Multicultural Psychology. Jennifer T. Pedrotti
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Connor holds the viewpoint that Alex is thinking about his race too much, and yet many in our country understand that for Black men in particular, being unaware that your race may impact your daily life may have dire consequences (Hadden, Tolliver, Snowden, & Brown-Manning, 2016; Patton & Snyder-Yuly, 2007).
It is possible that if the two remain friends, Connor might witness some of the experiences that Alex has that deal with racial discrimination in his life, and this may allow Connor to make room for the possibility that Alex’s worldview is linked to concrete experience and evidence in his life. Though this might first lead to cognitive dissonance in Connor, he may be able to start to open his worldview to include the idea that race may impact people on a daily basis. This type of ethnocultural empathy is often developed when we interact with individuals who are different from ourselves. For a current example, you might look up the story of John Lewis (a former Freedom Rider who is now a US senator) and Elwin Wilson (a former member of the Ku Klux Klan that confronted Lewis at a rally long ago). When Wilson actually spoke to Lewis, he had a different sense of him as a man, and Wilson changed his life because of this interaction.
One final note in this section: Ignoring the fact that worldviews of others can be different can lead to members of one group assuming that their ideals, beliefs, and characteristics might be viewed in the same way by another group. Researchers in the field of psychology often call the concept of this practice imposed ethics, which refers to putting one’s worldviews onto others as “right,” “normal,” or “healthy” (Berry, 1990; Leong, Leach, Marsella, & Pickren, 2012). This may be intensified by the fact brought up earlier that invalidating the worldviews of nondominant groups by dominant groups may also result in fewer friendships between these two groups, thus making groups more homogenous. Going back to our discussion of the differences between White settlers and American Indian and Indigenous populations in the Americas, the White settlers brought with them a host of customs and practices that were based on their own worldview and insisted that the native populations adhere to these. Any dissensions from this norm were seen as “savage” and “primitive,” among other descriptors. The nondominant group, in this case the native peoples, suffered greatly under these imposed ethics. It is a lesson that our country should not forget in thinking about how to integrate more worldviews into our current social milieu.
Conclusion
In this chapter we have explained a number of different factors that may impact the development of worldview in groups and in individuals. We have used more vignettes than we used in any of our other chapters to help provide you with a variety of voices from all different groups. Some of you have heard many of these worldviews before, or have more intimate knowledge of people that may hold similar beliefs, while others of you may be hearing about some of them for the first time. One of the most effective ways to learn about those who are different from you in some way is to develop a level of multicultural competence that allows you to have a level of awareness of your beliefs and others’ beliefs, knowledge of different groups, and skills for working and interacting with many different kinds of people (American Psychological Association, 2008). As you develop this multicultural competence, you may see your friendship and social circles expanding naturally to include a more diverse array of individuals. Note that we use the word diverse here to mean a group that has many different types of identities and worldviews present—some from majority cultures, and others from more underrepresented or historically disenfranchised groups. Consider some of the activities in the ACT section below to help you learn about other worldviews this week and to expand your knowledge of other groups.
We close by asking you to work toward distinguishing between the path and your path. There is no one path that works for us all, and we would all do well to remember that (Coelho, 1993).
ACT: Assess Your Knowledge, Critical Thinking, Take Part
Assess Your Knowledge
Think back to Chapter 1 when you first created your culture sketch. Look over your answers, and choose several identities that feel salient or prominent in your daily life; then complete the following questions for each. (See the example of Jonas below for some ideas.)
Does your status on this identity facet hold power in the United States? (For example, if you identify as a man, your gender is a group that holds power in the United States today.)
What messages do you get about this identity facet in the media or from other information readily available? Do you agree or disagree with these messages?
What values, strengths, or beliefs do you think come along with your identity in this area?
Example: Jonas on the facet of ethnicity and race
1 My status does not hold power in the United States. As a Latinx man, I have less social power than White men and women today.
2 The media often depicts my group as non-English-speaking, undocumented, poor, and uneducated. These aren’t things that are true about me, so I don’t agree with the messages, but I fight them all the time. I do feel like people often stereotype me in this way and are surprised that I’m a college student in engineering and that I speak both Spanish and English fluently and without an accent. I try to make sure I correct people if I feel like they are stereotyping me.
3 I think family is very important, and I know this comes from my Latinx heritage. I think men should be strong and care for their family. I’m not super religious, but I believe in God, and I think that comes from my grandmothers talking about this so much. I also believe in standing up for myself, and I think that comes from my family being in a position of having had to do that for many generations because of racism and other discrimination.
Critical Thinking
In looking at the answers to the above questions, can you begin to see your own worldview? Does the world feel safe to you? Does it feel fair? Does it feel open or closed? How do the intersections of your various identities manifest in everyday life for you?
Now take one of your salient identities and try to answer the above questions as if you held a different identity on that facet. If you are a man, for example, try to answer those questions as though you were a woman or a nonbinary individual. How are your answers different? Is the worldview different as well?
Take Part
Participation: If you are imagining the answers of someone who is different from you in race, gender, or some other facet, now is your chance to do a little research. Choose an identity that is different from yours, and find some literature about that population. This might be a novel or short story narrating another’s experience, or a series of articles that talk about views of this group. See Appendix for a list of novels about different racial groups.
Initiation: Find a person who shares several of your identity facets, and conduct an interview with this person on these facets by asking the questions in the preceding Assess Your Knowledge section. As you begin to see the shape of this person’s worldview, note where you are similar and where you are not. You may find some diversity in worldviews because of the intersections of their other facets as well.
Activism: Find a person that you know is different from you in ways that might mean your worldviews are incredibly different. Sometimes this is a person who is older than you (of a different generation) or of a different racial or sexual orientation group. Make some time to conduct an interview asking the person the questions in the Assess Your Knowledge section. Though you may not agree with this person’s viewpoints, try hard not to disagree and to just record the answers. Plot these into a worldview sketch of the person based on the answers. Does this help you to better understand where this person comes from? What is your reaction to the different worldview? How might you still interact with a person whose worldview is incredibly different from yours?
Descriptions