Tuesday, July 18, 2017

Perspectives on Diversity and Culture

Rebecca (friend and colleague)

Culture is the pieces to our everyday puzzle that make us who we are. It is our religion, language, race and so on that shape us who we are.

Diversity is the differences in society’s cultures allowing for people to be able to be different. It is a part of our life that can create issues of allow for us to learn about others depending who we utilize the information gained.

Amanda (friend)

Culture is our religion, race, ethnicity, language anything that defines our beliefs and values we hold dear to us.

Diversity is the differences within groups of people.

Joel (Husband)

Culture is our language, religion, ethnicity, and background of who we are and where we came from.

Diversity is the variance of groups of people.


While asking for the definitions of what is culture and diversity there was hesitance each time as they began to define the term. Each person is from a different economic, religious, gender, age, abilities, and social class.

I find the answers I received from the participants did mirror with the definitions of culture and diversity, which are:

Culture is groups of people and how they live. It includes everything that is valued, beliefs, language, and religion (Derman-Sparks, L., & Edwards, J. O., 2010, p.55).

Diversity is the unique differences within people and their culture (Derman-Sparks, L., & Edwards, J. O., 2010, p.55).

Each individual omitted the parts of culture that can include abilities and economic social standings. These are important parts of cultural differences to create identity.

Reflecting on what others definitions of culture and diversity are just continue to prove the broadness of the topics. The meanings of the words are different to everyone some are more precise and others believe it to be less diverse. Being able to learn more about culture and diversity will greatly impact me as an early educator giving me more insight to better be able to serve those in the programs I am a part of.

Reference:


Derman-Sparks, L., & Edwards, J. O. (2010). Learning about culture, language, & Fairness. In Anti-bias education for young children and ourselves (p. 55). Washington, DC: National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC).

4 comments:

  1. Hello Stephanie,
    I think it funny that we both have a friend named Rebecca that we used for this assignment. My friend Rebecca is of Asian decent, specifically Chinese, but was born in the United States. I agree with your statement on how it impacts our aspect of diversity and culture. Everyone has a different answer to diversity and culture but still has some of the same ideas about the two. Thanks for sharing!

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  2. Hi Stephanie,

    I agree that both culture and diverse are broad topics to define. They mean different things to different people. However, a consensus is that they are both important in recognizing the differences in people and differences need to be appreciated and respected.

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  3. Hi, Stephanie,

    I really enjoyed reading your post! I agree that all are entitled to respect the differences of every human being. We all are unique!

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  4. Stephanie,

    My friends that I asked these questions to also took a minute to think before they answered the question. Each had their own interpretation of the words. This subject will greatly impact you as an early childhood educator because you will come in contact with many occasions where diversity and culture will be a topic in your classroom.

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