Should we incorporate texts from other cultures in our core curricula? If you are still unsure about the answer, let’s find it out through the examination of the evolution of American culture!

Invention of “traditional Western Civilization” in the 19th and 20th century

In China, we are taught that America and other western countries can be understood as one “entity” and have the same inheritance thread: from Ancient Greece to the Great Roman Empire and then spreading to the whole European continent. Until yesterday when I read the history of “Western Civilization” written by Rebecca Futo Kennedy, and I realized how serious my stereotype of the western world is. In her article, Kennedy argues that the idea of western civilization equals the identity of “whiteness” that connected the U.S and European countries beyond national boundaries and was linked to classics “on purpose”. 

The word “Western Civilization” first appeared in the annual report of the Society for the Promotion of Collegiate and Theological Education in 1844. Since then to 1890, the word only referred to “the world of the American frontier”, which stated that in opposition to savagery and barbarism of native Americans, Christianity was the key element of civilization. Later in the 1860s, the term “Western Civilization” included Western Europe. 

However, in the 1890s, the meaning of Western Civilization changed. Due to the huge increase of immigrants from different parts of Europe, the population was mixed in America. It became increasingly important to construct an ideology that united people from different countries. Thus, the idea of “whiteness” was invented. The inventors created a bridge between white people and some ancient civilizations like Ancient Greece, the Great Roman Empire, and ancient Macedonia through books and works of art and architecture containing “traditional Western ideas”. This propaganda is pervasive around the world, and it is successful. The stereotype rooted deeply in people’s minds just as those inventors wanted to see. 

However, now in America, things have been changed. Due to the postwar social upheaval and African Americans’ civil rights protests in the 1960s, American people became less and less comfortable with the idea of cultural monolithism. Nowadays, the America we are familiar with is largely built on the idea of “cultural pluralism”.

2019 Census Data in the U.S

America is now a very diverse country. From the 2019 U.S. Census data, we can see that white people still hold more than half of the population. The remaining 36.6% of the population is largely made up of three races: Latino (15.3%), African American (13.4%), and Asian (5.9%). 

According to US Census Bureau’s report, around the time the 2020 Census is conducted, more than half of the nation’s children (people under age 18) are expected to be part of a minority race or ethnic group. This proportion is expected to continue to grow so that “by 2060, just 36 percent of all children will be single-race non-Hispanic white”.

Clearly, simple “whiteness” does not mean to be an American anymore.

What does it really mean to be an American?

In the article “What Does It Mean to Be an ‘American’?”, Michael Walzer argues that the fundamental idea that supports America is cultural pluralism. It means when smaller groups within a larger society maintain their unique cultural identities, whereby their values and practices are accepted by the dominant culture and coexist with it. 

America is known as “the melting pot” for a long time. In most countries, there will be an assumption of immigrants absorbing the culture from native society. However, America is a country of immigrants who still remember their old places and maintain their own cultures. It is not simply a normal immigration country.  All cultures brought by people from different nations mix together into one culture—the American culture we now know.

American philosopher Horace Kallen defined the U.S as “a union of ethnic, racial, and religious groups” which is a union of “unrelated natives” from all over the world. Although Americans have different cultural backgrounds, each of them contributes to the American culture. 

What a culturally plural core curriculum should be like

Back to the question we ask, the answer seems clear. America is not a country with only white people anymore. Our core curricula should and need to take every part of American culture into account. They should incorporate texts representing different races and cultures in America, (European, Asian, African, Latino, etc.), for example: incorporating books like The Analects of Confucius, The Negro Speaks of Rivers by Langston Hughes, The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros can perfectly serve the purpose of making our core curricula more diverse.

Author

My name is Derrick Qu. Currently, I am a Sophomore at Colgate University. I come from China and spend this whole semester studying remotely in Beijing.

I plan to major in philosophy because the processes of solving philosophical questions are really interesting! If you have any interesting questions, welcome to sharing with me!