OPINION

Published Monday, December 15, 2003
Fast Food Diversity?
Reflections on the Multicultural Festival
By Jeff Garrett
APPIAN STAFF WRITER

On Friday, November 14th, the first floor lounge of Cronkhite Graduate Center was the site of this year’s HGSE Multicultural Festival. The event drew a sizeable crowd eager to sample the array of free food from around the world and take in the intriguing performances from members of the HGSE community. Over the course of three weeks prior to the event, I along with other members of the HGSE Black Student Union (BSU) had been asked if we would like to perform at the festival. In the past, we were told members of BSU had danced and done step routines at the festival, and the organizers of the event for this year were interested in having members of BSU do something similar for this year’s performance. As an organization, we did not perform in this year’s festival, though I will refrain from speculating on the motivations of others here as to why. From my standpoint, however, I can best explain my hesitation as a strange feeling I get in my stomach any time this kind of an event is held. There is certainly an intellectual explanation as to why I am reluctantly accepting of this kind of campus event, but that scripted, intellectual response has its roots deep within a raw, emotional first reaction. There is something about the idea of a multicultural festival, an event where people come to be entertained by the abbreviated expressions of exotic cultures other than their own, that is troubling to me.

In a conversation with several Ed School colleagues about a week prior to the festival, we discussed this topic openly. I explained to the group that I was having this subtly negative feeling about the multicultural festival, but that I was having trouble explaining exactly why. A male colleague offered his perception of these kinds of events and it was one I felt was particularly helpful in me being able to articulate my own thoughts on the matter. He explained that there was something almost “fetishistic” about the concept of a multicultural festival. In his view, these kinds of performances did little in the way of actually changing a person’s views, or substantively informing them for that matter. Attending a multicultural festival simply encouraged people to feel like they had done their part to embrace diversity and now they could get back to their normal lives. After reflecting on this conversation later that night it became clear to me that this same idea was what had been troubling me. That strange feeling in my stomach was indeed a manifestation of my belief that a multicultural festival functions as a double-edged blade. On one hand, it is a valuable opportunity for all members of a community to experience the breadth of cultures that exist in our society. On the other hand, it is an event that, while exposing people to the diversity around them, does little to actually immerse people within that diversity, or encourage them to question their assumptions about those groups of people whom they observe performing.

These kinds of multicultural events, though surely not universally negative in their impact, do contribute to a climate of tokenism with regard to diversity that I believe plagues our country. As an undergraduate I often encountered this tokenistic attitude towards diversity while doing activist work around campus. My fellow students always seemed interested in attending a “culture night,” tasting ethnic food, or hearing music from around the world be performed. But when it came time to engage in dialogue about diversity on campus, or the challenges of overcoming racial inequality, the number of supporters often dwindled. The conclusion I drew from those experiences, was that people are most often willing and eager to participate in diversity-focused events that simply offer brief glimpses into the complexity of another’s experience, but are hesitant to participate in an experience that involves the process of acknowledging another’s experience and understanding their perspective. I often joked with friends that people just want quick events they can attend and get their “liberal pass” stamped so that they can get back to life as usual. The kind of critical thought, analysis, and willingness to engage that one would expect from college students was precisely what I found lacking with regard to issues of diversity. Though I would not characterize my peers’ willingness to engage issues of diversity in meaningful ways here at HGSE as exactly the same as I experienced as an undergraduate, I do find elements of that experience still hold true here. Unfortunately, multicultural festivals often provide people an easy way out of more meaningful engagement. They give people the erroneous impression that one can somehow get diversity-to-go, in an easily digestible capsule, and come away with the same kind of benefit they would have from a more in-depth and interactive dialogue.

Let me be clear here that I am neither attacking the spirit of multicultural festivals, nor the efforts of those who see that they come to fruition. I attended this year’s multicultural festival to support my friends and colleagues who were performing and was impressed by what I saw. In fact, compared to many similar events I’ve seen, this one certainly ranked as one of the best with regard to the issues raised above. I appreciated seeing the richness of experience we have here at the Ed school. This same richness of experience is noticeably absent from our faculty and course offerings this year and it was a positive experience for me to see that at least student diversity can have a prominent voice at HGSE. Still, I left feeling somewhat unsettled. I applaud the efforts of the students who performed and those people who gave many hours of their time to organize the festival, but I would hate to see their effort to bring attention to the importance of acknowledging and embracing diversity go to waste by observers assuming that the conversation has simply ended with the conclusion of that night’s performance. What we get in multicultural festivals is merely a glimpse into the diversity that makes up our collective student experience at HGSE. One would be remiss to assume they have really learned what they should about another person’s experience by attending a multicultural festival, just as they would be if they assumed they had learned all there is to know about cooking by walking up and down the aisles of a grocery store. In this regard I see personal engagement with diversity as being more like a process than an event. Multicultural festivals, while entertaining and accessible, are not a fitting substitute for sustained dialogue and true interpersonal and intellectual engagement with individuals of other backgrounds and with philosophies and perspectives different from your own.

As a school of educators, we have a unique responsibility in our society to be conscious of these issues. We are the people seeking to facilitate, organize, administer and support the education of millions of students in the United States and abroad. Each of us must ensure that in our time here at HGSE, we do not fall into the trap of tokenizing diversity and limiting our own meaningful engagement in these issues. Essential in this process is challenging ourselves to understand the value and profound significance of individual experience and background in shaping our own attitudes as well as those of the people with whom we interact. Our time here is only meaningful in how it enhances our ability to be effective in serving the students and communities we will eventually impact, whether that is in the classroom or the boardroom. To that end, we must ensure that we do not let the discussion of diversity be reduced to a brief and formalized annual event.

We must challenge ourselves to engage in these issues with regularity both in academic settings, as well as in our daily lives.

Jeff Garrett is a masters candidate in the Teacher Education Program.