these things are an issue for school children when it includes among its aims and objectives the intention that children should develop a respect for others' rights, and when it states that it should enable children to develop a respect for cultural difference (Ireland, I 999a: 34 - 36). However, despite the positive intention, it is not immediately clear to many people how these twin aims can be achieved through the curriculum.While we have recently witnessed the development of packs in this area (by Pavee Point [Murray and O'Doherty, 200 I]. by the Irish National Teachers Organisation [2002]), and by the Department of Education and Science (2002) we feel that in Ireland at the moment the full range of the international learning on these issues has not been made available to teachers. What are ou r aims and objectives for children's learning? How are we to teach these issues? What are the potential pitfalls and how can they be overcome? How do we ensure that interculturalism becomes integrated across the curriculum and not simply another 'add-on' to what often feels like an already overloaded curriculum? All of these questions have been addressed in other countries over the last forty years or so.

The lack of a debate on cultural difference in Ireland since the foundation of the state means that we are playing catch­up in this area. The debates and discussions that have taken place in the UK, the US and other countries for the last forty years have only begun to take place in Ireland in recent times. This provides us with an amazing opportunity to learn from other people's successes and failures . We need to take that opportunity or else we condemn ourselves to repeat the errors of the past.

Contents and Structure

In this book we outline a framework for the integration of cross-curricular, critical multicultural and intercultural teaching practices in Irish classrooms. The framework is the outcome of an extensive review of the English-language international literature concerning multicultural, intercultural and antiracist education, and of consultation with a range of bodies involved in promoting respect and inclusion and reducing prejudice both in Ireland and abroad.The framework and the debates concerning education are detailed in chapters four and five of this book. Some readers may want to skip ahead to these chapters immediately; however, we feel that the discussions on the changing nature of Ireland which are contained in chapters two and three will be of great benefit to any teacher developing their own intercultural

education work and cannot, therefore, be ignored. This report is intended as a companion to Celebrating Difference, Promoting Equality - lntercultural Education in .t~e. Irish Primary Classroom, which describes how a group of Irish teachers sought to apply the ideas within this book to their o'lv'.n teaching over the course of a year. Together, they describe both the theory and the practice of intercultural education.

In this publication we cover a variety of core topics relevant to the development of this framework. In chapter two, we place the development of this framework within the socio-economic, political and educational contexts in Ireland. We highlight that Ireland is a changing society, and a society in which many individuals and cultural and ethnic groupings experience exclusion and racism at both institutional and personal levels. We explore educational policy in this regard and emphasise the need for the education system to respond to the issues of diversity and racism.

In chapter three we explore the changing sense of what it means to be Irish, while also looking at the changes in the way in which belonging has been understood by researchers working in this area. A range of approaches are considered in order to highlight the contested nature of the debate in this field and in order to facilitate readers in engaging in these debates . In chapter four we examine the development of multicultural , intercultural and antiracist education practices in other countries. We explore issues such as the rationale for these practices, their aims, perceptions of them and criticisms that have emerged from their evaluation over time. We also take time to identify some of the barriers/challenges to teachers' adoption of these practices in their teaching.

In chapter five we examine and identify the principles that should underpin effective intercultural, multicultural or antiracist education and highlight some models of good practice that have been identified during this research process. Finally, we present a model or framework for the Irish context and highlight the manner in which this framework needs to be developed and piloted.

Limitations

While the development of this framework is an innovative and much-needed development in Irish education, it is important to highlight the limitations of this piece of work. In developing this framework, we focused largely on the primary context. While much of the material in this report applies equally to primary and post-primary contexts, a primary-level bias will sometimes be evident.

Secondly, this framework focuses exclusively on individual teachers in their respective classrooms. However, individual teachers need to be viewed within the context of their schools, while schools need to be viewed within the context of overall national educational policy and practice. We do not present a framework for the development of whole-school or national educational policies to address racism. It is clear, however, that the efforts of individual teachers to address racism and promote cultural diversity in their respective classrooms are likely to be seriously challenged if they are not matched by compatible whole-school and national educational policies. Consequently, there is a need for parallel developments in the area of whole-school planning and national education policy if the issues of multiculturalism, interculturalism and antiracism are to be addressed in a meaningful way in Irish schools.

Similarly, it is important to recognise that the education system is but one of many influential institutions in our society. As will be highlighted below, racism is a complex issue and antiracist action must, therefore, match the complexity of the problem. Teachers, schools and the education system as a whole can only play one part in a process to address racism that must include all social, economic and political institutions and systems in this country. In the words of Gillborn: "In isolation ... no field of social policy can eradicate racism from society: racism gains strength from too many quarters simply to be 'taught out of existence'" ( 1995: 2) . Notwithstanding this, school can: "make its distinctive contribution by tackling the intellectual and moral basis of racism that is amenable to and indeed falls within its purview" (Parekh, 1986: 31).

Net immigration (i .e . the balance between inward and outward migration) reached an historic highpoint of 26,300 in 200 I. Returning Irish nationals continue to be the J~rg,est immigrant group (between 1995 and 2000 they accounted for 50 per cent of immigration). In that period US nationals represented 7 per cent of immigrants compared with 18 per cent for the UK and 13 per cent for the remainder of the EU. Immigrants who are nationals of other countries (including Australia, Canada and New Zealand) accounted for 12 per cent of immigrants during that period (Department of Justice Equality and Law Reform, 2002: 9) .

Ireland is increasingly becoming a country that is attracting foreign nationals to its shores and a growing number of cultural and ethnic groups are visible in the country. These include asylum seekers applying for refugee status in Ireland. In fact, the numbers of individuals seeking asylum in Ireland has risen quite dramatically in the last decade, from just 39 applications in 1992 to I 0,920 in 2000 (National Consultative Committee on Racism and lnterculturalism, 200 I; United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, 200 I) . The following graph illustrates these significant increases.

Asylum Applicants in Ireland 1992 - 2000

12000 l 10000

- ------i 10920

Ill 8000 ...

c: ~ v c.. 6000 . c..

<( 4630

4000 .

2000 1179

0 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000

Year

These asylum seekers have come from a range of different countries, including Nigeria, Romania, Moldova, the Russian Federation, Croatia, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Lithuania and Poland (United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, 2002: 14). Even the range of countries of origin does not show the extent of diversity among asylum seekers: on its own, a country like Nigeria is home to over two hundred separate ethnic groups, languages and cultures.

This growth in the number of foreign migrants has become a contentious issue in Ireland.Terms, such as ' legal ' and 'i llegal immigrants', ' refugees ' and 'asylum seekers' and 'economic migrants' have come to the forefront in public attention, and debates on these issues have received much negative media coverage. Interestingly, while the number of asylum seekers and refugees entering Ireland is significant in absolute terms, in relative terms the number remains quite small both by national and international standards. The total cumulative number (29,241) of asylum seekers between 1992 and 2000, for example , represented only 0.76 per cent of Ireland's total population at this time.This figure probably overstates the size of this group, since a substantial proportion of these will have had their applications turned down by the Irish Department of Justice, Equality and Law Reform and will have been repatriated.

While a great deal of media attention has focused on the numbers of refugees and asylum seekers coming to Ireland, the last few years have also seen a significant number of people coming to Ireland on working visas. During the boom years around the recent turn of the century, significant labour shortages developed which had a negative impact on economic growth. Although the EU allows for free movement of people , the number of workers from EU countries was not sufficient to meet the economy's labour needs. As a result, work visas were issued to non-EU citizens to fill specified jobs. In the year 2000 about 18,000 work visas were issued.This figure rose to over 36,000 in 200 I .Apart from EU citizens living in Ireland, significant numbers of migrant workers have come to Ireland from countries such as Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, the Philippines, South Africa and the Czech republic (Regan and Tormey, 2002).

CHAPTER 2 - DIVERSITY AND EQUALITY IN IRELAND : .: , Why do we need to focus on multicultural or intercultural education in Ireland? Given that only a small proportion of our population is not settled and white, a focus on celebrating diversity and promoti ng equality may seem premature. What diversity do we have to celebrate? This chapter addresses these issues. Since interculturalism is also about promoting equality, it is necessary to look at the extent to which inequal ity is an issue in Irish society. This chapter therefore explores the extent of economic inequality in contemporary Ireland. This chapter focuses on Ireland at the beginning of the new millennium and highlights some of the economic, so cial and pol itical issues that have the potential to influence the development of multiculturalism and antiracism in this country. Economic Growth and In e quality The Irish economy in recent years enjoyed one of its healthiest periods since the foundati on of the state. The state experienced a period of sustained and unprecedented economic growt h, placing Ireland among th e top 20 wealthiest and most developed nations in the world (United Nations Development Programme, 200 I: 141 ). The National Development Plan 2000 - 2006 (Ireland, I 999b: 25) identified that the country had at that time a substant ial budget surplus. While the extent of budgetary surplus has declined since then, it is still e nvisaged that Ireland will continue to grow economically in the next few years. In the early years of the new century the country was experiencing almost full employment, while GNP per head represented 88 per cent of the EU average compared to 79 per cent in 1994. The buoyancy of the Irish economy brought substantial changes to the quality of life experienced by Irish citizens. The Combat Poverty Agency (200 I: 9) notes that practically all sections of Irish society are better off in absolute terms, a point reflected in the steady fall in the number of people experiencing consistent poverty in Ireland.The data on poverty from 2000 shows that 6.2 per cent of Irish households experienced consistent poverty compared to a figure of 15. I per cent in 1994. During this period the reduction of poverty was also identified as a key aim of Government policy. A National AntiPoverty Strategy outlining how Government policy would tackle poverty in Irish society was put in place in 1997 (Ireland, 1997). The Government in 2001-2002 reviewed this strategy and its key targets. Under this plan, the Government aims to reduce consistent poverty to a maximum of 2 per cent (Department of Social, Community and Family Affairs, 2002). However, despite this strategy, it is quite apparent that certain sectors of society have benefited from the boom years more than others. A substantial proportion of Irish society still lives in relative poverty (which is to say they are precluded from having a standard of living considered the norm for Irish society generally). In fact, research indicates that the gap between rich and poor in Ireland is increasing. For instance, the Combat Poverty Agency (2000: I) highlights, based on 1997 data, that 22 per cent of the population lives on less than 50 per cent of average national household income and this represents an increase in the number of people experiencing relative poverty in Ireland since 1994. The United Nations Development Programme has pointed out that the richest I 0 per cent of the Irish population is I I times richer than the poorest I 0 per cent (Irish Times, 24th July 2002). Indeed, "the richest I 0 per cent of the population received 25 per cent of the budget giveaways during the five years of the [ 1997 -2002] Government, while the poorest 20 per cent received under five per cent" (Irish Times 17th April 2002). It is worthwhile putting the Irish situation in an international context.Alongside the well known Human Development Index, the United Nations Development Programme also uses a Human Poverty Index which is essentially a measure of 'quality of life' and is based on the extent to which people are poor or rich in longevity, knowledge and standard of living. When human poverty is measured, Ireland fares poorly as compared to other developed countries. In a list of seventeen developed countries, Ireland is listed in second last place (United Nations Development Programme, 2002). The countries at the head of the list include Sweden, Norway, the Netherlands, Finland and Denmark. Ireland is in sixteenth place, between the UK in fifteenth place and the US in seventeenth.As Cantillion et al. have recently noted: Inequality is one of the hallmarks of Irish society. Our recent prosperity has not benefited all but has, in fact, marginalised and excluded asizeable part of our population including the long-term unemployed, single parents, Travellers, early-school leavers, small farmers and the elderly (200 I: xxxv). Social Transformations Economic change in Ireland came at a time when the country was also undergoing a substantial social makeover. Indeed, the two are related, since the first played a part in the latter. In 200 I, the country's population stood at 3.84 million, its highest point in 120 years (Central Statistics Office, 200 I) . In the year to April 200 I, 25,700 more people were born than died, the largest natural increase since 1988. Equally staggering is the fact that emigration for the same period stands at less than 20,000 compared to a high of 70,000 in the late 1980s.

Cultural Diversity in Ireland -A New Phenomenon?

Despite the relatively small numbers involved, th~re ' is certainly an increased visibility of cultural and ethnic diversity in Ireland as a result of the growing number of foreign nationals residing in the country. This has meant that cultural diversity has recently been highlighted as an issue. However, it is arguable that Ireland has long had diverse cultures present and that this diversity has not always been recognised.

Writing in the early part of the twentieth century, George Bernard Shaw identified that the Irish were drawn from series of immigrations over the centuries. For Shaw, a "genuine typical Irishman" is born of"Danish, Norman, Cromwellian and (of course) Scotch invasions" (Shaw, 1929: viii) . Despite this undoubted historical diversity of origins, in the public imagination Ireland has been understood as being based primarily on a Gaelic/Celtic heritage. More broadly, it has been generally accepted until recently that contemporary Ireland was a mono-cultural society in which people had a strong attachment to the land (Mac Laughlin , 1995) and shared a heritage that was 'Catholic and Gaelic' (Tovey and Share, 2000: 286) .

Yet Ireland has always been a home to those who did not fit these descriptions. The largest cultural minority grouping in Ireland has long been the Travelling community. There are an estimated 25,000 Travellers in Ireland, while a further 15,000 Irish Travellers live in Britain (Pavee Point, 2002). The 1983 Travelling People Review Body (quoted in Ireland I 995a: 71) describe Travellers as: ... an identifiable group of people, identified both by themselves and by other members of the community . .. as people with their own distinctive life style, traditionally of a nomadic nature but not now habitually wanderers. They have needs, wants, and values which are different in some ways from those of the settled community.

Maclaughlin ( 1995: 14) points out that nomadic groups, such as Gypsies and Romanies, have been found in many European and Indian societies since the fifth century.Although distinct from these nomadic groups, Irish Travellers share with them a nomadic culture.As McDonagh points out ( 1994: 95-96), nomadism "entails a way of looking at the world , a different way of perceiving things, a different attitude to accommodation, to work and to life in general". He points out that what makes a Traveller a Traveller is not travel as such - many 'settled' people move more in any given week than Travellers do - it is a nomadic mindset. As Maclaughlin points out ( 1995: 23) the focus on ownership of, and rights to, property in western societies means that nomads are often seen simply as propertyless and poor, rather than reflecting a valid culture in their own right.The report of the Government's 1995 Task Force on the Travelling Community (Ireland, I 995a: 71) noted that: It is clear that the Traveller community's culture is distinct and different. 'Settled' people generally recognise the difference but fail to understand it as cultural difference. This is a phenomenon, characteristic of many societies, where the majority culture sees itself as holding a universal validity or norm in relation to values, meanings and identity.

Travellers are not the only historic minority in Irish society.According to McVeigh, in 1996 - before the recent growth in immigration - there were 45,000 people of colour in Ireland, north and south (McVeigh and Lenin , 2002: 23) . The island of Ireland also contains a diversity of religious groups. In 1991, only 75 per cent of the population of the island of Ireland were Catholic (Tovey and Share, 2000: 315). Narrowing the focus to the Republic of Ireland in 1991 , 92 per cent of people described themselves as Roman Catholic, 3.2 per cent described themselves as Protestant, of which 2.5 per cent described themselves as belonging to the Church of Ireland, 2.4 per cent described themselves as having no religion , 1.9 per cent did not state a religion . Other religions, including Muslims, Jews, and Jehovah's Witnesses each accounted for a fraction of one per cent (Central Statistics Office, 2002). Yet this snapshot does not represent the historic extent of religious diversity in Ireland, since the numbers of some religious groups in Ireland have been in decline. The percentage of the population of the state who are Protestant fell from a figure of I 0.4 per cent in 191 I to 7.4 per cent in 1926. This figure continued to fall until the 1991 low point of 3.2 per cent. The number of Jewish people living in the state has also fallen. Between 191 I and 1945 the number of Jewish people in the state stayed at about 3,800 people. Thereafter it fell to the 1991 low point of 1,581 people (0.04 per cent of the population) .

Overall then, we can see that the traditional sense of lrishness as being settled, Catholic and Celtic/Gaelic is one that was always questionable as a description of Ireland. Lentin, for example, argues that it was always na·1ve to describe Ireland as mono-cultural. "Ireland has been multi-ethnic for a long time now", she writes (2000: 5). Alongside the evidence in support of this position, the evidence also makes clear that ethnic minorities have historically made up a small percentage of Irish people. In recognising that the traditional view of what it means to be Irish was too narrow a description to be applied to all Irish people, we also need to identify that it describes a culture to which many people feel a strong connection.

The recent changes in Irish society have not necessarily been responsible for us becoming multicultural, but they have given rise to an opportunity for the concept of'lrishness' to be explored.This in turn provides a context for a re-thinking of what it means to be Irish, in the past, in the present and in the future.

Yet before we embark on that task, it is worth noting that the traditional view of lrishness is one that has had profound implications for minorities living in Ireland. Lentin argues that the way in which lrishness was understood has excluded many Irish people (2000: 5) and also relates the emigration of young Irish Jews to their being made to feel that they do not really belong here . She cites the example of one young Irish-Jewish woman who told her: " I am fourth generation

Irish born. How can I be more Irish other than being Catholic?" (2002: 157-158). In a similar way, the idea that ' Irish' means 'settled' has meant that there has been little accommodation for what is distinctive in Traveller culture in Irish society. Therefore, before going on to look in mo; e detail at how 'lrishness' is being rethought, we will look at the problem of racism in Irish society. ·

Racism in Contemporary Ireland

The term racism is defined by the UN International Convention on all Forms of Racist Discrimination ( 1969) (quoted by National Consultative Committee on Racism and lnterculturalism: 200 I) in the following terms: Any distinction, exclusion, restriction or preference, based on race, colour, descent, national or ethnic origin, which has the purpose of modifying or impairing the recognition, the enjoyment or exercise on an equal footing of human rights and fundamental freedom in the political, economic, social, cultural, or any other field of public life constitutes racial discrimination.

Other definitions of racism identify that racism is based on an ideology of superiority/inferiority: Racism is the belief that some 'races' are superior to others - based on the false idea that different physical characteristics (like skin colour) or ethnic background make some people different from others (Edinburgh City Council, Education Department cited in National Consultative Committee on Racism and lnterculturalism, 2000).

More detailed explanations of racism offered by various social scientists over the last twenty years have tended to concentrate on two specific aspects, namely:

• individual racism • institutional racism.

We will look at these in turn.

Individual racism

Individual racism is often manifested in stereotypes about difference and inferiority (The Commission on the Future of a Multi-Ethnic Britain 2000: 63), "implying a position of ignorance , an irrational hatred or fear of another [identity] group " (Gillborn 1995: 5). In his national study of prejudice and tolerance in Ireland, Micheal Mac Greil ( 1996: 131 - 154) found that in the late 1980s there was a significant minority of Irish people who expressed racist views. 16.7 per cent of his national sample said that Black people could never become as good Irish people as others because of their basic make up, I 0.8 per cent believed that Black people were inferior to White people , while 7.5 per cent held that Black and White people we re not, by nature, equal. More depressingly, he found that many Irish people , while not expressing overtly racist views, wanted to avoid close contact with Black people . For example, when asked if an American person would be welcome into the family, 78.6 per cent said that they would welcome a White American , while only 26.2 per cent would welcome a Black American. In a similar fashion , 95.6 per cent said they would have White Americans as a next door neighbour, but only 59 per cent said they would similarly welcome Black Americans. Mac Greil concludes that these figures "make depressing reading and highlight the level of racialist prejudice in our society ( 1995: 151 ).

Increasingly, attention is being drawn to the fact that many people living in Ireland experience racism on an ongoing basis. A survey car ried out by the African Refugee Network in Dublin found that a third of refugees had experienced verbal or physical abuse, and in 2000 The Sunday Independent noted 27 racially-motivated, unprovoked attacks in just the first three months of the year (Amnesty International Irish Section, 200 I). In July of 200 I, Amnesty International urged the Irish government to show leadership in tackling racism before Ireland witnesses the levels of racist violence seen in other countries (The Irish Times, 26th July 200 I). In January 2002 a 29-year-old Chinese man , Zhao Liu Tao, was attacked and beaten to death by youths who hurled racial abuse at him.As McVeigh and Lentin note , this attack "marked a terrible new phase in the evolution of racism and antiracism in Ireland" (2002: I) . They note that this attack is not an isolated incident: The attacks have included a brutal kicking along a busy Dublin street of Mary, a pregnant asylum-seeker from Angola (who had given birth in June 1998 to an Irish child); a stabbing in May 1998 by a gang of youths as they walked along O'Connell Street; and an assault in April 1998 with a smashed bottle by a group of youths not far from the city centre Halfpenny Bridge against a I 7-year old Zairean asylum-seeker Landeau, whose political prisoner mother had died in jail and whose father was assassinated before his eyes (2002: 4).

In a survey of ethnic minority attitudes in Ireland, 78 per cent of more than 600 respondents from a variety of ethnic minorities living all over Ireland highlighted that they had been a victim of racism, most often in public places like the street o r in shops or pubs, and over 80 per cent of the sample tended to agree that racism is a serious problem in contemporary Ireland (Loyal and Mulcahy, 200 I) .

Travellers also experience individual racism in Ireland.The Government's Task Force on the Travelling Community noted: Discrimination at the individual level is most common when a Traveller seeks access to any of a range of goods, services and facilities, to which access is denied purely on the basis of their identity as Travellers . Examples abound of public houses refusing to serve Travellers, hotels refusing to book Traveller weddings, bingo halls barring Traveller women, leisure facilities barring access to Travellers, and insurance companies refusing to provide motor insurance cover. This experience can also include physical and

Reviews of the Irish media and of Irish public comment have found a tendency to use racist sentiments, identifying Travellers as being inferior to other Irish people. Jo,urnalists such as the Sunday lndependent's Mary Ellen Syn on and Brendan O 'Connor (O'Connell, 2002:54-55) and the Irish Times' Kevin Myers (Lentin, 2002: 161) have been identified as authors of racist views. O'Connell cites, for example, the Sunday Independent which in 1996 carried an article by Mary Ellen Synon headed "Time to get tough on tinker terror "culture"", which described Travellers as living: ... a life worse than the life of beasts, for beasts at least are guided by wholesome instinct. Traveller life is without the ennobling intellect of man or the steadying instinct of animals.

Such racist rhetoric is not only found in journalists.A number of authors (O'Connell, 2002; Maclachlan and O'Connell, 2000) have identified anti-Traveller sentiment from public representatives also. O'Connell (2002: 55), for example, describes how in 1996, a Fianna Fail Councillor at a Waterford County Council Meeting is reported to have said: The sooner the shotguns are at the ready and these Travelling people are put out of the country the better. They are not our people, they aren't natives.

Harvey (2002: 41) notes that the European Union research body Eurobarometer sees Ireland as a 'passively tolerant' society with about 50 per cent of people neither wanting government action against racism, nor wanting members of ethnic minorities assimilated or sent home. Only around 13 per cent of Irish people had very negative attitudes towards minorities. He goes on: Support for the outlawing of discrimination against minorities is very low in Ireland, 24%, the lowest in the [European] Union, as is support for promoting equality at all levels of social life, 31 %, also the lowest. .. Irish people are, compared to other European, more prepared to welcome Muslims and people from eastern and central Europe, but less sympathetic to people fleeing human rights abuses or situations of conflict.Asked whether they feel that minorities enrich our cultural life, only 32% of Irish people say yes, compared to 50% of all Europeans. The Eurobarometer survey found a sharp hardening of attitudes to minorities between 1997 and ... 2000.

Institutional Racism

While individual prejudice and attacks are part of racism, they are not all of racism. McVeigh and Lentin quote Stokely Carmichael who graphically illustrates this: Racism is both overt and covert. It takes two closely related forms: individual whites acting against individual Blacks, and acts by the total white community against the Black community. We call these individual racism and institutional racism .. . When white terrorists bomb a Black church and kill Black children, that is an act of individual racism, widely deplored by most segments of society. But when in the same city 500 Black babies die each year because of the lack of proper food, clothing, shelter and thousands more are destroyed or maimed physically, emotionally and intellectually because of conditions of poverty and discrimination, that is a function of institutional racism (2002: 7).

Institutional racism refers to racist structures in society (Epstein 1993: 15) and to the social exclusion and marginalisation of particular identity groups because of their ethnic, cultural and/or class backgrounds. Institutional racism may be obviously unfair; however, it is not always so. On the surface of it things identified as institutionally racist may have the appearance of fairness because the same rules and regulations are applied to everyone; however, when one recognises that the rules , in effect, benefit some groups more than others, one can see why they are identified as institutionally racist. Such a situation is called indirect racism. Epstein cites the example of a school that, because it is oversubscribed, offers places first to children who have a sibling there. She notes that this common enough situation: .. . is likely to disadvantage black children in areas where there have been relatively recent influxes of black people. It is unlikely that such a practice would have originated from the prejudiced intention of reducing the numbers of black pupils, but this will be the effect. It is practices such as these that are defined as 'indirect racism' ( 1993: 15).

According to The Commission on the Future of a Multi-Ethnic Britain (2000: 75) institutional racism includes: • indirect discrimination • a lack of positive action to promote equality • a lack of professional expertise or training in dealing with diversity in the organisation • a lack of systematic data gathering on the impact of policies on minority groups • a lack of workable facilities for consultation and listening to minority groups.

For Murray and O 'Doherty institutional racism is recognisable by its outcomes: Institutional racism occurs where the activities, practices, policies or laws of an institution lead, intentionally or unintentionally, to less favourable outcomes for minority ethnic groups. (200 I: 40)

Institutional racism is therefore closely, though not exclusively, linked to issues of poverty, underachievement within systems such as education and employment, inequality of opportunity, and the use of power to assimilate, discriminate and subjugate (Gillborn 1995: 5, The Commission on the Future of a Multi-Ethnic Britain 2000: 63) .

The report of the Government's Task Force on the Travelling Community identifies that institutional discrimination against Travellers is practised in Ireland through ~hre,e mechanisms: • Procedures and Practices can reffect a lack of acceptance ofTravelle(s culture and identity and can involve controls placed on

Travellers in excess of those placed on members of the 'Settled' community in similar circumstances • Travellers can be segregated in the provision of various services. Segregation is an imposed setting apart of a group.

Segregation is therefore different from provision which is designed to advance positive resourcing and affirmative action policies, where participation is by choice.

• Legislation, policy making and provision can be developed without account being taken of their potential impact on a minority cultural group such as the Travellers. In this way, policy and practice can develop in a manner that only reffects the 'Settled' community's culture and identity and can therefore be inappropriate for the Traveller community. The nomadic way of life, though not being named, is marginalised, as resources and services which are provided are inappropriate to this aspect of the Traveller culture and identity. (Ireland, I 995a: 80)

Institutional racism can stem from those who have power in institutions ignoring the different ways of life of people. In this respect, treating everyone the same is not the same as treating them equally. The Commission on The Future of Multi-Ethnic Britain notes, one of the fundamental beliefs of a good society is that: Since citizens have different needs, equal treatment requires full account to be taken of their differences. When equality ignores relevant differences and insists on uniformity of treatment, it leads to injustice and inequality; when differences ignore the demands of equality, that results in discrimination. Equality must be defined in a culturally sensitive way and applied in a discriminating but not discriminatory manner (2000: ix)

McDonagh ( 1994: 99-108) has identified that evidence of institutional racism against Travellers can be found in government policy concerning Travellers from the 1960s to the 1990s. During the 1960s, Ireland's policy focus was on assimilating Travellers into the Settled population, and on denying them opportunities to travel. He cites the boulders and trenches which are designed to prevent Travellers from stopping on roadsides, and the lack of suitable accommodation for Travellers.

He also cites evidence of indirect institutional racism against Travellers within the education system. Into the 1990s the basic educational policy of the Irish state in relation to Travellers continued to be based on the denial of a right to be nomadic and an insistence on assimilation. While other states found themselves able to provide for children whose circumstance or culture made it difficult for them to attend settled schools (radio-based instruction in the Australian outback, for example) , in Ireland, "no provision is made for meeting the educational needs of nomadic children nor ... to accommodate nomadic families" ( 1994: I 03) . Instead, it was assumed that education could only be properly offered to those based in settled accommodation, with the 1980s Report of the Travelling People Review Body warning that 'settled' Travellers ran the risk of "regression to a travelling way of life and consequential negativing of the benefits of permanent accommodation and education" (quoted in McDonagh, 1994: I 03).

Travellers are not the only Irish people who have found that Irish institutions do not reflect their culture. For example, those who are not Roman Catholic have often found it difficult to obtain suitable local education for their children since educational provision is tied so closely to the religion of the majority. Many parents from minority religious groups in Ireland have, throughout the life of the state, been forced to place their children in Catholic education because of the lack of a local realistic alternative (Inglis, 1987: 53). It is certainly worth asking whether the lack of provision which might reflect the diversity of cultures and religious groups also constitutes evidence of indirect discrimination.

The Commission in the Future of Multi-Ethnic Britain identifies that a lack of systematic data collection about the effects of policies on different ethnic groups is, in itself, evidence of institutional racism.As such, it is certainly arguable that in Ireland, significant work still needs to be undertaken in tackling such institutional racism.

There is little doubt that racism is a negative and damaging force in society. The Commission on the Future of a Multi­Ethnic Britain highlights its effects as being "deeply divisive, intolerant of differences, a source of much human suffering and inimical to the common sense of belonging lying at the basis of every stable political community" (2000: ix} . While greater attention has been drawn to the existence of racism in Ireland in recent times, it is important to highlight that racism is neither a new phenomenon nor exclusive to Ireland; it has existed and continues to exist in all countries and all societies (The Commission on the Future of a Multi-Ethnic Britain 2000: 63) .

Racism is not, and should not be, a concern only of minority cultural and ethnic groupings. While these groups are most negatively affected by being treated as in some way inferior, racism also impacts negatively on those from more powerful groups. Racism feeds these groups with a false sense of superiority and distorts their understanding of themselves and the world around them (The Swan Report 1985: 36; Siraj-Blatchford 1994: xi) . Racism is, therefore, an issue for everybody.Additionally, since racism is a complex phenomenon, "anti racist action must be of matching complexity to be at all effective against this dynamic and oppressive ideology" (Brandt 1986: 67) .

The State and lnterculturalism

The Irish state has sought to respond to racism in Ireland in a number of ways. Responses can be summarised under three specific categories - legal measures, policy measures and education and train in£' measures (Deoartment nf h1sticP.

In legal terms, provisions in the Employment Equality Act ( 1998), the Equal Status Act (2000) and the Human Rights Commission Act (2000) present Ireland with _comprehensive anti-discrimination legislation covering discrimination related to gender; marital status; family status; age; disability; race; sexual orientation; religious belief; and membership of the Traveller Community in areas such as employment, education, provision of goods, services and accommodation and disposal of property.The enactment of this equality legislation by the Government has also enabled Ireland to ratify the UN Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination.

At a policy level, equality infrastructure has been put in place to give effect to this equality legislation. The Equality Authority was set up as an independent body under the Employment Equality Act ( 1998) and was formally established on 18th October 1999. The purpose of the Authority is to ensure that the provisions outlined in the Employment Equality Act ( 1998) and the Equal Status Act (2000) are realised. Additionally, the National Consultative Committee on Racism and lnterculturalism (NCCRI) was established by the Department of Justice, Equality and Law Reform in July 1998. The committee consists of a partnership involving government departments, agencies and non-government organisations. It was created to provide an ongoing structure to develop programmes and actions aimed at developing an integrated approach against racism and to act in a policy advisory role to the government (NCCRI, 200 I ).The choice of the term ' interculturalism', rather than, for example, 'multiculturalism' is quite notable. It indicates the sort of society the Government envisages we should aim to live in: while the term multiculturalism may denote a society in which different cultures live side by side, the term interculturalism is intended to go further, denoting the "belief that we become richer persons by knowing and experiencing other cultures, that we add to our personality because of encounters with other cultures" (Exchange House Travellers Service, 2002). In 2002 a National Action Plan Against Racism in Ireland was in the preparation phase.

lntercultural Education Policy

In accordance with the changed environment in Ireland, educational policy now aims to promote and accommodate cultural diversity in its provision of educational services. The Government White Paper on Education - Charting our Education Future (I 99Sb) highlights, "The State 's concern is with a number of key considerations which should underpin the formulation and evaluation of educational policy and practice - principally, the promotion of quality, equality, pluralism, partnership and accountability" (Ireland / 995b: 3)

This promotion of equality and pluralism is rooted in the recognition of Ireland as a democracy and in the need for the education system to fulfil democratic principles: "The democratic character of this society requires education to embrace the diverse traditions, beliefs and values of its people" (Ireland I 99Sb: S). These principles are also endorsed in the Revised Primary Curriculum (I 999a) . The Curriculum recognises the diversity of beliefs, values and aspirations of all religious and cultural groupings in Irish society and acknowledges that it has a "responsibility in promoting tolerance and respect for diversity in both school and the community" (Ireland [Primary School Curriculum - Introduction]. I 999a: 28).

Since 1994 the Guidelines for the Education ofTraveller Children in National Schools have indicated that the successful integration ofTraveller children into the education system presupposed "the transmission [to all children] of appropriate knowledge , skills and attitudes with regard to the traveller community and its culture and lifestyle" ( 1994: I 3). lntercultural education is, therefore , not only or primarily an issue for ethnically mixed classrooms. It is equally important in mono-ethnic classrooms.

Revised guidelines, issued by the Department of Education and Science in 2002 reiterate this position, and note: An intercultural approach is important within the curriculum in order to help pupils to develop the ability to recognise inequality, injustice, racism, prejudice and bias and to equip them to challenge and to try to change these manifestations when t hey encounter them.Young people should be enabled to appreciate the richness of a diversity of cultures and be supported in practical ways to recognise and to challenge prejudice and discrimination where they exist (2002: 34).

It is apparent, therefore, that the Irish State has created a range of social, economic and educational policies that promote social inclusion, that recognise cultural diversity and that challenge racism.This is to be commended and must be seen as an important step in tackling the spread of racism in Ireland. However, it is evident that these policies have, to date , not resulted in a significant diminution of racist experiences for members of ethnic minority groupings. Loyal and Mulcahy (200 I) in their study of the attitudes of ethnic minorities living in Ireland found that: • 84 per cent of respondents felt that the Government was not doing enough to combat racism; • there were I SS incidents in which the respondents felt that they had experienced racism at least once from a

member of An Garda Siochana, i.e . those responsible for implementing anti-discrimination legislation; • only 14 per cent of the sample tended to agree that Gardai take racist incidents seriously; • S4 per cent do not feel confident about reporting a racist incident to a Garda; • 81 .S per cent of the sample believes that not enough is being done to educate the public about racism.

Conclusion

Ireland is now one of the richest countries in the industrialised world, and also one of the most unequal.As such, the justice issues that affect Ireland are not solely about ethnicity. Nonetheless, there are important ethnicity issues affecting Ireland. Minority groups, such as Travellers have long experienced discrimination in Irish life . More recent immigrants have also experienced discrimination, but have kick-started a debate about our diversity of cultures - a debate we could perhaps have done with many years ago, but had to live without until now. Central to this emerging debate is the question of what it means to be Irish.The traditional view of lrishness as settled, Catholic and Celtic/Gaelic has, to some extent, been fractured. Government policy now promotes a more inclusive and diverse sense of lrishness, yet the extent to which this re-thinking of who we are can be achieved is open to question. In the next chapter we look at this question of identity and lrishness.

CHAPTER 3 - RE-THINKING IDENTITY AND BELONGING IN IRELAND

When Joe Cohen, newly arrived from Cork, looks for a job with the London Jewish Sabbath Observers Employment Bureau, the receptionist asks him if he is Jewish, saying they had never met an Irish Jew before. He gets a job at Levin Brothers Ltd where, at 200, the Jewish employees number more Jews under one roof that the whole community he has lived in all his life . .. At Levins Brothers he also meets the Black packer Gary, who, when told Joe is Irish, giggles to high heaven:"Man ", he sang, his words dancing with incredulous laughter "who ever heard of an Irish Jew?" (Marcus, quoted in Lentin, 2002: 153-154).

What makes a person Irish? Is it because they carry an Irish passport or because they were born in Ireland? Must they speak Irish, drink Guinness, be Catholic, or play camogie or hurling? Must they live in Ireland, or is it enough to be one of the 40 million across the globe that allegedly claim an 'Irish identity'? (Tovey and Share, 2000: 285)

In the last chapter we identified that the traditional view of what it means to be Irish has been too restrictive to properly include many Irish people. For Irish Travellers, the idea that Irish people were settled meant that government po licies were often driven by the idea that nomadism was a problem to be eradicated rather than a culture to be catered for. For those Irish people who were not Roman Catholic, the focus on Catholicism as a key component of being Irish played a role in people not being seen as belonging in their home place. We also identified that the traditional sense of Irish culture is one that has both descri bed and catered for a substantial majority of Irish people in the past and indeed, into the present. For many Irish people their sense of belonging here is tied to this culture and, as such, many people may be unhappy about engaging in a process of re-thinking what it means to be Irish. To make sense of how we can move forward , given such apparently contradictory needs, we need to look more closely at what it means to belong.

In this chapter we look at the different ways in which researchers and writers have understood identity and belonging. We trace the changes in the ways in which identity has been understood, and identify how these changes enable us to make sense of the re-thinking of lrishness. In tracing the development of theories of identity we will look at and define terms such as race , culture and ethnicity. We also wish to show that significant debates continue to exist aro und these terms, therefore, we have avoided presenting only a single definition of these terms. This is in order to highlight the debates around terminology, and to encourage the reader to engage in these debates and to make up their own mind about the terms and how they are used. As we will make clear below, we feel it is important to encourage people to th ink, talk and make up their own mind about these issues. While we will offer our conclusions, we hope that people will engage with them, rather than simply take them as fact.

Central to all the terms which are discussed here is the question of identity.Weeks ( 1990:88) defines ' identity' as follows: "Identity is about belonging, about what you have in common with some people and what differentiates you from others. At its most basic, it gives you a sense of personal location, the stable core to your individuality. But it is also about social relationships, your complex involvement with others".

At the heart of discussions of identity is the potential tension between how a person sees themselves and how they are seen by other people. Much of the debate around terms like ' race' or 'ethnicity' has been about providing a list of criteria which might allow a person to be objectively or scientifically categorised into a racial or ethnic group (e .g Nf Shuinear, 1994). Another part of the debate has focused on the ways in which people identify themselves and the sort of subjective factors which might encourage them to identify themselves as part of a social group (e.g., Anderson, 1991 ). Jenkins ( 1996: 127) identifies these as two different kinds of processes which help to make us what we are: a process of categorisation and of identification. In many cases, it is the tension between these two things - how we are seen and how we see ourselves - that makes the issue such a controversial one.

In this chapter we will trace some of different ways in which identity has been understood. Starting in colonial times, the concept of ' race ' was used to distinguish between identity groups. It was also used to justify discrimination and exploitation.The term 'race' fell out of favour as it became increasingly apparent that the term was unable to make sense of identity groupings. While the term is still used in everyday speech most writers now argue that the term is useless in trying to distinguish between groups.

After ' race ', 'ethnicity' became the key concept, identifying that differences between identity groups were based on culture - the way of life of people - rather than on physical characteristics. Yet this new understanding also gave rise to questions, as the nature and meaning of 'culture' was considered. While culture was traditionally understood as something passed on from generation to generation, most contemporary writers see culture as something which changes , adapts and emerges anew all the time as circumstances change. Likewise, they recognise that the culture - the way of life - of different people within an identity group (an Irish solicitor and an Irish sheep farmer, for example) are likely to be different.All this means that identity groups are not easily categorised in terms of different cultures.As such, there is no inevitable link between culture and identity. How we understand who we are, and the ways of life that constitute who we are, is always changing. It is in this context that an attempt to define lrishness in intercultural terms makes sense.

'Race' and the Colonial Period ..

Given that the issues at the core of this work are often described as being about ' racism', the term 'race' is sometimes seen as central to the debate . The term 'race ' is frequently used to indicate recognisable categories within the human species. It is usually associated with physical differences, such as skin colour, facial features, bone structures, hair, height, etc, (Gillborn 1995; National Consultative Committee on Racism and lnterculturalism 200 I) ; however, some people also imply that these visible differences are associated with less visible personality traits (red-haired people are quick­tempered and so on) .

The term 'race ' was widely used during the colonial period. Kiberd ( 1996: 9-10) identifies that when Ireland was being colonised, the racial myths of the Irish as wild, hot-headed, rude and nomadic were used by the English to justify their rule as an attempt to impose order. In colonial expeditions to Asia.Africa, the Americas and the South Seas, the idea that physical characteristics could be equated with other abilities persisted. In some colonies, a hierarchy of racial groups was imposed upon the colonised people, with some being regarded as 'more European' and therefore better than others. In Ghana, for example , the colonial government described one section of the indigenous people as "an amiable, but backward people, useful as soldiers, policemen and labourers in the mines and cocoa farms ; in short fit only to be hewers of wood and drawers of water for their brothers in the colony and Ashanti" (Tormey, 1996: 266). Colonial authorities justified their colonialism with reference to a racial hierarchy which placed white Europeans at the top, those who looked most physically like white Europeans next (in Africa, north Africans and taller central Africans) and those who looked least like Europeans at the bottom of the hierarchy, close to apes. It was argued that because of their racially determined backwardness, colonialism was necessary to civilise or replace the colonised peoples. Since the idea of race was based in the science of biology, there were attempts to justify the use of the term, and justify the exploitation and genocide of the colonial period, scientifically. For example, Charles Darwin, wrote in the Descent of Man: At some future period, not very distant as measured by centuries, the civilised races of man will almost certainly exterminate, and replace, the savage races throughout the world.At the same time, the anthropomorphous apes . .. will no doubt be exterminated. The break between man and his nearest allies will then be wider, for it will intervene between man in a more civilised state, as we may hope, even than the Caucasian, and some ape as low as a baboon, instead of as now between the negro [sic] or Australian and the gorilla ( 1952: 133).

Although developed as a biological concept and consequently basing itself on some claim to scientific justification, the concept of'race' is now widely acknowledged as being of dubious descriptive value. Scientific research has identified that race cannot be used to account for a range of differences among peoples and indeed that there are as many genetic differences within ' racial' groups as between them (Epstein 1993: 13; Hylland Eriksen 1993: 6; Gillborn 1995: 3; The Commission on the Future of Multi-Ethnic Britain, 2000: 63 ; Watson 2000: 2) . While people may look different, these differences in appearance are not associated with other differences such as differences in tempe rament.A second factor in the decline in the use of the term 'race' is the recognition that widespread interbreeding of peoples around the world renders meaningless the suggestion of fixed boundaries between races (Hylland Eriksen 1993: 6) .

In the Irish context, as far back as the early years of the twentieth century, George Bernard Shaw pointed out that Irish people were descendent from a range of different groups (Celts, Vikings, Normans, English , Huguenots and so on) that had arrived in Ireland over a period of centuries. As such he describes the idea of an Irish ' race ' as the "hollowest of fictions":"There is no Irish race any more than there is a English race or a Yankee race" (Shaw, 1926: x) . Despite this, as Goldstone (2002: 171) points out, a concern with "alien penetration into Ireland" and the authenticity of Irish bloodlines continued through the 1930s and beyond. In 1934, for example , Eamonn de Valera felt compelled to defend himself against what he called the 'dirty innuendo' that he had 'Jewish blood ' in his veins.

Despite the myth of a racially pure Irish, the diversity in origin that Shaw refers to is clearly evident in the range of names which is found in Ireland, names such as Fitzgerald (Norman) , Smith (English), Tormey (Viking), Lemass (Huguenot) and so on. Genetic researchers have also demonstrated the diversity of immigrant peoples who made up the modern Irish (Irish Examiner.April 5th 2002).The Irish population as it currently stands is already the result of a long process of mixing by various immigrant groups. As such, the idea that Irish people share a Celtic origin or bloodline is clearly and demonstrably incorrect.

Although the term 'race ' continues to be used by many people in everyday speech, the term, which was originally based on a biological idea, has been demonstrated to have no basis in biology. As such, those who study identity groups have moved away from race in their search to understand identity group formation .

Irish Culture and Irish Ethnicity

In many respects, the term 'ethnicity' has taken the place of the term 'race' in debates on discrimination. While the idea of 'race' was based on biological difference, the idea of 'ethnicity' is often associated with cultural difference .As such, an ethnic group has recently been described as one whose members share "common origins, a shared sense of history, a shared culture and a sense of collective identity" (The Commission on the Future of Multi-Ethnic Britain 2000: xxiii) . (In general usage, the word 'ethnicity' is often associated with minority issues and minority cultural groups [Hylland Eriksen

1993:6], i.e., minority groups are described as 'ethnic groups'. In reality, all human beings belong to an ethnic group, and cultural majorities are no less 'ethnic' than minor_ities [Hylland Eriksen I 993:6;The Commission on the Future of Multi-Ethnic Britain 2000:xxi ii]) . · · '

Although the term 'culture' is frequently used, its nature and meaning are often debated . This in turn has implications for how we understand ethnicity. Just as with 'race', people often understand culture as something fixed that is passed on from generation to generation.Watson (2000) outlines that frequently quoted elements of culture include common language, shared history, shared religious beliefs and moral values, and a shared geographical origin, all of which taken together define a sense of belonging to a specific group. Under this understanding, then, we are Irish because we share an Irish culture.As Tovey and Share point out (2000: 286) and as we discussed in the last chapter, the specifics of what makes Irish culture Irish are often vaguely felt but not clearly identifiable. Is it drinking Guinness and eating stew? Is it attachment to a language? (If so, what language, Irish or Hiberno-English?) Is it knowing who Dana or Bosco is? Is it the experience of having gone to school in a country where almost all the schools are run by religious groups? Tovey and Share note that despite the lack of specifics as to what it is in Irish culture that is Irish, in general, at least until the 1990s, the Irish nation has often been described as Catholic and Gaelic.

We have already seen that equating Irish culture with Catholicism and Gaelicism does not properly represent the diversity that has historically been present in Ireland, nor the growing diversity in the present. This traditional view of culture is also problematic for two other reasons. First, cultures are not simply handed down from generation to generation, they change and adapt over time. Second, apart altogether from minority ethnic groups, a country like Ireland contains such a diversity of different ways of life it becomes difficult to identify it as a culture as such. We will look at these in turn .

The traditional view of culture does not pay enough attention to the way in which culture changes over time. For example, the way Irish teenagers spend their free time is likely to be different to the way their parents spent their time as teenagers. Many Irish people also now have access to a wide variety of food types that would not have been widely available only twenty years ago (fresh pasta, pesto, a range of types of Italian, Indian, Mexican and French breads, a wide range of curries, chillies, as well as the development of new Irish farmhouse cheeses and so on). Language also changes as new words, phrases or ways of speaking enter the vocabulary. Values also change over time (see the various contributors to Whelan, [ 1994], discussed below). Culture, then, cannot be seen as something that is passed on or inherited from generation to generation. It develops in specific places and at specific times. Watson (2000: I 09) , therefore, dismisses the traditional view, describing culture as a process: of the constant adaptation of people to historical circumstances which requires them, as a condition of their own survival, to engage sympathetically with new ways of understanding the world and responding to it.

The second problem with the traditional view of culture is that it seems to suggest that each society has only one culture. In fact, such sets of beliefs, values, norms and practices are numerous in any given society. For example, the way of life of the people who wrote this report, perhaps also their values and beliefs, are likely to be very different from that of a hill farmer in the Cooley peninsula, yet we are all Irish .A number of studies of Irish attitudes show such difference . Micheal Mac Greil 's ( 1996) study of prejudice and tolerance in Ireland found that across a range of measures, the attitudes of Dublin respondents were significantly different to those of the national sample. He also found differences across a range of indicators such as age, education level and social class. Hornsby-Smith and Whelan ( 1994), found significant differences in religious practices and attitudes in Ireland between urban and rural areas, different age groups and different social class groups. Indeed, the Irish educational literature has in recent years shown a growing recognition of the diversity of cultures present within the settled, white Catholic population. For example , some of the literature in Ireland (e.g. The Conference of Major Religious Superiors, 1992) has emphasised that there are identifiable cultural and lifestyle differences between working class and middle class homes in language and parenting styles.

This suggests that, even without looking at minority ethnic groups, the generalisation that is called Irish culture hides a great diversity of ways of life .As Tovey and Share point out: Many sociologists have abandoned the assumption that a single dominant culture holds society together. They assume that societies are naturally diverse and ask instead how some groups can establish their own customs and values as normal, so that those of others are seen to be subcultural deviations from the norm (2000: 298)

This in turn raises questions about ethnicity. If ethnicity is seen as meaning 'a people with a shared sense of culture', then how can we have ethnic groups without a shared culture? It is interesting that this sort of issue is not raised here more often. Most of the time, most people in Ireland simply accept that, despite different lifestyles, values and beliefs, there is a core part to Irish culture that most people in Ireland share and which means that we can all be identified together as part of the same national or ethnic group.The assumption of shared culture is based on a feeling of belonging or collective identity. In identifying themselves as Irish, people notice the things which are similar for them and for other Irish people. It is not simply because we share a culture that we identify ourselves as part of a group - the two things are more intricately related . Belonging to a group affects which similarities and differences we focus on, while at the same time , similarities and differences help identify which group we can be in.

Jenkins ( 1996: 127) notes that these questions are most often asked of those at 'the boundaries', that is, those for whom their identity is open to question, either because .t.hey question it themselves, or because their own view of their identity is not the same as the view of others, or both. For those not at ,the boundary, they simply accept that they are similar to other people in the group without much questioning of what exactly is similar. For this group, he notes, their common identity is like: ... an umbrella or a mask, under or behind which the diversity and contradictions of the [different] points of view over time and across situations can co-exist without having to be perpetually in the public limelight ( 1996: 114). Ireland is a country with a great deal of diversity, yet the way in which we have traditionally thought about Ireland has made that diversity seem invisible to many people. Drudy and Lynch ( 1993: 51 - 55) describe this as 'Consensualism', saying that we have often focused on what unites us rather than on the differences within Ireland. This has often meant the hiding of difference or blaming people for being different. Drudy and Lynch also note that this idea is particularly strong in Ireland, in part because of our relatively recent colonial past and because of the perceived need to establish a strong unitary national consciousness. Yet, as we will see below, shared culture is not the only basis on which a nation can be based. To understand this, it is worth looking in more detail at how and when lrishness became linked to Catholicism and Gaelicism.

Different lrelands

You will know all too well that Ireland is a country at war with its past - or, at least, with confficting versions of its several pasts. But we are each of us in a struggle with those . .. on a much more deeply personal level than we sometimes know.

The character 'Sr. Mary Rose Kennedy' in Joseph O'Connor's lnishowen

Up to this point we have focused on the question of what makes someone Irish , that is, what makes someone fit into an identity group. It is possible to address this question differently and ask 'who is not Irish! '. Increasingly, many writers (e.g. Jenkins, 1996; Lentin, 2000: 5; Tovey and Share, 2000: 291) argue that 'who we are' and 'who we are not' both emerge at the same time and are related to each other. One example of this process is the development of the idea that Irish meant 'Catholic and Gaelic '.

As Tovey and Share point out (2000: 291 ), the association of the Irish nation with Gaelic culture and Roman Catholicism developed in the nineteenth century, at the same time as the United Kingdom sought to increasingly integrate Ireland. Ireland sought to differentiate itself from the United Kingdom by engaging in what Douglas Hyde called a process of de­Anglicising Ireland (Lyons, 1971 : 228) , and in that process Ireland became understood in terms of not-Britain (Gillespie, 1998: I I) . The defining characteristics of the Irish nation were those which distinguished 'us' from the 'other' - in this case , the coloniser. In the second half of the nineteenth century the English nation was being built around symbols such as the Anglican Church and the 'glorious literature' of the English language. Irish nationalists prioritised exactly those elements which differentiated Ireland and, in the process, lrishness became a mirror image of Britishness - where they were understood to be Protestant we were understood to be Roman Catholic, where they were seen as urban we were seen as rural, where they were regarded as descendants of Anglo-Saxon stock, we were regarded as a product of Celtic blood.

Although this idea of what it meant to be Irish has been dominant, there have always been those who argued against this position. Gillespie ( 1998) argues that there was a struggle between two competing versions of nationalism, ethnic nationalism which saw the nation as being founded around a common ethnicity, culture or 'race', and civic nationalism which saw the nation being formed around a common set of ideas. As we have already seen, in the early years of the century, writers like Shaw who insisted that Ireland be understood in broader, more inclusive terms contested such ethnic nationalism. Earlier in our history, one can also identify a difference between, fo r example, the civic nationalism of Wolfe Tone who had no time for romantic Gaelicism and who felt that the ideals of 'l iberty, equality and fraternity ' would unite Anglicans, Catholics and Presbyterians (Elliott, 1989), and the ethnic nationalism of Hyde who argued that it was only by preserving/developing a distinct culture that we could understand what was 'most racial' in ourselves and become a nation (Lyons, 1971 :228).

Each presents a different view of what it means to be Irish - one is based around shared ideals and is open and inclusive of difference. The other is based around a shared culture and can be narrowly defined and exclusive. These two views are not simply morally different, they are also different in substance. Ethnic nationalism is based on the assumption of a shared culture - an assumption that we have already seen does not make sense in modern societies such as Ireland, even if it ever did so. This suggests a logical , as well as moral imperative for focusing on a more inclusive sense of what it means to be Irish .

MovingTowards lnterculturalism

The debate over what it means to be Irish is not simply a historical phenomenon, it also carries on into the present. Gillespie ( 1998) notes that as Ireland became more actively involved with American and other European states, the sense of opposition to England becomes less important. Closer involvement with the European Union has raised the question of dual identities - both Irish and European - or even multiple identities - local , national and European. The Belfast

Agreement also raises the idea of multiple identities, envisaging that people could be both British and Irish at the same time. The experience of Irish emigration and re-immigration stretched the boundaries of Ireland and made us a global phenomenon. In particular, the changing population structure of lr;eland has kick-started a debate as to how we want to see ourselves in the future . ·

In contributing to this debate the Government has used the term 'interculturalism' to describe Ireland (in the title of the National Consultative Committee on Racism and lnterculturalism, as well as in a range of governmental documents) . As we identified in the last chapter, this means that a feeling of belonging in Ireland would not be based on belonging to a specific culture, but would instead focus on a set of values which are based on equality, tolerance, respect and willingness to engage with and learn from a diversity of cultures. Given the positive feelings which many people in Ireland have for what has been understood as being traditional Irish culture, it is likely that some people will experience the changing mindset from a 'mono-cultural' to an 'intercultural' Ireland as a 'dilution' of what has historically been understood as Irish culture, and may, therefore, resist such a change. Yet interculturalism is not an attack on 'traditional culture'. lnterculturalism envisages a variety of cultures each having equal respect within society, including the 'traditional culture'. In challenging the prioritisation of one culture within the nation at the expense of other cultures, we must remain careful not to seek to attack the dominant culture in its own right. Such iconoclasm would run counter to the spirit of interculturalism.

What might such an intercultural idea of belonging look like? The Commission on the Future of Multi-Ethnic Britain have articulated what they regard as the fundamental values which should underlie an intercultural society.These values need not be accepted in Ireland in their entirety, however they do at least provide a framework for discussing what it might mean to be a citizen in an lntercultural Ireland. They are (2000: viii-ix) : • have equal worth irrespective of their colour, gender, ethnicity, religion, age or sexual orientation and have equal claims to the

opportunities they need to realise their potential and contribute to the collective wellbeing ... • Second, citizens are not only individuals but are members of particular religious, ethnic, cultural and regional

communities ... Britain is both a community of citizens and a community of communities ... • Third, since citizens have different needs, equal treatment requires full account to be taken of their differences . When equality

ignores relevant differences and insists on uniformity of treatment, it leads to injustice and inequality ... • Fourth, every society needs to be cohesive as well as respectful of diversity, and must find ways of nurturing diversity while

fostering a common sense of belonging and a shared identity among its members. • Fi~h, although every society needs a broadly shared body of values, of which human rights are an important part, there is a

risk of defining the values so narrowly that their further development is ruled out or legitimate ways of life are suppressed. While affirming such essential procedural values as tolerance, mutual respect, dialogue and peaceful resolution of differences .. . society must also respect deep moral differences .. .

• Lastly, racism ... is an empirically false , logically incoherent and morally unacceptable doctrine . .. It can have no place in a decent society.

Conclusion

While the term 'racism' is still widely used, the base concept of' race' is now discredited by scientific research.This means that knowing what someone looks like will not tell us about his or her capacities and the ways they are likely to act. In recent times people have tended to focus more on culture as an issue, however, we cannot simply predict a person 's abilities or ways of being from their culture either, as each culture contains a good deal of diversity.We need, therefore, to treat people as individuals. Despite the diversity that exists within cultures, there is also some degree of homogeneity. Most Irish people speak English while many Irish Travellers will have a nomadic disposition. When we treat people as individuals, we must recognise them as being situated within a culture.

The power to influence social structures is the power to decide if one group's idea of what is normal is to be imposed upon everyone else. The challenge of equality is to ensure that the twin elements of human identity are recognised -our identity as an individual, and our membership of particular social groups. In the next chapter we will look at the debates within education as to how this is to be done.

CHAPTER 4 -THE CASE FOR INTERCULTURAL OR CRITICAL M.l)l,.TICULTURAL EDUCATION

' '

As chapter two identified, Ireland has always been, at some level, a society of diverse cultures, however, this fact has only recently been widely acknowledged by our society. As Chapter three identified, diversity within and across cultures is an integral part of all human societies, including Ireland. However, the consolidation of power in the hands of some groups means that this diversity can sometimes become the site of inequality. The challenge is to celebrate our human diversity while promoting equality.The question is how we can address that challenge.As a society we have come to this issue late; however, that has its benefits. Much has been tried in other countries and much has been learned about dealing with diversity and equality through education. It should, therefore, be possible to avoid re-creating the mistakes of other countries' pasts.

In this chapter we explore the existing literature on multicultural and antiracist education with a view to synthesising best practice which can them be applied to the Irish context. This chapter sets the scene for chapter five in which a framework for doing intercultural or critical multicultural education will be set out.

Multicultural Education

At its most fundamental level , the term 'multicultural' denotes the existence of many cultures in society (Brandt 1986, Watson 2000). At a deeper level , it is a philosophy that not only acknowledges but also respects and celebrates the existence of cultural diversity. Proponents see multiculturalism as egalitarian and as promoting equality of opportunity for all citizens irrespective of their cultural background. It is not simply associated with the existence of cultural pluralism in society. It is perhaps more correctly associated with the coexistence of cultures. It aims to create and foster unity, harmony and community in society. Champions of multiculturalism believe that the coexistence of culturally different peoples leads to an acceptance of the commonality of citizenship. Watson (2000: 3), for instance, suggests the need to: encourage multiculturalism in the expectation that citizens who are proud of their culture and see that culture being endorsed by the state will be anxious to join in common citizenship with members of other cultural groups to protect the liberal tolerance which is so important to them.

The development of multicultural thinking can be traced back to the 1960s. While not all countries or soc1et1es embraced this concept, its development in the USA and Britain at this time was particularly significant. Watson (2000: 5) notes that the development of multiculturalism in both societies took place against different backdrops: In the USA it was a consequence of the civil rights movement and a perception of the strong and sincere emotions which underlay the black power campaigns that liberal Americans gradually understood the importance of allowing all American citizens the space and opportunity to build a foundation for their self-respect on the bedrock of their own cultural traditions. In Britain it was the novel experience of large numbers of immigrants from countries known as the 'New Commonwealth ' who, while committed to the laws and norms of the society at large, saw no need to abandon their religious traditions or their cuisines or their languages, which led to the realisation that assimilation was not the only means of incorporating immigrants into the society and that integration offered a more practical way forward, as well as a more liberal and ethically acceptable one.

Watson highlights that the first impact of this new understanding was on schools, as the model for dealing with diversity changed. In the 1950s it had been envisaged that the best way of dealing with diversity was to ensure that ethnic minorities were assimilated into the dominant population. In practice, this mono-cultural or assimilationist approach assumed that it would be better for everyone if all children learned the customs, values and language of the majority. Educational provision for dive rsity was, therefore based on providing extra resources to ensure that minority children could learn the language and culture of the majority in order to enable them to succeed in to a school system which was based on the language and culture of the majority (Si raj-Blatchford, 1994: 68) .

The multicultural model of education, which developed in the UK and US in the late 1960s, arose as a response to the perceived weaknesses of this assimilationist model. Instead of working towards the eradication of language and cultural difference the multicultural approach focused instead on the creation of space on school curricula to explore the diversity found in both societies. This impact continued throughout the 1970s and 1980s. In Britain, for example, a substantial number of schools adopted a multicultural dimension within their curriculum from the 1970s onwards and, in particular, following the publication of the Swann Report in 1985 (Connolly and Keenan 2000: 88). (As we have seen in chapter two, throughout this time, the thrust of Irish policy towards minorities such as Travelle rs remained assimilationist.)

The multicultural education movement, as it developed in the US and UK in the 1960s, attempts to facilitate in school the range of distinctive languages and cultures that make up society and to use this cultural diversity to broaden the cultural horizons of every child. It is based, as the UK's 1981 Rampton Report states, on the premise that, "A 'good' education cannot be based on one culture only, and ... where ethnic minorities form a permanent and integral part of the population, we do not believe that education should seek to iron out the differences between cultures, nor attempt to draw everyone into the dominant culture" (cited in Epstein, 1993: 20) .

Bhikhu Parekh agrees that for education to be any good to anyone , it must be multicultural. He argues that the effects of a mono-cultural education on everyone, incluqing the child of the dominant culture, are damaging: First it is unlikely to awaken his curiosity about other societies and cultures because he is not exposed to them at all or because they are presented in uncomplimentary terms, or both ... Second, mono-cultural education is unlikely to develop the faculty of imagination. Imagination represents the ability to conceive alternatives .. . Imagination does not develop in a vacuum. It is only when one is exposed to different societies and cultures that one's imagination is stimulated ... Third, mono-cultural education stunts the growth of the critical faculty ... He judges other cultures and societies by the norms and standards derived from his own, and predictably finds them odd and worthless. And since he judges his own society in terms of its own norms, he can never take a genuinely critical attitude to it. .. Fourth, mono-cultural education tends to breed arrogance and insensitivity ... Fi~h, mono-cultural education provides a fertile ground for racism. Since a pupil knows very little about other societies and cultures, he can only respond to them in terms of superficial generalisations and stereotypes. Multi-cultural education is therefore an education in freedom - freedom from inherited biases and narrow feelings and sentiments, as well as freedom to explore other cultures and perspectives and make one's own choices in full awareness of available and practicable alternatives ( 1986: 23-26).

For Parekh, multicultural education is, at its core, about teaching people about the inherent plurality of the world: The inspiring principle of multi-cultural education then is to sensitise the child to the inherent plurality of the world - the plurality of systems, beliefs, ways of life, cultures, modes of analysing familiar experiences, ways of looking at historical events and so on (1986: 27)

Hessari & Hill ( 1989: 4) suggest that the process of multicultural education is as important as its product. Through the celebration of a diversity of cultures (integrated throughout the curriculum), it was believed children would work through the misunderstandings and ignorance that are the basis of racism and intolerance (Siraj-Blatchford, 1994).

Antiracism and the Critique of Multicultural Education

The early 1980s saw the evolution of considerable debate concerning the value of multicultural education (Epstein 1993: 20) . Multicultural education was criticised for, amongst other things, (a) focusing on a diversity of culture when the real issue was the tackling of racism, (b) being shallow, superficial and exotic, and (c) being based on the false belief that prejudice is caused by ignorance. We will look at these in turn.

First, it is argued that education to celebrate cultural diversity is "tackling the wrong problem and doing it in the wrong way" (Arnot, 1986: 32). By focusing on cultural diversity and by consequently ignoring the issue of racism, multicultural education fails to encourage children to examine and understand the complex nature of racism as both a personal and institutional issue, to appreciate the effects of racism on the lives of ethnic minority peoples and to consider the roles they can play in resisting and challenging it (Epstein 1993: I 03 , Connolly & Keenan 2000: 88/89,Watson 2000:53) . Other commentators (Brandt 1986: 71, Shallice 1984: I I) endorse this viewpoint, highlighting that we cannot simply do away with one of the things that might contribute to the growth of racism (i.e . mono-cultural education) . Instead the deconstruction of racism must be direct and at a conscious level. They assert that it is racist to concentrate on something else, like culture for example , and to hope for the positive outcome that racism will end. Failure by teachers and the education system to directly engage in the fight against racism legitimises and perpetuates racial prejudice and discrimination. Education, they argue, cannot take a neutral stance.

Other critics use terms such as 'shallow', 'superficial ', 'peripheral' and 'tokenist' in their descriptions of multicultural education (Connolly & Keenan 2000: 88;Watson 2000: 52/53).They refer, for example, to the fact that much multicultural curriculum change has relied on the use of cultural artefacts that children can experience and also on having ethnic minority children in the school and immediate community to act as a kind of ' resource' (Epstein 1993: I 02). Watson notes that this approach has been accused of exoticisation of minority groups and has frequently been derided as the 'steel bands, saris and samosas' approach (2000: 53). Such an approach, it is argued: • does not encourage children to understand the complexity of diverse cultures and actually tends to reinforce existing stereotypes about minority ethnic groups (Connolly 1998). • encourages the perception of minority ethnic groups as exotic and entertaining while placing little emphasis on white , settled people's cultures and consequently tends to reinforce notions that the dominant culture is the 'norm ' or 'high culture' by which all others are to be studied and judged (Epstein 1993: I 03 ; Connolly & Keenan 2000: 88/89). Ultimately, it seems likely that children will find it hard to empathise with people who are presented in terms of their exotic differences.

Some writers have noted that multicultural education operates on the assumption that by teaching children about other cultures, ignorance and , consequently, racism will be overcome. For some, this simple equation of prejud ice with a lack of knowledge is not accurate . Singh says: Discrimination based on 'race', for instance is not wholly constituted of reason based on argument, evidence or experiment. Rather it is constituted of elements of emotions, feelings , attitudes and beliefs. Consequently, mere development of the cognitive faculty, or an appeal to facts or argument, would not be sufficient to remove it. Hence prejudices, according to Phillips-Bell . . . may not be reversible when exposed to new information or further experience:'There is an emotional resistance to the unseating of a prejudice and a tendency to apprehend new evidence in a manner which distorts the evidence to conform with prejudice' ( 1988:93).

Those who criticise multicultural education contrast it with anti racist educational strategies where the education system and its teachers engage with questions of power anc;l ,ra,cism in interpersonal and institutional contexts.

Brandt ( 1986: 125) describes anti racist education as "oppositional" by nature, oppositional to whatever "operates to oppress, repress or disenfranchise . .. on the totally unjustifiable grounds of a perceived 'difference' within which there is an assumption of inherent inferiority".The aims of antiracist education are described, therefore, as Equality, Justice and Liberation/Emancipation.

As with multicultural education, proponents of antiracist education recommend its incorporation into a ll areas of the curriculum (Carrington and Troyna 1988) or its inclusion in a broad programme of political education (Epstein 1993: 21 ). They also note the necessity to develop anti racist education at an emotional as well as cognitive level to ensure an alteration in children 's attitudes and behaviou rs (Brandt 1986: I 04; Singh, 1988). While multiculturalism focused on celebrating difference and on valuing plurality, antiracism focused on the idea that the major institutions of society including government, health care and education are institutionally (and often unintentionally) racist, and sought to identify racism in society and equip people with the skills to challenge it (Todd, 1991; 42; Si raj-Blatchford, 1994:69).While the core idea of multiculturalism was to celebrate plurality, the core concepts of anti racism, are, as the name suggests, identifying and tackling racism.Todd quotes the Institute of Race Relations, which says: "Just to learn about other people's cultures .. . is not to learn about the racism of one's own" ( 1991 : 52).

Towards an lntercultural Synthesis

Unsurprisingly, antiracist educational practices are also subject to their share of censure, often from the champions of multiculturalism. Some of the reasons used by critics for not attempting antiracist education include (a) the assertion that there are limits to what schools can hope to achieve, (b) the assertion that antiracist education is a form of proselytisation or indoctrination and is not therefore education at all, and (c) the suggestion that it is divisive in its effects and w ill not build a sense of empathy and common care between different groups. We will take these in turn .

First, some wonder how schools can actually carry out antiracism. Parekh says that racism is sustained in the economic and political spheres, and must be tackled there . For him, this means that schools simply cannot achieve the aims of anti racism: .. . education has its limits and the social and political roots of racism lie beyond the control of the school. However, it can make its distinctive contribution by tackling the intellectual and moral basis of racism that is amenable to and indeed falls within its purview. To ask it to do more is perhaps the surest way to ensure that it will not be able to do even this much ( 1986: 3 I)

Parekh also argues that if anti racist education is to be a true education, it cannot have made up its mind in advance what the outcome of the education process is to be. Mc Phail et al. ( 1972: 91) identify that if young people: ... are bullied about what is right and wrong, they may abandon the attempt to find answers for themselves and remain as inadequate dependent adults devoid of ideas and incapable of change.

Knowledge moves forward because of inquiry, questioning and debate . If we know now that ' race' theory is scientifically invalid, it is because people questioned it, interrogated it and investigated it. Likewise, if our understanding of ethnicity has developed over the last twenty years , it is because some people did not accept the answers (sometimes the 'politically correct') answe rs they were provided with . Our educational process needs to support and promote continued investigation. We cannot simply replace racist rhetoric with the unquestioned acceptance of 'politically correct' rhetoric (Tormey, forthcoming) . Certainly we can foster the development in people of skills , knowledge and attitudes, but must also allow them to make up their own mind. In this vein Bhikhu Parekh has argued that "the so-called anti racist education is likely to be either not education at all but anti-racist propaganda, or it is in substance little different from multicultural education" ( 1986: 30). This is borne out by an examination of Siraj-Blatchford's description of the features of an antiracist curriculum, which is, in practice, indistinguishable from Parekh 's multiculturalism (see 1994: 72) .

Brandt ( 1986: I I 0) notes, that, to many teachers, anti racism says nothing other than they should be against racism. Robin Richardson also wonders what, exactly, anti racism means: 'A fascist who is nothing but a fascist ', wrote the Austrian poet Erich Fried, 'is nothing but a fascist. But an anti-fascist who is nothing but an anti-fascist is not an anti-fascist'. His point can be readily adapted to other campaigns and struggles: for example, an anti­racist who is nothing but an anti-racist, is not an anti-racist. .. we need to be as clear-eyed and as clear-speaking as possible about the positive goals and values, not only about those things we criticise or oppose; we need, for example, terms such as 'race equality' or 'racial justice' rather than anti-racism to summarise our concerns ( 1990:63).

Finally, Hessari and Hill ( 1989: 14), suggest that antiracist education alone may have the effect of antagonising people if not matched by multicultural education practices that question attitudes and constructive thinking in every part of life, and admit diversity and change as part of the dynamism of life . Indeed, this point could be made more widely. Even taking Richardson 's point and articulating goals in terms of a positive statement of'race equality' may not be enough if it seems to prioritise one group's human rights over another. Other poor or dispossessed groups may be resistant if they feel that the rights of ethnic minorities are being promoted while their own rights are being ignored. In this context,

Derman-Sparks suggests that antiracist education, in itself, is too limited. She emphasises the importance of linking different liberation struggles in her focus on ~nti-Bias Education ( 1989). It is, therefore , arguable that education to promote racial equality should be placed firmly in t e context of a broader framework of education for equality.

Taking note of Parekh's suggestion that antiracist education would in practice be little different from multicultural education, some would argue that the anti racist characterisation of multiculturalism is something of a 'straw man ', and as such is partial and unfair. Watson notes that there is no single version of multiculturalism. At one extreme, multiculturalism is considered to provide a platform from which to educate about difference, dispel ignorance and reduce prejudice. This is sometimes referred to as 'soft multiculturalism ' (see Watson (2000: 51-52]). At the other extreme, Turner ( 1994: 408) states that multiculturalism can be more 'critical ', identifying it as an opportunity "to use cultural diversity as a basis for challenging, revising and relativising basic notions and principles common to dominant and minority cultures alike, so as to construct a more vital, open and democratic common culture". 'Critical' multiculturalism is, therefore, about cultural diversity but also about tackling inequality, including racism - in the terms of Sleeter and Grant ( 1987: 434) it is both " multicultural and social reconstructionist".

Hessari and Hill ( 1989: 14) note, These two parts of the complex whole of anti-racist education can work well concurrently. To concentrate on anti-racist education alone is rather like insisting on watching a television programme in black and white when full colour and better comprehension may be achieved with just a small effort in tuning. Conversely, multicultural education alone may be likened to watching the programme in colour but with sound and vision hazy and not fully focused.

In this context, many authors have argued that, while the debates of the 1980s and 1990s became quite polarised between multiculturalists and antiracists, the two were in fact complementary. Todd follows Grinter in suggesting a synthesis to be called anti racist multiculturalism ( 1991 : 54). Both Parekh and Watson also favour keeping the term multiculturalism, with Watson favouring the term 'critical' multiculturalism (2000: 54). In Ireland a range of groups (INTO, NCCRI), writers (Murray and O 'Doherty, 200 I) and the Government now use of the term 'intercu lturalism ' to signify such a synthesis (although this may be confusing to readers of the international English-language literature since in the past the terms multiculturalism and interculturalism were sometimes regarded as interchangeable [Siraj-Blatchford, 1994: 68]) .

In some senses, the issue of the name may be a red herring - or worse, counterproductive - if we end up producing a language which is "too abstract, artificial and unrelated to the idioms of everyday life to be intelligible, let alone provide a vehicle for meaningful dialogue" (The Commission on the Future of Multi-Ethnic Britain, 2000: x) . It is probably more important to identify the specifics of what a group is in favour of, rather than to focus on what they call it. Indeed, just as the term 'multiculturalism' hid a diversity of positions, it is possible that the term 'interculturalism' may al so (already?) hide a diversity of positions.

While we personally favour Watson 's term 'critical multiculturalism ', as one which emphasises the two components of celebrating difference and engaging in a critique of racist practices and institutions in society, we do not object to the term interculturalism, and indeed, will use the two interchangeably in order to highlight that it is the substance and not the name that is important.

Synthesising antiracism and multiculturalism

From anti racism, critical multiculturalism/ interculturalism can learn: • the need to identify the culture of the child as one of many cultures which is no more right or normal than another

culture • the need to develop in children a sense of empathy and connection with those who are being discriminated against • the need to present 'critical knowledge' about injustice and racism in the child's society

From multiculturalism, critica l multiculturalism/interculturalism can learn: • critical educational process is not t he same as indoctrination or campaigning - while people can be taught to value

diversity and justice, critical knowledge, and critical thinking, the outcomes of people's own reflection cannot be pre-determined

• empathy must be carefully cultivated, and may be damaged by an "oppositional" approach which brands the learner, their family or their community as raci st

• the targets set for the education system must be realistic

Overcoming Barriers

lntercultural education, based on both celebrating diversity and on promoting equality is now being promoted by a range of Irish agencies, including the Government.At present it is difficult to assess the exact extent to which schools in Ireland have adopted interculturalist educational practices. Anecdotal evidence would suggest that few have engaged deeply in these processes. Discussions with a number of development education centres and a small number of primary schools

indicate that schools which address these issues in Ireland do so primarily from the perspective of (soft) multiculturalism - e .g. holding international days or inviting guest ~peakers from minority ethnic communities to speak to the students in their care and so on. It seems that schools engaging in these actjvities tend to be schools whose student populations incorporate a range of ethnic backgrounds and tend not to be schools whose students are drawn principally from the dominant culture in society. It is perhaps worthwhile spending some time exploring the potential barriers that prevent schools and individual teachers from engaging in broader teaching practices that address diversity and justice issues.

A number of potential barriers are frequently identified including: • racism is a controversial issue and as such should be avoided • school cannot hope to compensate for the influence of the home • young children are not developmentally ready to deal with such issues • teachers do not have the appropriate skills to deliver on such an agenda • schools already have too much to do and cannot be asked to do more

Multiculturalism and racism are controversial issues

Multiculturalism and racism are sensitive and potentially controversial issues. As previously highlighted, antiracist education is oppositional by nature . Pollard ( 1988: 56) suggests that, as a consequence, many teachers choose to approach these controversial issues with caution or choose to avoid them altogether on account of their potential to cause confrontation or create division in their classrooms.

In the first instance, examination and exploration of controversial issues in school is not just a worthwhile practice; it is essential. In keeping with the assertion of the Government White Paper on Education (I 995b) that the education system reflects the democratic principles of our society, the incorporation of controversial issues into the curriculum must be viewed in the context of the ethical and social imperatives of our democratic, culturally diverse society. Indeed, since the world is controversial and since children deal with disagreements and conflict every day, controversial issues provide real-life opportunities for the social skills of peacefully dealing with conflict to be developed. As Pollard ( 1988: 63) points out, Controversial issues, therefore, have a place in the school curriculum not only because of the substantive importance of the issues which may be raised ... but also because they provide an introduction to peaceful processes by which such issues can be fully aired and conflicts resolved. This is a very important educational experience for children and thus, in many ways, a condition for the future health of our democracy.

The Brazilian educator Paulo Freire once noted that irrespective of what we teach, education is a political act. Our education either deals with cultural diversity and justice issues or it hides from them. Either way, the choice has consequences for the children in front of us and for society at large. Freire said: This is a great discovery, education is politics! When a teacher discovers that he or she is a politician, too, the teacher has to ask, What kind of politics am I doing in the classroom? (Shor and Freire, quoted in Shor, 1993: 29)

There is, therefore, no such thing as 'neutral' when it comes to issues of diversity and equality.Teachers cannot be neutral in relation to racism and cultural diversity. It is right, therefore, for teachers to openly promote equality and to challenge all manifestations of racism within their classrooms, (although, as we will explore below, they need to be sensitive in how they do this) . Shall ice ( 1984: I I) highlights this choice: As 'intellectual workers' ... we have a responsibility to expose the illusions of racism to engage in that fight against it and if we are not prepared to do this, we end up as agents of its perpetuation. We cannot take a neutral stance.

School cannot compensate for the influence of the home

Many teachers also argue that there is little they can do to tackle racism in their res pective classrooms, because children 'bring it from the home'. These teachers find it difficult to challenge the negative attitudes of children, as they are perceived primarily as the attitudes of their parents.The assumption is, therefore , that if parents possess racist attitudes, there is little teachers can do to encourage the children in their care to develop antiracist attitudes. Gilborn has noted: In isolation, of course, no field of social policy can eradicate racism from society: racism gains strength from too many quarters simply to be 'taught out of existence ( 199 5: 2) .

This view was echoed by Parekh ( 1986) who identified that if we ask the school to do too much, it may be prevented from doing anything at all . Notwithstanding this, he does emphasise that school can: "make its distinctive contribution by tackling the intellectual and moral basis of racism that is amenable to and indeed falls within its purview" (Parekh, 1986: 31 ). There is little doubt that the influence of the home on the attitudes of the child is very strong. However, the school has a responsibility for the moral education of the child.

Indeed, Epstein ( 1993) highlights that there can be a case of 'double-standards' involved in situations where teachers refuse to address racism on the grounds that children 'bring it from the home'. She notes that without a qualm, teachers will often impose a total ban on playing with guns (generally purchased by parents) in the classroom and playground. She

continues by questioning what makes it both comfortable and possible for teachers to interfere in matters such as fighting and war games but not in matters such ~s racism. Si raj-Blatchford ( 1994: 6) addresses this issue in very concrete terms: · If it is understood by educators that racism causes long term damage to children and is unacceptable conduct in our society, that it denies basic human rights and diminishes the life chances of some people, then it follows that it must be dealt with. We have no doubt that once we know about child abuse by a parent towards their child, be it physical, emotional or sexual, intrusive action must be taken. We accept that this would be working against the parent's wishes but would not feel deterred, because abuse is against the law and contravenes children's rights to a secure environment. Similarly, racism is against the law and unacceptable.

It is not only school that has the potential to be a force in this respect. Children too have the potential to challenge racism, both as children and as future adults in society. We must recognise this and provide the opportunity for children of all school-going ages with opportunities to engage in these issues. The curriculum should reflect ethnic and cultural diversity and pupils should be encouraged to respect and value people from different cultural backgrounds. They should also be encouraged explicitly to understand the nature of prejudice and be equipped to challenge it.

Ability of primary children to deal with controversial issues

Another justification for not attempting to develop teaching strategies dealing with diversity or racism is the assertion that children, particularly those at primary level, are unable to understand social, political and moral issues (Dunn 1988; Epstein 1993; Siraj-Blatchford 1994). It may sometimes be assumed that teachers have a responsibility "to protect the young from a harsh and corrupt reality" (Short, 1988: I I) and engaging young children in the examination of controversial issues should, therefore, be avoided.

Many writers contest the assertion that young children of primary level are unable to understand social , political and moral issues such as multiculturalism and antiracism. Such writers claim that even the very youngest children learn from what takes place around them and are aware of the feelings of others (Dunn 1988; Epstein 1993; Si raj-Blatchford 1994). If this is the case, then it logically follows that they will continue to be able to consider the feelings of others at a later stage when they enter primary school, unless, of course,"they are discouraged from doing so by the constant assumption that it is not possible" (Epstein 1993: 93) .Allport (cited in Short, 1998:26) commented as far back as 1954 in this regard, "The age at which these lessons should be taught need not worry us. If taught in a simple fashion all the points can be made intelligible to young children and, in a more fully developed way, they can be presented to older students ... In fact, through 'graded lessons' the same content can, and should, be offered year a~er year"

Teacher awareness, understanding & attitudes

In order for teachers to combat any form of prejudice, teachers need to know how it arises and why (Lynch 1987: ix). In other countries, research suggests that teacher awareness and understanding of racism and multiculturalism is low. Where lack of awareness and understanding of controversial issues exists, so too does a tendency to avoid those issues (See Granville and Malone [200 I] writing in the context of poverty awareness as a controversial issue) . It has been suggested that many teachers may themselves hold ambivalent or oppositional attitudes towards ethnic diversity and/or may feel threatened by anti racism (Gillborn 1995). Given that we know that many Irish people hold ambivalent attitudes towards diversity and equality (see Harvey 2002, cited above), it would be surprising if many Irish teachers' attitudes were not equally ambivalent.At the same time, many teachers may feel powerless in their roles to challenge racism, given their lack of training or professional orientation in this area.

Were such low levels of teacher awareness and understanding to exist, they would highlight the need for both pre- and in-service teacher education programmes to deal with issues related to cultural diversity and equality with a view to enabling teachers to deal with these issues effectively in their classrooms Ueffs I 988;Thomas 2000;The Commission on the Future of a Multi-Ethnic Britain 2000). This training could not simply be concerned with developing teachers' skills, but must also offer opportunities fo r teachers to explore their own opinions and attitudes, as some may, consciously or unconsciously, hold racist or culturally intolerant attitudes (Gillborn 1995). It is of central importance that teachers have opportunities to reflect on their own personal bias and to engage themselves in a process of informed discussion around issues of diversity and equality.

Schools having to cope with constant change

Anecdotal evidence suggests that multiculturalism and antiracism are viewed as additions to an already overburdened workload. Many teachers argue that schools constantly have to cope with change and that, as new issues emerge within the public domain (e .g. relationships and sexuality, drugs awareness), a corresponding expectation emerges that teachers must adapt their teaching to incorporate these issues. There is little doubt that this has bred resentment among some teachers towards these issues, perhaps resulting in a preference not to include them in their teaching.

It is perhaps inevitable that some teachers may feel somewhat disillusioned by the fact that schools constantly have to cope with change. There is nothing particularly new about this situation, but it can be viewed positively rather than

negatively. As Gillborn ( 1995: 98) highlights "the ability to respond to changing local circumstances, and to initiate new programmes and approaches, has long been seen a~ ,a'1 essential part of any good educational system".

Central to the idea of intercultural education as a response integrated throughout the curriculum is the belief that we do not need to do more, we need to do differently. Many of the lessons currently taught by teachers in Irish classrooms can be used to celebrate diversity and to promote equality (Ruane et al., 1999). As such, intercultural education does not need to be understood as a new subject on top of an already full curriculum. In fact, a close reading of the Revised Primary Curriculum (Ireland, I 999a) shows that the values, attitudes, skills and knowledge of intercultural education are already integrated into the curriculum. The challenge for intercultural teachers is to bring this out in the lessons they are already using.

Conclusion

The debates, which have raged in the international literature for forty years, can teach us a great deal. We should endeavour to ensure that we do not repeat the mistakes of other countries' pasts. The next chapter seeks to draw out the specifics of what we can learn about celebrating diversity and promoting equality through education. In particular, attention is paid to putting in place a framework that will enable Irish teachers to integrate such work across their curriculum.

CHAPTER 5 -A FRAMEWORK FOR INTERCULTURAL EDUCATION •N IRISH CLASSROOMS

The purpose of this chapter is to propose a framework for the integration of intercultural and critical multicultural teaching strategies in primary classrooms around Ireland. Drawing on the concepts discussed in chapters two and three, and drawing on the educational literature explored in the last chapter, this chapter specifically identifies what principles critical multicultural/intercultural education bring to bear on classroom practice.

One of the key principles identified is that intercultural education should be and can be integrated across all subjects. In order to do this, it makes sense, as the last chapter argued, to identify clearly what is at issue in intercultural education. The second section in this chapter provides this clear framework for integrating intercultural education across all subjects.

Critical Multicultural/lntercultural Pedagogy

A number of writers highlight the absence of literature relating to multicultural and anti racist pedagogy (Epstein 1993; Troyna 1993; Gill born 1995). Epstein ( 1993: 98) notes that most of the anti racist literature has focused on curriculum content or on school policies and has failed to provide clear-cut recommendations for teachers' classroom practice. Gillborn ( 1995: 132) does recognise that this situation is improving stating "there is now the beginning of a useful literature on antiracism across the curriculum".

Literature that does focus on pedagogy emphasises multicultural and antiracist teaching strategies as one aspect of a general concern for equal opportunities and social justice (Grugeon & Woods 1990). Multiculturalism and antiracism are closely linked to education for equality and tolerance, which in turn, are closely related to education for human rights (Dickson 2000) . Parallels are drawn, therefore, between effective teaching methodologies employed in multicultural/antiracist education and other forms of education concerned with controversial issues - education for human rights, development education, political education, education for democratic citizenship and youth work. These teaching methodologies focus on experiential learning and on facilitating active participation and involvement through the use of games, role-play, group-work, theme-work, brainstorming, music, art, exploration and discovery, discussion, and so on. What the diversity of literature makes clear is that there is no single 'anti racist pedagogy' that can be taken off the shelf and always used successfully. Gillborn ( 1995: 147) notes that successful anti racist pedagogy relies on the "skill, patience and confidence" of teachers who vary their approaches according to the topic, lesson and pupils' responses.

Various writers refer to the need for a conceptual framework to facilitate teachers' understanding and subsequent adoption of these education practices.Arlow (2000: 1-2), for example, notes that teachers often feel ill-equipped to deal with controversial issues because of an "insufficiently developed conceptual framework" . Smith and Robinson ( 1996) endorse this viewpoint, emphasising the need to create a clear agenda that highlights aims , objectives and core concepts, and addresses areas such as established practice and uncertainties about a cross-curricular approach to controversial issues.

While few writers offer comprehensive conceptual frameworks for multicultural and antiracist teaching strategies, a considerable number identify the elements that are important in the background to, and the process of, intercultural education. These elements include:

• focusing on educational processes, not campaigning • starting with the pupil • educating the whole person • recognising their culture as part of the pupil • recognising that young people know about inequality • taking the opportunities that are given to you • integrating interculturalism across the curriculum • seeing education as a process of discussion • recognising that education takes time • recognising that justice is an emotive issue • modelling equality as well as teaching it.

We will take each of these in turn.

Education is a Process not a Campaign

We have identified above that education is never neutral. We have also noted that to say that we are not neutral is not the same as to say we are engaged in a campaign of indoctrination or proselytisation. As Parekh ( 1986: 3 I) has noted, education "cannot spearhead a political movement, and if it ever tried to do so, it would lose its educational character".

lntercultural education means teaching critical thinking skills, as well as teaching specific bodies of knowledge and ways of thinking. Knowledge moves forward because of _inq uiry, questioning and debate . If our understanding of 'race' and ethnicity has developed over the last twenty years, it is because some people did not accept the answers (sometimes the 'politically correct') answers they were provided with . Our educational process needs to support and promote such continued investigation. As we noted above, in promoting critical thinking we cannot simply replace racist rhetoric with the unquestioned acceptance of 'politically correct' rhetoric (Tormey, forthcoming).

Good Education Starts with the Pupil

Most contemporary pedagogy would suggest that good teaching should be pupil-centred. This is equally true for critical multicultural and intercultural teaching strategies. In the first instance, a core aim of learner-centredness is to enable pupils "to know, understand and accept themselves" (Hessari and Hill 1989: I 17). However, pupil-centredness is not only inward looking but takes account also of pupil's social world. Si raj-Blatchford ( 1984: 5) highlights that learner­centredness is reflexive and enables young people to look outward and value others for their similarities and differences. This focus on the 'self' and on 'others in our social world' is a critical part of pupil-centred multicultural and antiracist teaching strategies.

Educate the Whole Person

Pupil-centredness involves educating the whole person. The Introduction to the Primary School Curriculum, for example, identifies that the development of the child's full potential involves among other things, developing values, knowledge and skills, while promoting their emotional and physical development (Ireland, I 999a: 7). As we noted above, Singh has pointed out that attempts to deal with issues of difference and justice cognitively without engaging emotionally are based on a misunderstanding of the way in which people learn and develop. Effective intercultural education must start with engaging people in the issue at an emotional level and developing a sense of empathy with others. The focus cannot simply be on teaching intercultural facts or opinions, but must also be on developing a sense of empathy and emotional engagement. When we identify a framework for critical multicultural education (below) we structure the framework around the range of aspects of the whole person, that is, the knowledge, skills, values and dispositions that such an approach seeks to develop.

Culture is Part of the Learner

When we look at young people we should be careful to avoid looking at them outside their cultural context.This means that treating everybody equally does not mean treating them all the same. For example, to say that children from minority groups have an equal right to their language (as does Article 30 of the UN Convention of the Rights of the Child) means that we cannot simply offer the same English-language education to a white, settled English-speaking child , a child from the Gaeltacht and a child whose first language is Turkish. As the INTO note ( 1998: 29) , it is desirable that countries assist migrants such as refugees in preserving their own language as a central element in their individual and collective identity.As the Commission on The Future of Multi-Ethnic Britain notes, one of the fundamental beliefs of a good society is that: Since citizens have different needs, equal treatment requires full account to be taken of their differences . When equality ignores relevant differences and insists on uniformity of treatment, it leads to injustice and inequality; when differences ignore the demands of equality, that results in discrimination. Equality must be defined in a culturally sensitive way and applied in a discriminating but not discriminatory manner (2000: ix).

While recognising the young person as an individual, it is, therefore, necessary to be sensitive to their different needs. The distinction between segregation and cultural sensitivity, drawn by the report of the Government's Task Force on the Travelling Community (I 995a) , is worth remembering. It is important that policies and practices should be developed in a context of recognising the potential for cultural differences. Failure to facilitate such differences constitutes institutional racism. However, categorising people on the basis of an assumption as to their capacity or culture constitutes segregation and therefore is also institutional racism. In being open to cultural difference, we should not impose our expectations of their cultural differences upon people.

Young people know inequality

Within the context of pupil-centred intercultural teaching, it is also important to 'start where learners are'. Brandt ( 1986: I I I) points out that pupil-centred approaches begin by working on inequalities with which children are familiar. "As children come to understanding their often complex positions in relation to these inequalities, they can come to understand and combat racism". Indeed, most young people will identify that they have been treated unfairly at one time or another, whether that means having an adult step in the queue in front of them in a shop, or whether it means having

a teacher refuse to listen to their side of the story. Such experiences mean that children can often readily empathise with others who are victims of discrimination . .

Take the opportunities young people give you

For Epstein, pupil-centredness also means engaging with the issues which young people themselves raise, rather than always relying on structured learning opportunities. Issues raised by pupils come from their experience of their world . Therefore it is essential that we "pick up possibilities for development from the activities of the children themselves" and that the pupils can relate "their work to their direct experience of stereotyping others and fulfilling stereotypical roles themselves" ( 1993: I 15).

Education happens throughout the Curriculum

Multicultural and antiracist education should be viewed "neither as a separate subject, to be slotted into the existing timetable, nor as a completely new method of teaching but as an extension, a development, a deepening of all of the often excellent teaching and learning that is going on in many schools" (Hessari & Hill 1989: 4).We need to acknowledge the potential of all subject areas of the curriculum to challenge racism and promote cultural tolerance. It is possible that we could ensure that every lesson is an intercultural lesson, while no lesson is ever specifically named as 'intercultural education' . Once we are clear what we intend to teach (see below), we can embed those learning aims in every lesson.

It is easy to see how intercultural messages can be integrated into Religion, Geography or History lessons.The example of Development Education shows that such issues can also be addressed through other lessons also. Indeed, as we suggested above, the integration of these issues across the curriculum is the best way of ensuring that classroom overload does not result in their being neglected in their entirety. In Ireland, at primary level, publications such as The World in The Classroom (Ruane et al, 1999), and the Guidelines on Traveller Education in Primary Schools (Department of Education and Science, 2002) indicate precisely where these issues can be raised at every class level in every subject of the 1999 primary school curriculum.

Education is a Discursive Process

"Children's construction of meaning is conducted through their use and development of language" (Brandt 1986: I 05) . Teachers should give careful consideration to language used in lessons pertaining to different cultures and to justice and ensure that "the relationship between language and power and their place in education is clearly an important aspect of the development of antiracist understandings".

A primary concern for teachers in implementing anti racist and multicultural teaching strategies should be the facilitation of a voice for those groups that may be experiencing racism. As Epstein ( 1993: I 00) notes, "While there are many mythologies around issues of race, combating racism is not simply a matter of discrediting them or of gathering the 'truth'. Reality is experienced in many different ways and one important aspect of education for equality, is that the realities of marginalised groups be validated and explored. However, for this to happen, those in such groups will need to find a voice".

This does not mean that children from minority cultures should be made to stand up and act as spokespersons for their ethnic group. To do so may make the children uncomfortable. She goes on to note ( 1993: I 0 I): The black child's choice of silence should be respected. It is unacceptable for people from oppressed groups to be compelled to bear the burden of always explaining their experiences to those in the dominant group.

It does, however, mean that we need to create a safe space in which children can talk about their experiences of diversity, racism, injustice and conflict, in which non-dominant groups can articulate their experiences. Jeffs notes that the "teaching of all controversial issues and all subject areas must seek to be an honest attempt to encourage the pupil to enter into a discourse and the engagement of their judgement with the underlying issues" ( 1988: 36).Teachers should remember, therefore , to allow pupils to express themselves fully and honestly in the classroom.Where teachers identify that they disagree with a statement or position, they should avoid, insofar as it is possible, to make it a disciplinary matter. Instead, they should seize "the opportunity to discuss with the children their own perceptions . .. to help them reflect on their feelings and understandings about them, and to change not only their behaviour but also their understandings" ( 1993: I 14-1 15). In this regard, multicultural and anti racist education practices rely strongly on a positive teacher/student relationship. Arlow (2000: 8) notes: "A process of relationship and trust building is necessary, so that young people are given permission to express who they are, in the classroom. If their opinions are sectarian or racist, that at least reflects the reality of their lives and opens the way for discussion".

Gillborn ( 1995: 140) endorses this viewpoint, stating that it is unlikely that students will engage fully in the anti racist process if the "teacher is aloof". His point is reiterated by Singh ( 1988) and Epstein ( 1993), who identify that in facilitating

discussion and understanding of these controversial issues, it is important that teachers make their pupils aware of alternatives to entrenched and racist positions, and qll_o":" pupils the opportunity to explore these alternatives in depth .

Education Takes Time

Si raj-Blatchford identifies ( 1994:3) that children as young as three sometimes display racial prejudice. Such prejudice did not appear overnight - it has usually developed over an extended period of time. Challenging such beliefs and changing attitudes and actions will not happen overnight either. It takes more time to create a space in which something can be discussed than it does to simply lecture to pupils on right and wrong; however, such a space is precisely what is required . As Lee & Lee ( 1987: 219) propose "talking is learning and that talk is not merely teacher-to-child but child-to-child and needs considerable time".

Epstein suggests that, in the context of a national curriculum, it is harder to find that time ( 1993: I 15). However, it is also notable that apart from Oral Language lessons that are specifically about talking and listening, many other lessons also provide such opportunities.The real issue is whether these opportunities are identified and seized, or whether they are allowed slip past.

We also need to recognise that positive outcomes will not always be visible.As Hessari and Hill ( 1989: 13) emphasise: "Anti-racist education ... must rely partly upon making people aware of their own prejudices and stereotyped concepts, and upon changing their attitudes. The vast majority of children and adults cannot leap from complete ignorance in this respect to an appreciation of the strangle-hold that institutional racism has on all parts of the life of this country. Most have to come to this realisation in stages".

Justice is an emotive issue

Multiculturalism and anti racism are not just controversial issues; they are also emotive issues. Any attempt by teachers to address these issues in a meaningful manner must allow for pupils' expression of emotion.

Far from seeing the emotion and anger that surface in the exploration of these issues as a negative, teachers should view this as "a legitimate, indeed as a necessary part of the discussions; they (i.e. emotions) form a genuine link with 'the real world' and set the programme apart from traditional subject-based teaching" (Gillborn 1995: 143). In fact, the expression of emotion by students should be viewed as an indicator of success in engaging them in the issues and as indicative of the issues' importance to them.

This can sometimes be frightening for teachers who are understandably wary of upsetting pupils. However, as we have identified above, education of the whole person cannot be based on neglecting their emotional engagement and development. Enabling pupils to engage fully and emotively with the issues of multiculturalism and anti racism does place an additional responsibility on teachers to ensure that these discussions take place within a safe space, and that emotions are used positively and do not simply translate into a heightened sense of conflict that reinforces previously held positions.

Model equality as well as teaching it

The antiracist critique of multicultural education identified that it makes little sense to attempt to teach ch ildren the knowledge, skills and attitudes of intercultural education if the education system itself is not modelling best practice. The concepts of 'indirect racism' and 'institutional racism' identify that institutions such as schools may in fact be unintentionally racist in their operations.As we noted above: Institutional racism occurs where the activities, practices, policies or laws of an institution lead, intentionally or unintentionally, to less favourable outcomes for minority ethnic groups. (Murray and O'Doherty, 200 I: 40).

Epstein (also cited above) offers as an example a school which, because it is oversubscribed, offers places first to children who have a sibling there . She notes that this common enough situation: ... is likely to disadvantage black children in areas where there have been relatively recent influxes of black people. It is unlikely that such a practice would have originated from the prejudiced intention of reducing the numbers of black pupils, but this will be the effect. It is practices such as these that are defined as 'indirect racism' ( 1993: 15) .

Likewise when the education system prioritises the language, culture or religion of one ethnic group over others, one could argue that the system is racist.

If we are teaching children knowledge, skills and attitudes which enables them to see racism and equips them to challenge it, it will quickly become obvious if we are not applying to our own institutions the standards we are setting up for the rest of society. In teaching children to think critically about the world in which they live, it is entirely appropriate for us to think critically about our own actions and the institutions within which we work, and if necessary,

to challenge racism should we find it evident in our own actions or in those institutions.

A Framework for Integrating Criti.cai Multicultural and lntercultural Teaching Practices Across the Curriculum Arising from the extensive literature review undertaken in preparation of this document, a framework is now offered for the integration of critical multiculturalist/intercultural teaching practices across the curricula used in classrooms around Ireland. Although developed originally with primary schools in mind, the concepts built into this framework are equally applicable to post-primary contexts .

It is planned to present this framework under four core headings of Aims, Objectives, Strategies and Resources (similar headings are used by Hessari & Hill [ 1987] and Lynch [ 1986]).

Aspects of Doing lntercultural Educat ion

Aims Why integrate multicultural and anti racist teaching practices into all areas of the curriculum? What is the ultimate purpose of doing so?

Pupil Objectives What specific outcomes are we looking for in pupils? What understandings/skills/values/dispositions are we trying to develop and foster in pupils?

Strategies What is the most effective means of fostering these understandings/skills/values in the classroom? What methodologies should be used?

Resources/ Materials What resources are required to implement these methodologies effectively?

The framework presented below attempts to offer answers to these central questions. In particular, pupil objectives are sketched in some detail. The pupil objectives are at the heart of this entire process. It would not make sense for us as teachers to engage in an educational process without clearly understanding what we want out of it. The answer to the question of what exactly critical multicultural or intercultural education is for, is sketched out in that section.

It is important to understand that these core headings form part of an interconnected whole. For example, the overall aim informs the selection of pupil objectives, which in turn informs the selection of appropriate teaching strategies. These strategies in turn influence the selection of relevant resources and materials . Conversely, the use of relevant resources and materials facilitates the effective implementation of selected strategies.The effective delivery of strategies facilitates the achievement of selected objectives, which in turn contribute to the achievement of the identified aims.The illustration below shows the interconnectedness of these terms.

Aims Why integrate multicultural and anti racist education practices into all areas of the primary school curriculum? What is the ultimate purpose of doing so?

Murray and O'Doherty (200 I: 68-69), following the work of the US writer Louise Derman-Sparks, identify four core aims (aims 2 - S below) as the necessary backdrop for multicultural and anti racist teaching strategies. To these, we have added the first aim. These aims link intercultural education to other equality and justice issues, and underlie the framework presented here. They are: •To contribute to the development of a fair, just, tolerant and equitable society in which the rights and dignity of all

individuals are recognised and realised . •To nurture each child's construction of a knowledgeable, confident self-concept and group identity. •To promote each child's comfortable, empathic interaction with people from diverse backgrounds. •To foster each child's critical thinking about bias. •To cultivate each child's ability to stand up for her/himself and for others in the face of bias and discrimination.

Framework Headings & Connection~

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Pupil O bjectives If thes<:: are our objectives,

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I Resources I

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Pupil Objectives

What specific outcomes are we looking for in ·pupils that will contribute to the achievement of the aims listed above? What core understandings, values and skills are we trying to develop and foster in them?

This framework presents pupil objectives under three central headings:

• Knowledge and Understanding •Values and Attitudes • Skills and Capabilities

Key pupil objectives for multicultural and antiracist education practices are summarised in the table on the following page.

Strategies

No single antiracist or multicultural teaching strategy can be taken off the shelf and always used successfully. It is also important that teachers vary their teaching approaches according to the topic, lesson, pupils responses, age and cultural backgrounds of pupils, prior learning experiences and so on. Nevertheless, a number of teaching strategies have been identified as appropriate to the process of developing the knowledge/understandings, values/attitudes and skills/capabilities highlighted above. Some specific strategies can be named however.

• Integrate the knowledge, skills and attitudes of intercultural education across the curriculum. Find opportunities in all subject areas to talk and think about issues such as power and inequality and to develop critical thinking skills and appropriate attitudes. Often this can be done by taking to opportunities afforded by existing lessons (human rights issues in History, diversity issues in Geography, global inequality in resources in Science etc.).

• Construct a safe learning environment within which people can speak their mind and engage in discussion over issues. Such a safe environment does not simply emerge in the course of one lesson , it must be built up over time and supported in an on-going way. Such a safe environment is necessary if people are to engage emotionally with issues raised and if they are to develop empathy.

• Facilitate collaborative models of learning and placing language and talking at the centre of intercultural learning. Recognise the value of talk as a learning device and allow and support pupils to discuss and make sense of issues as they arise. Recognise also that talk takes time and people cannot simply be rushed to 'correct' answers .

• Create a democratised classroom in which a climate of co-operative decision-making and mutual respect is created. Support pupils in learning how to challenge authority appropriately (if necessary by being the authority that is challenged) in a spirit of collective responsibility. The development writer Robert Chambers identifies that power can be a 'disability' since it enables us to keep quiet those who best understand the effects of our actions - our pupils ( 1997: 76). Overcome this problem by being willing to listen to and engage with pupils, even if what they have to say is sometimes uncomfortable for us.

• Facilitate experiential/active learning strategies such as games, role-play, drama, group-work, theme-work, case histories/studies , brainstorming, music, art, exploration & discovery, discussion , etc . Such engaged strategies are more likely to be successful in engaging pupils emotionally than traditional 'chalk and talk' strategies.

• Facilitate the coming together of groups of pupils from diverse backgrounds to engage in cultural exchanges.

Knowledge and Understanding

• Human rights - understanding the dignity of all human beings and their basic human rights, in particular those that pertain to children, learning the language of rights;

• Social justice - understanding that there are inequalities in society and understanding the challenge of ensuring that all individuals are treated with equity;

• Power and oppression - understanding power and oppression, how they are manifested and, in particular, understanding their effects on individuals and communities;

• Racism - understanding racism as an abuse of power and a manifestation of oppression and discrimination;

• Peace and Conflict - understanding the various ways in which people resolve differences of opinion and the effects of these responses at a global and an interpersonal level ;

• Pluralism/Diversity - understanding the potential and social challenge of difference in society;

• Interdependence - understanding the centrality of relationships and the global interdependence of human beings;

• Democracy - understanding the challenge of decision-making in a diverse society and the rights and responsibilities associated with democratic citizenship;

• Identity - understanding various forms of social identity with a view to fostering self­awareness among pupils, a sense of belonging and empathy with others from different identity groupings;

• Society, Culture and History - increased knowledge of pupils' own society, culture and history, and the societies, cultures and histories of other pupils.

Values and Attitudes

• Empathy - developing a sense of compass ion and solidari ty with those experiencing oppression and an abuse of their rights;

• Respect for self and others - in particular, accepting one's own identity and others' expression of their respective identities;

• Commitment to social justice, human r ights, and equality of opportunity and outcome for all people and a rejection of all forms of oppression and discrimination;

• Respect for diversity - affirming the value that can be derived from the existence of difference, irrespective of how it is expressed, and remaining open to other viewpoints;

• A commitment to learning from others with different viewpoints;

• Commitment to peaceful processes as a means of resolving discord - appreciating that conflict is part of the human experience, but that it is better to seek non-violent and non-discriminatory ways of accepting difference and resolving disputes;

• Interdependence - a recognition of the interconnectedness of reality and the obligations and commitments of individuals to others in society;

• A commitment to democratic principles -recognising the rights of all citizens to participate fully in society and appreciating the responsibilities associated with this;

•A belief in the individual's ability to make a difference;

• Healthy scepticism and critical attitude toward representations of other people in print, and in audio-visual media.

Skills and Capabilities

•Ability to draw on a range of source material before making judgements;

•The ability to recognise prejudice and stereotyping in other people, in print and images, and in themselves;

• Make balanced judgements; •Active learning skills - participation,

communication, co-operation; • Engage with democratic processes and

experience democracy in action; • Manage conflict and engage in conflict

resolution; • Engage in dialogue and respond critically

and constructively to opposing opinions; • Access, assess and apply information from a

wide range of sources; • Develop language to express opinions,

interpretations, proposals, solutions, concerns and convictions with confidence;

•The ability to change her/his opinion as more is learned about an issue;

•Work with others co-operatively; • Apply human rights and democratic

principles to specific situations; • Develop mature relationships with a wide

variety of individuals from a variety of identity backgrounds;

• Challenge injustice and inequality.

Resources

The resources used in intercultural education 'are influenced principally by the topic or lesson and by the choice of teaching strategy made by the individual teacher. It is evident that there is a wide range of resources available to assist in the development of antiracist and multicultural teaching strategies under the following headings:

• Resources from children themselves - children sharing their own experiences, belongings , selves; • Resources from the local and wider community - e .g. parents and community members sharing their

experiences and themselves with pupils, community facilities , libraries, political facilities, community organisations and organisations representing particular interest groups, development education centres, etc;

• Published resources - e.g. work packs, guides, books, CD Rom, Internet, etc.

In many cases teachers do not need to look beyond their existing textbooks and curriculum documents to find the necessary resources. For example, the current primary school history curriculum emphasises that history teaching should develop in children critical thinking skills, the ability to see things from a range of perspectives, the capacity to empathise with those whose lives are different from their own and a willingness to be open to changing their mind and opinions (Ireland, I 999a [History Curriculum] : 8 - 26) . Similar aims are found throughout the curriculum, in languages, in drama and in other subjects. By recognising the broad range of knowledge, skills and attitudes which make up the objectives of intercultural education, one can see that it is relevant in a range of subjects area which go far beyond the 'steel bands saris and samosas' stereotype of soft multiculturalism. Publications such as The World in the Classroom, (Ruane et al., 1999) , and the Guidelines on Traveller Education in Primary School (2002) make explicit how and where the learning outcomes of intercultural education are integrated across curricular areas. The knowledge, skills and attitudes of lntercultural education can be taught in any subject, whether or not the subject matter is obviously about cultural difference .

Where textbooks offer limited opportunities to explore difference, to promote equality or to develop critical thinking skills, this can, in itself, be turned into a resource. Through questioning of what perspectives are missing and of how the same material or event might be presented or viewed differently or though comparing textbooks with other possible source materials, teachers can use limited material to develop a pupils capacity to think about the way in which information is presented to them.As such, intercultural education does not require an entirely new set of resources for the teacher. It may simply require seeing the opportunities presented by the presence and absence of particular materials in existing texts and materials.

While often useful, specially produced intercultural packs and resources can also be counterproductive. There is a risk that, by using such materials, one might lose sight of the goal of integration across the curriculum as well as the attitudes, skills and knowledge which can be integrated across the curriculum.While they may contribute to a shot-term answer to the question of'What do I do?', such packs are rarely, in themselves, a long-term answer to that question.When using such resources, do not forget to also use a framework for planning across the curriculum.

Conclusion

In this chapter we have explored exactly what it means to engage in intercultural or critical multicultural education.We explored what we can learn from the pedagogic literature on doing critical multicultural education. In essence, good intercultural teaching is informed by the principles of what is simply good teaching.The experiences of multicultural and antiracist practitioners in the UK and the US from the 1960s to the 1990s have helped to inform these debates. In Ireland we have today an opportunity to learn from other people's mistakes rather than to recreate them. For that reason we need to take th is literature seriously.

Finally, we presented a framework for the integration of intercultural issues across the curriculum. Central to the framework is the knowledge skills and attitudes of intercultural education. As we identified in earlier chapters, many people now use the terms multicultural, intercultural and anti racist education in vague and ill-defined ways. By identifying explicitly what we see as the learning objectives of intercultural education, we have shown that such knowledge , skills and attitudes can be taught throughout the curriculum. Indeed, we have noted that, in the case of the Irish Revised Primary School Curriculum, these knowledge skills and attitudes are already written explicitly into the Curriculum. Publications such as The World in the Classroom, (Ruane et al., 1999), and the Guidelines on Traveller Education in Primary School (2002) make explicit how and where the learning outcomes of intercultural education are integrated across cu rricular areas.

This approach to integrating intercultural learning objectives into teaching is central to intercultural education, but it is not all of it.We cannot simply teach interculturalism, we must apply it to ourselves and to the institutions we work and live in .As Hessari and Hill ( 1987: 13) have noted: "Antiracist education ... must rely partly upon making people aware of their own prejudices and stereotyped concepts, and upon changing their attitudes". This applies to us as much as to others. This process of reflection will not necessarily be an easy one. Justice is an emotive issue, and questioning ourselves as to whether or not we have been part of a system that has disadvantaged or discriminated may well be a painful process. Nor is it likely to be a quick process. One does not come to develop an understanding of complex

questions such as identity and discrimination overnight. Indeed, since intercultural education requires us to engage in critical thinking, we should never stop interrogating our own assumptions, beliefs , attitudes and skills, we should always remain open to learning and to developing our ideas and skills. Should we, on reflection , find ourselves working within systems that disadvantage or discriminate unfairly, we will need to work for change within those systems. This too may be a difficult process. Overall then the challenge of intercultural education is, therefore , a serious and complex one. Yet we can hardly expect pupils to engage in that process if we are unwilling to do so ourselves.

Educators sometimes find themselves charged with correcting many of the ills of society. In some cases these ills are not caused by education alone and cannot be corrected by education alone.This is true of racism. Racism is perpetrated and sustained in the broad social and economic life of our society. The school cannot, alone , make racism go away. Yet neither is the school powerless in this context. It can combat racist attitudes where it finds them. It can develop empathy for different groups in children. It can facilitate them in developing an understanding of the diversity that exists in our society and our world and it can facilitate them in developing a sense of the value of that diversity. It can develop in them the capacity to see other people's point of view, the capacity to resolve the conflicts they find themselves involved in and the capacity to think critically about the knowledge and ideas they encounter in the world around them. It can equip them to be agents for change and it can model the change process in the way in which it reflects upon its own structures and actions. As the Brazilian educator Paulo Freire has noted (Shor and Freire , quoted in Shor, 1993: 29) , education is never neutral; it either reproduces society as it is, or it changes it. The recent changes in Irish society have provided us with an opportunity to see this choice more clearly than at other times in our recent past. Our education either deals with interculturalism or it hides from it. Either way, the choice has consequences for the children in front of us and for society at large.

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