Advancing the Challenges and Possibilities of Multicultural Education

Multiculturalism matters and is both conceptually and practically more important than integration and assimilation. To understand this hypothesis, this presentation will examine the political nature of multiculturalism in England and how the term is becoming audible in a General Election year. The irony of political discussions on integration by the most culturally diverse Parliamentary English Cabinet in history underlines how political ideology prevents the discussion of issues of race and ethnicity by individuals whose parents participated in both Windrush and Partition (Shorten, 2022).

I will begin this presentation by explaining my advocacy of the challenges and possibilities of multicultural education (Banks, 2016) with the promotion of anti-racist pedagogy and decolonising curriculum (Race, 2022a; 2022b). What is multiculturalism and why it is important in 2024? Does multiculturalism work or is it dead (Joppke, 2017)? I will examine a theory of multicultural education which arose from the empirical data collected for the author’s monograph, Multiculturalism and Education. The findings from that monograph will be examined i.e., the importance of awareness and diversity training through continuing professional development, the (distant) promotion of citizenship education, and the need for a transformative education which needs to change the monocultural, dated national curriculum in England.

I will draw out implications and recommendations. There is an ultimate need to challenge the ‘national’ within an English context within an international focus. After all, the national curriculum in England was a Brexit policy thirty years before Brexit (Race, 2019). The United Kingdom has four unique education systems with histories, policy and practice e.g., compare the new(ish) national curriculum and state-anti-racism policy which were introduced by the Welsh Government in 2022 with either England, Scotland or Northern Ireland systems of education. There are continued opportunities for comparative research in education within the UK and beyond (Watkins and Noble, 2021) and those future empirical opportunities highlight the challenges and possibilities of multicultural education.

Biography

Dr. Richard Race is Senior Lecturer in Education at Teesside University, England and Visiting Professor in Education at Sapienza University in Rome, Italy.

For more information on his current research and publications (see below), email – r.race@tees.ac.uk

Selected References from the Author.

Race, R., Ayling, P., Chetty, D., Hassan, N., McKinney, S.J., Boath, L., Riaz, N., Salehjee, S. (2022a). Decolonising curriculum in education: continuing proclamations and provocations. London Review of Education. Vol. 20(1). https://DOI: 10.14324/LRE.20.1.12.

Race, R., Gill, D., Kaitell, E., Mahmud, A., Thorpe, A., Wolfe, K. (2022b). Proclamations and provocations: Decolonising curriculum in education research and professional practice. Equity in Education & Society, 1(1), 82–96. https://doi.org/10.1177/27526461211068833

Race, R. (Ed.) (2024a) Multicultural Dialogues and Multicultural Education, London, Open University Press.

Race, R. (3^rd Ed.) (2024b) Multiculturalism and Education, London, Open University Press.