LETTER: Non-Western cultures equally important

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To the editor:

I am writing this letter to clarify a point of view that was introduced in my original letter ("Ignorance begets racism") to the Thresher on Feb. 9, a point of view that was grossly misinterpreted by Lisa De La Torre in the Feb. 16 issue ("Desire to learn about own culture should not be perceived as ignorance, racism").

This argument began when I wrote the letter commenting on a friend's choice not to study abroad in Africa.

I would like to begin this letter by pointing out that I was not criticizing my friend for her choice -- my friend is entitled to choose as she pleases, and I don't really care what her final decision ends up being.

Rather, I was offering a possible reason for why my friend made the choice that she did and what her choice implies about the society that we live in.

I stated that my friend made the decision that she did because of her fundamental lack of interest in African culture; I suggested that my friend's lack of interest came from the fact that she was not familiar with African culture.

In response, De La Torre tries to say that education about other cultures is unnecessary: "No amount of knowledge about African technological innovations will help earn a promotion in Western society."

The implication of De La Torre's statement is that the United States is a society that is and should be dominated by those who have adopted a Western mindset, by those who have assimilated into white culture.

However, the whole point of my original article -- the point that De La Torre somehow missed -- is that America is not exclusively for whites or those who want to be white.

As I said before, the United States is a multicultural nation, with large populations of people who are from non-European cultures.

What this means is that the typical American is not white only, but instead may be white, Asian, Hispanic or black; the curriculum of the American educational system needs to begin to reflect this fact.

In other words, because blacks, Hispanics and Asians comprise such a large and and quickly growing segment of American society, it becomes incumbent upon whites to learn more about these cultures, just as blacks, Hispanics and Asians are made to learn about the culture of whites.

Education naturally leads to understanding and tolerance, and it is precisely this understanding which will alleviate problems between the races.

De La Torre disapproves of my criticism of the American educational system: "Criticism of our educational system has gone too far."

However, my argument focuses on the American educational system specifically because of its importance in shaping social norms: Changes in social attitudes begin as changes within the educational system.

For example, as multicultural education becomes more widespread, references which are currently made in popular literature to John Locke and David Hume will be replaced by references to the Qu'raan and to the I Ching -- this will occur once these works become more well established, once these works become accepted as subjects that every educated American should be familiar with.

To say -- as De La Torre says -- that there is not enough time to study other cultures is ridiculous.

How can De La Torre say that in the 12 years of pre-college education that she received and in the 4 years of college education she is about to receive -- 16 years of education total! -- that there is not enough time to read a couple of books written by authors not from Western civilizations?

This sounds to me like an excuse given by those who are too lazy to enact reform.

Although I am not suggesting that multicultural education is the be-all, end-all solution to racism, I firmly believe that it is an important first step to be made in addressing a pressing social problem.

Irphan Gaslightwala

Hanszen '96

This item appeared in the Opinion section of the February 23, 1996 issue.

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