Multiculturalism in the College Curriculum

Emphasizing that diversity in the curriculum is as much about a way of thinking as it is about specific information, Lutzker presents a compendium of innovative and practical classroom strategies and widely available information resources which will enable faculty to increase the multicultural content of their courses without necessarily making major changes in their accustomed methods of teaching. This is a handbook for college faculty in all disciplines who would like to increase the multicultural content of their courses, but have been reluctant to do so for a variety of reasons including an already overloaded syllabus, a lack of background in the subject, uncertainty about student reactions, or lack of time to make substantial changes in an existing syllabus. Administrators anxious to increase diversity in the curriculum of their institutions, but unable to fund large-scale curriculum revision projects, will also find this volume useful. Part I is concerned with classroom strategies and with student research projects. Starting with discussions of objectives and priorities, the underlying role of critical thinking, and the importance of language sensitivity, the book then describes specific classroom strategies useful for increasing diversity. The subsequent chapters are devoted to discussions of general guidelines for developing student projects with a multicultural perspective, innovative alternatives to the traditional term paper, and suggestions for multicultural student projects which do not require library research. Part I concludes with a discussion of possible student reactions to increased multiculturalism, and suggested approaches to those reactions. Part II is concerned with information resources which will be useful to instructors and to students. Fully annotated lists are provided in a variety of areas including widely available primary sources, specialized biographical directories, sources for sample syllabi in all disciplines, guides to ethnic and foreign press, to films and videos, and to electronic resources. Part II concludes with a discussion designed to increase efficiency in using the library catalog to locate information in multicultural subject areas. Appendices provide sample research worksheets, a list of small publishers and distributors of multicultural books, and an annotated bibliography.

MARILYN LUTZKER is Professor in the library at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, City University of New York. Her previous publications include Research Projects for College Students: What to Write Across the Curriculum (1988), and Criminal Justice Research in Libraries (1986), both published by Greenwood Press. She has lectured to numerous faculty groups about creative approaches to student research projects, and about incorporating multicultural approaches into traditional syllabi.