Read
For this activity, read “What Is Culturally Sustaining Pedagogy and Why Does it Matter?” from Culturally Sustaining Pedagogies: Teaching and Learning for Justice in a Changing World by Django Paris and H. Samy Alim. A PDF of this chapter was included in the Week 2 email.
Write
Reflect on and respond to the following questions by posting a comment below:
- How would you describe CSP to a colleague?
- What is one example from your own teaching of how you incorporate CSP into your courses?
- Beyond applying CSP to the materials in your courses, in what additional ways might you incorporate CSP into learning experiences and activities in which your students engage?
12 thoughts on “Culturally Sustaining Pedagogies Reading and Reflection”
CSP is both a theory and practice (praxis) of teaching and learning (pedagogy). Its main assumption is that the center of education must be the culture of the learning community used as an asset instead of a deficit. It decenters White Middle class norms and value structures as the basis or standard that everyone including minority communities must strive to achieve.
In my own research and teaching I focus on aspects of my culture as well as the experiences of Africans in the diaspora. I use examples from my personal experience and culture as well as from my scholarship to teach and encourage students to do same. For example, on the topic of language I use youtube videos on African- American Language as a form of empowerment for the community rather than a deficit. I also use words from my own culture to illustrate the phonetic aspects that influence my accent. Many Hispanic students often relate to that.
In preparing my CSP based course this semester I plan to encourage students to share the experiences, hopes, challenges, etc. of their communities and by guiding them through a critical analyses of their experiences to guide them to engage in some form of community and civic activism geared toward community empowerment and liberation.
I like how succinct your definition of the concept is. I also use YouTube videos illustrating AAE, and the different varieties of language use and emphasizing the validity of each variant. Unfortunately, it’s an uphill battle. Also, they confound slang with Creoles and Patois, constantly believing that the latter are of lower status or outright deficient.
I would paraphrase or quote directly from the text by Paris and Alim to describe to a colleague that culturally sustaining pedagogy means giving our students “the opportunities to survive and thrive, but it is also centrally about love, a love that can help us see our young people as whole versus broken when they enter schools, and a love that can work to keep them whole as they grow and expand who they are and can be through education” (14). This may be corny, but it is true and powerful, and a necessary reminder of what’s important in education. Then, I would provide examples of what CSP looks like in the classroom.
An example of how I incorporate CSP in my own teaching is student-led discussions (guided and supported by me as needed), which build on the classroom community and student understanding of literature and centers students in the teaching and learning process.
Additional ways I might incorporate CSP into learning experiences and activities in which I engage students: include more creative writing activities for students to share their observations and experiences, have students interview primary sources in their communities (for research essay assignment), and ….to be continued.
I would explain CSP as a way to “resist, revitalize, and re-imagine” teaching and learning so that students who have not been at the center of power (traditionally) can experience a culture of power for themselves and their communities in ways that sustain themselves and empower their communities.
I would say that an example of CSP in my social psychology course is when students view a particular PBS film titled “Why do I need you?” that I assign every semester so that they can write a reaction paper based on the film. This past semester (Fall 2020), I asked the students to use the film to explain why “social distancing and mask-wearing due to the coronavirus lockdown” was so difficult for many people to comply with . After reading the article, I believe that my assignment incorporates elements of CSP because the film that I assign is very engaging and powerful in presenting the neuroscience of humans as social beings that need each other to survive and thrive. This is a good CSP choice, but, by asking students to apply it to an experience that they are familiar with so they can re-imagine the cause of difficulties with this behavior, it becomes CSP because they can better understand their own difficulties and the difficulties of others with the challenge of social distancing in a pandemic.
As I redesign my content modules each week in Social Psychology, I will pose an additional overarching question that will deliver a CSP lens of inquiry to my previous list of questions. The question will be something akin to: “What is the invisible poison in the air that affects this question?” I would suggest students to look at the possibility of several poisons: implicit biases, inequality, historical injustice, superiority and dominance, entitlement, aggression, attitudes, etc. I would also suggest that they rewrite or re-work the question to take the poisons into account, respond to them, and counteract them with an potential antidote.
The way I understand CSP is going beyond lip-service to buzz words such as multiculturalism, equality etc., and acknowledging the legitimacy and actively involving students’ cultures and backgrounds as resources (linguistic and otherwise) into the learning process. Doing it from early education throughout college consciously and deliberately at every level might bring real-life change when it comes to social justice and equity. The process of educating teachers-to-be, however, should be done in a sensitive manner so it doesn’t evoke resistance or resentment, and must allow for mistakes along the way. In that way, the emphasis on the attainment of common good for everybody should be emphasized instead of overly “pontificating” language .
Some disciplines lend themselves to these pedagogies easier than others. I would be curious to learn more how math, and in general STEM subjects implement CSP principles in their curricula.
In my own courses (Introduction to Linguistics and Language and Culture) this comes more naturally given that many of the students speak more than one language. Last semester, I had an Indigenous Quechua speaker from Ecuador whom I used regularly as a resource to demonstrate nuances of the grammar as a synthetic language. A student from Japan clarified not only the numerous honorifics, but also the differences in use of the so called linguistic routines. This would be impossible in a homogenous class; however, besides our vast differences, I also like to emphasize the many similarities in between seemingly different cultures. The word “chancla”, for example, and its cultural significance in Latino parenting and in my Eastern European heritage have an uncanny resemblance. Students are also a source of educating me about growing up in the “urban” United States; linguistically, for a long time, I only understood the denotation of the “urban youth”. Only after teaching a couple of semesters the discipline of Language and Culture did my students enlighten me about the connotation of the expression. It has been a conscious effort for me (someone who comes from an authoritative and authoritarian educational tradition to be mindful of asset-based pedagogies especially in the context of an urban community college. One of the most successful final projects was a mini-experiment of systematizing people’s understanding of different slang expressions used in their circles of friends (both digital and spoken).
In my ESL classroom (intensive writing), I implemented a technique utilized by an Orthodox Jewish woman who became a writing teacher and encourages students to value themselves by formally putting down sentences with the phrase: “I am the one who…….”This also makes them practice the grammatical form of present simple. There is a dilemma, however, in maintaining one’s linguistic heritage via authentic language and culture while also adhering to “academic written language” standards. The authors use the acronym DAE (Dominant American English) I assume consciously avoiding the generally used term in linguistics (SAE), yet do not get into the details in the form of usable practical advice, nor do they cite quantitative research.
Looking into the future and thinking about subsequent semesters and courses, I want to explore the implementation of many more sources beyond the regular textbook (hence my presence in this workshop). Many textbooks used in sociolinguistics are in a way immediately out of date in the moment of their publication due to ever-changing theories and the flux in societal forces. I want to make it a second nature to look beyond academically “approved” materials and use authentic materials regularly.
All in all, the goal of CSP is clear and must be of utmost importance; making students’ experiences not just valid and valuable in every class, but doing it in a way that is authentic and natural; we must teach through their experiences without making it seem like we are doing it on a mandate. Students would immediately pick up on it if it comes across as fake or forced. This is the challenge, and through the process, we must allow ourselves to make mistakes.
Overall, I find the article to be interesting and it addresses issues that have been plaguing marginalized communities for decades. CSP as Dr. Naaeke describes and I agree is both theory and practice of teaching and learning. It is not or should not be limited in scope and reach in addition to including communities of color (Black, Brown Latinx, etc.) One way in which I incorporate CSP into my teaching is I have students share with the class via video, object, verbal description, and or any other means that they are comfortable a tradition value-centered aspect of their culture. This is usually required within the first and second week of class in order to create a learning environment that everyone is comfortable in and to give the sense that who and what they are contributes to the how we can learn from each other.
Moreover, semesters moving forward when preparing my CSP course I will intentionally include more activities that is “culturally” centered around the demographics of the class population. The subjects/topics will not be limited to one perspective and the continued narrative that represents the white middle class that often show up in text book readings and assigned articles by departments. Additionally, I will give the students a wider range of subjects/topics to select from for speeches and writing assignments.
How would you describe CSP to a colleague?
CSP is about us as educators understanding and connecting the importance of sustaining the many cultures of students that are in the classroom. This in turn leads to more impactful teaching and learning and sets the tone for a more inclusive and nurturing learning environment. Acknowledging that cultural awareness and the connectedness of cultures and learning are necessary for a positive and impactful learning experience will alter our classrooms even more. I’d also like to add that reading this chapter has reiterated the importance of self-evaluation in our courses. Cultural diversity is a positive in the classroom, adding to the learning experience, as “the future is a multilingual and multiethnic one.” (6)
What is one example from your own teaching of how you incorporate CSP into your courses?
I teach a Western music history course and not only are there virtually no women represented in the textbook that was formerly used, and in my many years of schooling, and no people of color. So, I did research this past fall and found really important composers and/or performers to add to my curriculum. I then had students choose from a menu format. The information is below.
Listening (choose 1):
Black Experience In The Concert Hall: The Mozart Effect: https://www.wqxr.org/story/mostly-mozart-black-experience-concert-hall-mozart-effect/
or
Joseph Boulogne: The Chevalier of Music and Revolution: http://www.lincolncenter.org/lincoln-center-at-home/show/the-chevalier-of-music-and-revolution-299
If you chose, Black Experience In The Concert Hall: The Mozart Effect, answer the following questions:
Which person’s Mozart experience are you highlighting? (Sanford Allen, Bobby McFerrin, Julia Bullock, Lawrence Brownlee or Alvin McCall)
Timestamp (what minute & second does it begin and end)
Describe that person’s introduction to Mozart.
Why is important to know about the Black experiences in the concert hall? Why is this important in our learning of music history?
If you chose, Joseph Boulogne: The Chevalier of Music and Revolution, answer the following questions:
Who was Joseph Boulogne?
What was his background/history?
Why is knowing about Joseph Boulogne important in music history?
I had many students in my class write and comment on the discussion board that it was so awesome to read about someone “who looked like them” during these different time periods or if they chose the latter example, could learn about the black experience in the modern-day classical world. It brought up a lot of great discussions and I’m really happy that it had such a positive effect on my students!
Beyond applying CSP to the materials in your courses, in what additional ways might you incorporate CSP into learning experiences and activities in which your students engage?
For student’s research papers, I could have them seek out musicians/composers that are not covered in the “textbooks.” By doing this, they will not only gain research experience, but will be adding to our discourse. Having them present research to the class will not only encourage their research, but provide another layer of CSP in the classroom, a respectful and culturally aware classroom. By doing this, hopefully this can lead to cultural awareness among other students and provide a change for students to present a piece of them that they can be proud of sharing.
1. I would describe CSP as a reformulation of the ways in which history, literature, and culture are included in education – not only in the material itself, but also in the inclusion of student experience as a learning asset. CSP strives to counteract white and westernized narratives and to question how colonialism still is present within our educational system today. For example, why is “integration” into whiteness still pushed?
2. My classes are all about intersectionality of gender, class, and race. I am very clear with my students upfront that as a white woman, I will not be able to share an experiential knowledge of the oppression and discrimination we speak about. I strive to provide an open forum where students can share their ideas and experiences, and we can then relate them back to class material. Especially in my history classes, I make sure to provide primary sources from BIPOC authors – then we discuss the ways in which the experiences of these authors is often neglected/misrepresented by something like a conventional textbook.
3. In the future, especially in the women’s studies class I am currently formulating, I hope to provide students with the opportunity to discuss and critique theories of gender that have been discussed in the 20th century. Because many of these focus solely on the experiences of white women, I hope to show how narratives of history are inherently biased. That way, they are learning the theories/movements that have existed in the past (i.e. First Wave Feminism) but also play a role in dismantling them.
I understand CSP to be about three things:
1. The promotion of a pluralism that does not center monocultural “Whiteness.”
2. An understanding of culture as constantly changing and subject to reinterpretation.
3. a. A celebration of the social justice nature of these communities, as well as b. A willingness to contend with the problematic aspects of these pluralistic communities.
At BMCC, I normally teach Critical Thinking (CRT 100). I would characterize my general pedagogical approach in terms of enabling students to discover identity and purpose in my classes. A culturally sustaining pedagogy (CSP) will undoubtedly serve this goal. I try to promote an active learning environment in which students ultimately apply in creative ways the skill-based content learned in class. I find inspiration in a UDL methodology that puts great emphasis on what it calls “engagement.” I understand engagement to involve introducing students to Critical Thinking content by telling them why the content is important and when they will use the material in everyday life as well as in their academic fields.
In my attempt to incorporate CSP, I encourage students to give examples from their personal experience, with the hope that this will add relevance of the class to their lives. I’ll ask them to give arguments about why they think it will be cold outside today, or why they think iPhone is the best phone. From there, I can have students give arguments about more abstract or theoretical concepts, such as why BLM promotes social justice. Engagement hopefully happens from start to finish, because students can give examples at any time. I believe that I can further incorporate CSP in the classroom by asking more pointed questions about my students’ personal experiences. I can ask them, for example, to give arguments that involve reasons that they care about and take seriously. In doing so, I am far more likely to enable students to see the relevance of the class to their lives and to their communities.
I would describe Culturally Sustaining Pedagogies (CSP) as a way of valuing the diversity of our students and incorporating their culture and experiences in the classroom. Moving away from the premise that only one culture is correct.
Currently, I incorporate CSP in my courses by providing students opportunities to share their perspective on a topic. In my Aging and health course, the student is asked to interview the oldest person they know and contrast their own health and experiences with that interviewee when they were the student’s current age. Going forward, I will try to supplement the textbook with more material ( videos, articles, etc.) that reflect the student’s diverse backgrounds
What would liberating ourselves from
this gaze and the educational expectations it forwards mean for our abilities to envision new and recover community-rooted forms of teaching and
learning? What if the goal of teaching and learning with youth of color was
not ultimately to see how closely students could perform White middle-class
norms, but rather was to explore, honor, extend, and, at times, problematize
their cultural practices and investments?
What astonishes me about the previous quote taken from the chapter is that it requires a large amount of work and dedication to dismantle the learning and teaching approach that has existed for centuries. I am excited about that work and I see many opportunities to provide CSD resources and also see that there will be a challenge when my students have to defend against what the career field has accepted as the cultural norms of education. However this reminds me of how HBCU’s (Historically Black Colleges and Universities) have educated their students to have pride in their legacy of many achieved scholars who have surpassed and contributed to their respective career fields beyond their white counterpoints.
I am still trudging through the chapter and will add another comment later.
My approach to culturally sustaining pedagogies has been to expose students to a diverse variety of cultures and cultural practices through ethnically diverse readings about American society’s micro-cultures and through conversations with and presentations to each other usually by partnering students from different cultures and having them interview and/or go with and present each other.