Reading Across Cultures: Teaching Literature in a Diverse Society (Language and Literacy Series)

270 Pages·1997·0.89 MB·English

by  Theresa Rogers

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title: Reading Across Cultures : Teaching Literature in a
Diverse Society Language and Literacy Series (New York,
N.Y.)
author: Rogers, Theresa.
publisher: Teachers College Press
isbn10 | asin: 0807735515
print isbn13: 9780807735510
ebook isbn13: 9780585099095
language: English
subject Literature--Study and teaching--United States, Pluralism
(Social sciences) in literature--United States.
publication date: 1997
lcc: LB1576.R396 1997eb
ddc: 808/.0071
subject: Literature--Study and teaching--United States, Pluralism
(Social sciences) in literature--United States.
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Page i
Language and Literacy Series
Dorothy S. Strickland and Celia Genishi, SERIES EDITORS
ADVISORY BOARD: RICHARD ALLINGTON, DONNA ALVERMANN, KATHRYN AU, EDWARD
CHITTENDON, BERNICE CULLINAN, COLETTE DAIUTE, ANNE HAAS DYSON, CAROLE EDELSKY,
JANET EMIG, SHIRLEY BRICE HEATH, CONNIE JUEL, SUSAN LYTLE
Opening Dialogue: Understanding the Dynamics of Language and Learning in the English Classroom
MARTIN NYSTRAND with ADAM GAMORAN, ROBERT KACHUR, and CATHERINE PRENDERGAST
Reading Across Cultures: Teaching Literature in a Diverse Society
THERESA ROGERS and ANNA O. SOTER, Editors
"You Gotta Be the Book": Teaching Engaged and Reflective Reading with Adolescents
JEFFREY D. WILHELM
Just Girls: Hidden Literacies and Life in Junior High
MARGARET J. FINDERS
The First R: Every Child's Right to Read
MICHAEL F. GRAVES, PAUL VAN DEN BROEK, and BARBARA M. TAYLOR, Editors
Exploring Blue Highways: Literacy Reform, School Change, and the Creation of Learning Communities
JOBETH ALLEN, MARILYNN CARY, and LISA DELGADO, Coordinators
Envisioning Literature: Literary Understanding and Literature Instruction
JUDITH A. LANGER
Teaching Writing as Reflective Practice
GEORGE HILLOCKS, JR.
Talking Their Way into Science: Hearing Children's Questions and Theories, Responding with Curricula
KAREN GALLAS
Whole Language Across the Curriculum: Grades 1, 2, 3
SHIRLEY C. RAINES, Editor
The Administration and Supervision of Reading Programs, SECOND EDITION
SHELLEY B. WEPNER, JOAN T. FEELEY, and DOROTHY S. STRICKLAND, Editors
No Quick Fix: Rethinking Literacy Programs in America's Elementary Schools
RICHARD L. ALLINGTON and SEAN A. WALMSLEY, Editors
Unequal Opportunity: Learning to Read in the U.S.A.
JILL SUNDAY BARTOLI
Nonfiction for the Classroom: Milton Meltzer on Writing, History, and Social Responsibility
Edited and with an Introduction by E. WENDY SAUL
When Children Write: Critical Re-Visions of the Writing Workshop
TIMOTHY LENSMIRE
Dramatizing Literature in Whole Language Classrooms, SECOND EDITION
JOHN WARREN STEWIG and CAROL BUEGE
The Languages of Learning: How Children Talk, Write, Dance, Draw, and Sing Their Understanding of the World
KAREN GALLAS
Partners in Learning: Teachers and Children in Reading Recovery
CAROL A. LYONS, GAY SU PINNELL, and DIANE E. DEFORD
Social Worlds of Children Learning to Write in an Urban Primary School
ANNE HAAS DYSON
(Continued)

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Page ii
The Politics of Workplace Literacy: A Case Study
SHERYL GREENWOOD GOWEN
Inside/Outside: Teacher Research and Knowledge
MARILYN COCHRAN-SMITH and SUSAN L. LYTLE
Literacy Events in a Community of Young Writers
YETTA M. GOODMAN and SANDRA WILDE, Editors
Whole Language Plus: Essays on Literacy in the United States and New Zealand
COURTNEY B. CAZDEN
Process Reading and Writing: A Literature-Based Approach
JOAN T. FEELEY, DOROTHY S. STRICKLAND, and SHELLEY B. WEPNER, Editors
The Child as Critic: Teaching Literature in Elementary and Middle Schools, THIRD EDITION
GLENNA DAVIS SLOAN
The Triumph of Literature/The Fate of Literacy: English in the Secondary School Curriculum
JOHN WILLINSKY
The Child's Developing Sense of Theme: Responses to Literature
SUSAN S. LEHR
Literacy for a Diverse Society: Perspectives, Practices, and Policies
ELFRIEDA H. HIEBERT, Editor
The Complete Theory-to-Practice Handbook of Adult Literacy: Curriculum Design and Teaching Approaches
RENA SOIFER, MARTHA IRWIN, BARBARA CRUMRINE, EMO HONZAKI, BLAIR SIMMONS, and
DEBORAH YOUNG

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Page iii
Reading Across Cultures
Teaching Literature in a
Diverse Society
EDITED BY
Theresa Rogers and Anna O. Soter
Foreword by Rudine Sims Bishop
Teachers College
Columbia
University
New York and
London
National
Council of
Teachers of
English
Urbana, Illinois

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Page iv
Published simultaneously by Teachers College Press, 1234 Amsterdam Avenue, New York, NY 10027 and the
National Council of Teachers of English
Copyright © 1997 by Teachers College, Columbia University
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means,
electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission
from the publisher.
"To You" by Langston Hughes reprinted from Collected Poems by Langston Hughes. Copyright © 1994 by the
Estate of Langston Hughes. Reprinted by permission of Alfred A. Knopf, Inc.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Reading across cultures : teaching literature in a diverse society /
edited by Theresa Rogers and Anna O. Soter.
p. cm.(Language and literacy series)
Includes bibliographical references and indexes.
ISBN 0-8077-3552-3 (cloth : alk. paper).ISBN 0-8077-3551-5
(pbk. : alk. paper)
1. LiteratureStudy and teachingUnited States. 2. Pluralism
(Social sciences) in literatureUnited States. I. Rogers,
Theresa. II. Soter, Anna O., 1946- . III. Series: Language and
literacy series (New York, N.Y.)
LB1576.R396 1997
808'.0071dc20 96-32594
ISBN 0-8077-3551-5 (paper)
ISBN 0-8077-3552-3 (cloth)
NCTE Stock No. 50284
Printed on acid-free paper
Manufactured in the United States of America
04 03 02 01 00 99 98 97 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

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Page v
Contents
Foreword by Rudine Sims Bishop vii
Acknowledgments xi
Introduction
Theresa Rogers and Anna O. Soter 1
PART I
Classroom Stories
1 Negotiating the Meaning of Difference: Talking Back to
Multicultural Literature
Patricia E. Enciso 13
2 Re-Visioning Reading and Teaching Literature Through the Lens
of Narrative Theory
William McGinley, George Kamberelis, Timothy Mahoney, Daniel
Madigan, Victoria Rybicki, and Jeff Oliver 42
3 Students' Resistance to Engagement with Multicultural Literature
Richard Beach 69
4 No Imagined Peaceful Place: A Story of Community, Texts, and
Cultural Conversations in One Urban High School English
Classroom
Theresa Rogers 95
5 Multiplicity and Difference in Literary Inquiry: Toward a
Conceptual Framework for Reader-Centered Cultural Criticism
Mary Beth Hines 116

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Page vi
PART II
Authors, Teachers, and Texts
6 Exploring Multicultural Literature as Cultural Production
Arlette Ingram Willis 135
7 Reflections on Cultural Diversity in Literature and in the
Classroom
Laura E. Desai 161
8 Out of the Closet and onto the Bookshelves: Images of Gays and
Lesbians in Young Adult Literature
Mari M. McLean 178
9 Reader-Response Theory and the Politics of Multicultural
Literature
Mingshui Cai 199
10 Reading Literature of Other Cultures: Some Issues in Critical
Interpretation
Anna O. Soter 213
About the Editors and the Contributors 231
General Index 235
Index of Literary Works for Children and Young Adults 242

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Page vii
Foreword
To sit and dream, to sit and read,
To sit and learn about the world
Outside our world of here and now
Our problem world
To dream of vast horizons of the soul
Through dreams made whole,
All you who are dreamers too,
Help me to make
Our world anew.
I reach out my dreams to you.
Langston Hughes, "To You"
MUCH OF THE PROFESSIONAL writing on the teaching of literature in elementary and secondary schools has,
in recent years, focused on reader-response theory and on multiculturalism in literature for children and young
adults. Reader-response theory has provided the foundation for instructional approaches that emphasize the role of
readers in constructing meanings and interpretations of texts, while multiculturalism has called for an expanded
repertoire of authentic literary works to reflect the cultural diversity that characterizes American and global
society. READING ACROSS CULTURES stands at the confluence of reader-response theory and multicultural
literature or cultural studies, moving both in a new direction.
The professional writing on the role of multicultural literature in classrooms has primarily focused on the need to
make visible underrepresented groups and to counter negative images and stereotypes. The main educational
benefit of these strategies for readers who are members of such groups has been presumed to be that such literature
would, by legitimating their images, their heritage, and their cultural experiences, provide opportunities for
building self-esteem. This would in turn lead to improved scholastic achievement, particularly in regard to written
literacy. For readers who are members of dominant groups, the assumption has been that becoming acquainted
with and finding their own connections to literature about people from nondominant groups would help

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Page viii
them to value all peoples, accept differences as a natural aspect of human societies, and even celebrate cultural
pluralism as a desirable feature of the world in which they live. Less attention has been paid to the specific kinds
of instructional strategies that might accomplish these ends, to the effects on response of the sociocultural
identities that readers assume, and to the influence on those responses of the social and cultural environments in
which readings take place.
READING ACROSS CULTURES helps to fill a gap by presenting stories of actual classrooms and the ways that
teachers and students in those classrooms, from third grade to college, make and take meanings from a variety of
texts. In so doing it takes us well beyond being satisfied with merely exposing readers to a variety of texts. It
reminds us that the goal of multicultural education, and the role of literature within that context, is ultimately to
help "to make our world anew," to transform society into one in which social justice and equity prevail, and that
reaching that goal will require schooling in which teachers and students are able to confront and critique some of
the thorny issues and -isms (such as racism and sexism) that are at the root of past and continuing inequities.
READING ACROSS CULTURES shows how literature, through the power of its artistry, can be a catalyst for
engaging students in critical discussions and for eliciting multiple perspectives and multiple voices in pursuit of
understanding. It also reminds us that among those multiple voices are voices of resistance. Real change will not,
therefore, be easy, nor will it come solely as a result of reading and responding to literature, which is, after all, an
art form, not an instrument of indoctrination. Nor can literature, even with all its potential artistic power, be
expected to carry the major responsibility for transforming the world.
In the classrooms portrayed in the first part of this volume, emphasis is mainly on the readers, the teachers, and the
texts. They are not, however, the only players in the game of reading and interpreting literature, particularly cross-
cultural texts. One of the main issues in the criticism of so-called multicultural literature, especially literature for
children and young adults, has been the extent to which an author's sociocultural background influences or
interferes with the ability to create literature about characters who are members of a different social group,
particularly when the author is a member of a dominant group writing about those who are not. In READING
ACROSS CULTURES the author is included in the conversation, as is the critic concerned with patterns in the
representations of social groups or with critical interpretations of literature across cultures and the teacher educator
aware that his or her instructional strategies will have an effect across generations of readers. In short, Theresa
Rogers and Anna Soter and the other authors in this collection take on the complexities

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Page ix
of reading, writing, interpreting, and critiquing literature in the context of both culturally diverse and more nearly
monocultural classrooms as well as the pluralistic larger society. In so doing they clarify issues and indicate some
possible steps toward resolution of some of those issues.
Teachers, teacher educators, and researchers with an interest in cultural studies, multicultural literature, and reader-
response theory will find that READING ACROSS CULTURES can be a guide through some of the swiftly
flowing waters of contemporary literary theory and criticism. It does not simplify the issues, because they cannot
be simplified, but with its own set of multiple perspectives and diverse voices, it helps to clarify our vision and
point the way forward toward a better understanding of the role that reading literature can (and cannot) play in
helping to transform schools and society, the ways that reading, writing, discussing, teaching, and critiquing
literature can help "to make our world anew."
Rudine Sims Bishop
Ohio State University

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