Dialogic Pedagogy and Educating Preservice Teachers for Critical Multiculturalism

Research Site and Research Participants

Students in the course

There were 35 students enrolled in the cultural diversity course all identified as females. Four identified as African American; one as first generation Korean American, one as Latina and middle class, one as White and lesbian; and one from a same sex household. The students’ demographic information was extracted from the results of a questionnaire that was administered at the beginning of the semester.

The study focused on cases of monologic interactions and the role that monologism and dialogism played in students’ learning. Two students who manifested extreme monologism in the dialogue were selected. However, the larger study revealed that the majority of the students swung between monologism and dialogism throughout the course. In this context, the author would like to justify her choice of the study case design in reporting the data. Yin (1994) maintained that case study designs are best for situations in which it is impossible to separate the phenomenon’s variables from their context. The reason the author selected these two students is to suggest that even in cases of extreme monologism and resistance, dialogic pedagogy could play a role in students’ learning and future decision making as teachers. Both students in this study came from similar socioeconomic background but they were different racially. The first student, Bonnie, was White and self-identified as upper-middle class. The second student, Monique, self-identified as African American, suburban, and middle class. Although only one of them seemed to be overtly opposed to the curriculum, the other was opposed covertly and for different reasons. The monologic/dialogic dynamic (in this course), thus, could differ according to the participants’ racial, ethnic, and cultural background and also according to their individual experiences and the way they interpret or perceive reality. This is why the author found that zooming on two individual cases could help the reader understand in depth the unique experience that the individual participant went through in that course, and while the author does not claim that such experience is representative of the opportunities or challenges to learning that all dialogic multicultural classes might offer, they also could not be unrepresentative (Tobin & Davidson, 1991).

Moreover, the author decided to analyze the data 2 years after the course was over to prevent any ethical issues related to the conflict of interests between the researcher who was also the course instructor and the students among whom some consented to being participants in the research. At the beginning of the course, students were asked to fill in a consent form for using their oral and written contribution in the class for research. The consent form assured the students that while data would be collected during the course, no analysis would take place except after the course was over and that their real names would not be used in reporting the data. As the author was analyzing the data 2 years after the course was over and wanted to supplement the data with interviews to achieve member check as discussed above, she sent an email to the class list that was still preserved in the course database and got 12 responses from students who agreed to be interviewed. The first case study was not among those students but an insider’s view on some of the process she went through during this course and after was offered by one of her friends who also used to be a student in the course and who came to the interview. The first student consented to using her written work and class discussion for research even though she did not come to the interview.

Data analysis and synthesis

The theoretical framework of dialogic pedagogy guided the initial coding of the data. The data were coded line by line in bottom-up process to assign codes and to find emerging themes related to students’ interactions in terms of monologism and dialogism as defined by Bakhtinian scholars, which the author discussed in the “Theoretical Framework” section of this article. When the author first started coding the data, she counted moments of dialogism and monologism. How these terms were operationalized in coding the data and sources of evidence are discussed in Table 1. However, after the initial coding process, the author also added students’ authorial learning as another code when she found students posting links of websites and YouTube videos either to respond to a certain argument or to start a new one based on the topics discussed in class and continued on the class web. In the final process of data analysis, the author, through investigating relationships among the themes of dialogism and monologism, tried to form the hypothesis that dialogic pedagogy would penetrate even a stubbornly monologic mind, and this hypothesis was tested through constant comparative methods (Merriam, 1998), setting data from the above-mentioned case studies against data gathered from other students.

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Table 1.

Operationalization of Bakhtinian Theoretical Framework and Data Sources.

Theoretical framework	Operationalization	Evidence from the data
Dialogism	Students’ attention to the others’ opinion as reflected in expressions of including that opinion in their words and in extending that opinion either by adding to it or by disagreeing with it upon further consideration	Students’ revised opinions as indicated by words such as “eye-opening,” “didn’t consider it before,” “see it differently,” or words such as “agree,” “disagree,” as long as the agreement or disagreement is justified
Monologism	Students’ utterances continue to express preconceived worldviews that do not show any sign of inclusion or consideration of the view of the class community, the instructor, and the learned material	Students’ contributions do not include any changed views and do not reflect any need for learning
Students’ authorial learning	Students providing provocations to further the dialogue and, thus, the learning process (Matusov, 2011)	Students’ posting links, videos, articles, local, and global news that students sought as a response to a discussion or as an initiative to further the discussion

Table 1 shows how the data analysis operationalizes the theoretical framework and aligns its tenets with the codes assigned to the students’ utterances.

Lack of Educational Goals and/or the Desire to Learn as a Source of Monologism and as an Obstacle to the Learning Objectives of the Course

One of the overlooked issues in critical multicultural education is whether students see its worth for their own learning and for their teaching career. Students might parrot buzzwords and slogans that they hear in the media or on college campuses about minorities, racism, and inequalities, but until they feel the need to learn about others and are able to identify these learning goals, how could one expect actual learning to take place? The two students, in this study, could not identify their goals for taking a multicultural class especially in light of the fact that the course was a requirement. Bonnie, a White middle class 20-year-old, expressed this fact frankly at the beginning of the course maintaining that if it were up to her, she would have not taken it:

Right off the bat, I think that it is necessary to point out the real reason that most people are taking this class. I am required to partake in this course regardless of my desire or lack-thereof to do so. With this demand looming overhead, I think that it squelches any real desire that we as students may have had regarding this subject. If it were not a required element, I am sad to say that, no, I would not be enrolled in this course. There are many reasons for this. The first is that I would much rather be spending my time learning about things in my concentration area. This would include English, or even my interests in history. (Mini Project I, September 9, 2011, 8:10 p.m.)

Bonnie did not only express her objection to a whole course on multicultural education, but she also spoke for everyone else in the class and indicated that they were all taking the class just to fulfill a requirement. Furthermore, in the above excerpt, Bonnie did not mention her background or lack of knowledge about cultural diversity; something that she revealed much later in the semester. In a midsemester mini project in which students were asked to interview someone outside their social circle, Bonnie felt the need to discuss her background to justify her reasons for choosing the person whom she interviewed. This was the first but not the only time, henceforth, Bonnie acknowledged her limited cultural diversity experience,

I am a White class female from the higher end of the middle range of socioeconomic realms. I grew up in a home with both of my parents and triplet brothers as siblings. In addition, I was raised from a Christian worldview. Although my life was incredibly stable I am not as cultured as I would like to be. All of my education has been through private or public schooling within the United States. (Bonnie, Mini Project III, Closing the Gap Between Social Groups, October 21, 2011)

In the above excerpt, even though Bonnie admitted that she was not as “cultured as I would like to be,” she did not examine her assumption that there should be correlation between a stable life and a “cultured” person, which in turn would suggest that those who did not have a stable life were less “cultured.” Merriam-Webster (n.d.) defines the word cultured as “having or showing good education, tastes, and manners.” Throughout her class contributions, Bonnie affirmed assimilative views that put the onus on marginalized groups for not learning the appropriate “American culture,” assimilating to “American values,” and achieving the “American dream.”

For example, in commenting on the video “Fear of Learning at Hoover Elementary,” a video documentary that was released at the time Proposition 187 was in California court to determine its constitutionality in denying undocumented immigrants education and health services, Bonnie blurted out in class, “I just don’t understand: why can’t those people assimilate?” (field notes, Class Session 6: Undocumented immigrants and immigration, October 7, 2011). Later, on the class web, Bonnie wrote,

People began immigrating to America because they wanted a better lifestyle. Well, if we continue to allow illegal immigrants to reside here without, as you said, paying dues . . . our society based on democracy and community will completely dissolve. There is always emphasis in classes nowadays on how citizens must “Do their part.” This should apply to illegal aliens as well. They must do their part. (Class web, Re: Illegal Aliens video, October 7, 2:31 p.m.)

Earlier, on the class web, Bonnie had expressed her feelings about the Proposition 187 video and sided with the White teachers in the documentary who expressed hostile or unwelcoming views toward immigrants. The video showed that children were subjected to micro aggressive acts of rejection and hurtful words from their teachers in such a way that questioned the kind of learning that could take place in such a hostile environment. The video also showed that the unsafe environment was both inside the school because of teachers’ attitudes and outside school because of the crime infested neighborhood in which the school was located and in which the students lived:

As I was walking out of class on Tuesday I realized that this video really irritated me. There were essentially two parties speaking during the video—the Hispanic teacher, and the “blonde-haired white” one. What I found myself thinking was that while the Hispanic teachers in the school were putting down the “white” ones for various reasons . . . (Whether these include not learning Spanish, etc.) she was making points that to me seem completely invalid. One comment I remember was “These teachers act like they are doing the children a favor.” This was precedented by a comment about superiority, and no one can judge whether the teachers think they are better than a student. However, the fact is that the white teachers who come from a high socioeconomic background are MOST DEFINITELY doing the urban children (or illegal aliens) a favor. No teacher takes a smaller pay and harder circumstance as a choice for their career EXCEPT for the good of the children. No teacher wants that, but instead makes a sacrifice for the students because they care about not only them, but their education as well. (Bonnie, class web, Illegal Immigrants video, October 6, 5:50 p.m.)

In the above excerpt, Bonnie tried to reflect her angry tone by the use of capital letters and also by using terms that the class discussed were hurtful and offensive, such as “illegal aliens.” These responses angered some class members especially when Bonnie blurted out the previously mentioned view about assimilation. In class, Leah responded to Bonnie saying, “I don’t think assimilation is an appropriate way of putting it. America now is a stew and not a melting pot” (field notes, October 7, 2011). Amy was not as confrontational and tried to get me as the course instructor to respond. Amy wrote on the index card—thus seeking a more private forum, “I think we need to have a brief discussion about word choice in this class because political correctness is becoming an issue” (index card, October 7, 2011). When I read Amy’s index card, I emailed her to ask what she meant by political correctness; Amy responded that Bonnie’s comment about the assimilation of “those” people was not appropriate (Amy, email, October 7, 2011). Bonnie’s views did not make her popular among the class community but it seemed that Bonnie was not interested in making any friends among the class community either. Carmen, whom Bonnie became friends with during the class, indicated in the private interview,

I like people who are blunt and sassy and express how they feel but her [Bonnie’s] bluntness angered many people . . . we never spent time together when we weren’t in class. I can’t think of anyone else who was close to her. I think this was only her second semester because she had transferred from [a Christian university] and I think she transferred back there so I don’t think there were many people that she knew or hung out with . . . but I think it was a transition for her and I think she might have known that this school wasn’t the school for her and this is why she wasn’t invested in making friends because she knew that she wasn’t gonna stay. I mean of course she might have known on an unconscious level like sort of a feeling because it didn’t come as a surprise to me when she transferred back to [the Christian school]. (Private interview, January 9, 2013)

The above excerpt suggests that Bonnie not only rejected the multicultural course and the class dialogue, but that she decided to reject the whole institution and return to her former school that was in congruence with the “Christian worldview,” which she had expressed was the basis of her upbringing. Bonnie’s views, however, were not mere opinions grounded in her own personal denial of White privilege and racial discrimination. The author suggests that Bonnie’s views represented some sort of political and ideological positions that have always existed in the American public discourse. Lippy (2012) contended that a traditional cry for the Americanization of all people groups was an ill-disguised call for Protestantizing everyone in the society to preserve the image of America as a Christian (Protestant) nation. These cries have existed, according to Lippy (2012), since the arrival of the first wave of immigrants from Southern and Eastern Europe with religious faiths different than the Protestant traditions. Bonnie’s monologism could have, thus, been grounded in her own interpretation of what it means to be an American stemming from some fundamentalist Christian worldview, according to Libby, which in turn could have represented a challenge to her learning about minorities in that course; her views could have also affected her relationship with other students in the course. However, there were instances, albeit rare, when the dialogic word penetrated Bonnie’s conscious. I will discuss this issue in the “Students’ Authorial Learning as an Opportunity for Dialogue and Learning” section.

However, Bonnie was not the only student who believed that there was not much to learn in the multicultural class. There were other students who did not see the value of the course to their own learning, although they did not express it as frankly as Bonnie did. Monique, the second case study, maintained,

I am taking [this course] because I work for an after-school program for school-age children. According to State Law, I must complete at least one three-credit education course to continue working there. At first I thought that taking a 3-credit course solely for keeping a temporary job seemed like a waste of time. However, looking through the course selection, [this course] was the only course that fit in my schedule. The class also seemed to be the only class opened. I was also glad that the class fulfilled my multi-cultural requirement. (Mini Project I, Why am I taking this course? September 5, 10:37 p.m.)

In the excerpt, Monique mentioned many reasons for taking the course, none of which included any educational needs or learning goals. Elsewhere, Monique expressed her conviction that she was all knowledgeable about the African American experience and there was nothing new that she could learn. This insistence cost her low grades in a course on Black American studies that she claimed she took as a therapy (but not to learn):

I didn’t learn anything because I already knew this stuff but she [the professor] was very highly opinionated so it kind of made it hard to interject even some things because she was so . . . she wasn’t teaching Black American studies; she was teaching her life and Black American Studies based on her and you learn it based on what she wants you to learn and you experience Black American studies the way she wants you to . . . there were some White students. I feel like it was an eye opener for them . . . you know we already knew everything but for us it was kind of frustrating because we had to learn from her experience as a Black woman, we couldn’t really put our own experiences and you felt that you needed to do that . . . to input your experience? Yea, I thought it was gonna be therapeutic but it was like this is what being Black means and if you don’t write it on the test you fail. I got a C like really? In my own . . . in my own people. (Private interview, August 8, 2012)

But the claim that Monique knew everything about the African American experience was not true. In commenting on her own upbringing, Monique maintained,

I based my whole Black experience on my family because they didn’t . . . this is the life they made for me so my dad he is from Ghana so there is a rich culture there and my mom is from the South . . . you know the Black neighborhoods of the South so that’s my experience there so really I just took what my family gave me and put my identity that way because really there is no way to turn. I never really identified with rap. I never really identified with Urban culture that much and that’s what I used. I hadn’t even started going to a Black church before I came here because in Ghana there is the type of people who are into the African culture and there are Africans who are more—well in dad’s generation—now it is not really like that—who are more concerned being British so basically White so my dad was like that. (Private interview, August 9, 2012)

Monique also indicated that her whole upbringing was in a predominantly White neighborhood in the suburbs and, thus, was regarded as an “oreo” (Black from the outside and White from the inside by many Black people). Monique did not specify which Black people regarded her as an oreo but her experience in the Black American studies class and her acknowledgment that it was eye-opening to the White students but not to the Black ones suggests that she stereotyped Blacks and categorized them all in one group and erroneously regarded their experience as unified. Monique’s stereotyping of the other was also extended to her classmates as well and affected her desire to engage in a dialogue with them. In her opinion, because they were White, she did not believe that any of them were serious about the topics of the course:

I definitely think it [multicultural education] is kind of entertainment for them a little because they are farly removed from it and most of them haven’t even been put in that situation where they can kind of even sympathize so I feel like they just read it and it kind of goes into one ear and comes out from the other so I don’t think they are even interested unless they have some interest like one have a biracial child, then she could be especially interested but I don’t think they really care to understand what’s going on. (Private interview, August 8, 2013)

In the above excerpt, Monique accused the White girls in her class with something she herself was guilty of. She, too, was “farly removed” from many of the experiences discussed in class and she, too, did not have much sympathy for other minorities. In the interview, reflecting on the topic of sexism that was discussed in class, Monique maintained,

The sexism didn’t really inspire me as much because I didn’t really know that it was there. The discussion on homosexuality was heated. I was kinda of apathetic because my sister is a Lesbian and she is very outspoken, annoying, and I really just because of my personal experience with that the way that she is always outspoken always gay pride makes me not care, makes me shut it out so unfortunately I wasn’t really I was very apprehensive to that part of the class because I didn’t really—I was just basically tired of hearing about it because of what I get at home so yea. . . . [Researcher: Even if it were about how to prevent bullying in this area? Even then did you feel it was annoying to you?] Unfortunately yes, because of the way my sister paints homosexuality. I mean I have gay friends and stuff but they are not like my sister because my sister is like very highly intellectual and hippy and annoying and basically just like one bad stone spoils the soup. (Interview, August 13, 2012)

So even though Monique claimed to have many gay friends, one experience that she claimed was bad with a gay person made her decide that she was “apathetic” to the topic of homosexuality even if it meant providing a safe and bully free environment for that group of students. Monologism in Monique’s case meant self-involvement in one’s own convictions to the extent of shutting out any other voice from outside. Monique’s monologism did not allow her to see anything new that she needed to learn in the first place.

In the above two cases, one could see that the students’ monologism grounded in their personal convictions, and their lack of educational goals represented a challenge to the learning objectives that the course aimed to achieve. However, the next section of the findings maintains that these students did not leave the class without being impacted by the dialogic word that seemed to have penetrated their monologic wall and given them new realizations despite their expectations of the course.

Students’ Authorial Learning as an Opportunity for Dialogue and Learning

In this study, dialogic pedagogy took place whenever students were allowed to guide their own learning. The course was structured to have students dialogue with others and in many cases to choose that other to dialogue with. For Monique, the only time during the course that she sought the other for dialogue was when she felt puzzled and confused about them. Despite the fact that Monique claimed that she knew everything about what it meant to be Black, Monique felt at a loss when she could not understand her Black boyfriend who came from a different socioeconomic status than she did: “[he] comes from a lower-class, poor southern family. Although my Mom is from the south, I had no clue what his childhood experiences would compare to mine” (Mini Project III, October 31, 2011). The above quote is extracted from Monique’s assignment of closing the social gap by interviewing someone outside the students’ social circle. Monique decided to interview her boyfriend at the time who was also a college footballer. After doing her research and interviewing him, she claimed to have understood things that she never did before:

So after talking to him for awhile, mostly about sports and college classes, I realized that Drew is someone who lives to the stereotype of being “the dumb football player.” In Drew’s world, strength is the most important, because intelligence may fail you. To Drew, anyone can be intelligent, but if you are truly intelligent, you hide your intelligence, so that people will never “get the best of you.” (Mini Project III, October 31, 2011)

In the above excerpt, Monique expressed her realization that Drew had certain defense mechanisms about his identity that made him hide his true self from a world that expected only physical strength and dumbness from Black males (Fordham, 1993); however, at the time of the course, Monique could only interpret this new realization in light of gender issues, which is suggested by how she reflected on what she learned from the assignment,

Talking with Drew taught me a lot about teaching, talking to “boys,” and masculinity. Drew would not open up to in depth about anything else but football . . . To teach a “Drew,” you might need to relate everything back to athletics. Every math problem, every grammar sentence, and every other lesson that Drew needs to learn. If you really care about Drew’s education, you would do him this favor. (Mini Project III, October 31, 2011)

Although the above could still be interpreted as a learning moment in which Monique had allowed a place for the other in her own consciousness and acknowledged that she learned from them what she did not know before, the truly learning moment happened, in my view, when Monique could interpret Drew’s attitude in light of capitalism and institutional exploitation of racial minorities. This was expressed in the private interview I had with Monique 2 years later,

The best mini project I had was the one that I remembered the best and that’s the one that was the most eye-opening project because the guy I interviewed was actually my ex on the UD campus and it was interesting because he was a football player and a lot of the athletes—college athletes—I don’t know if they pick on African Americans from poor families but they do—kinda of like a lot of professors are naming it a second slavery because when they come to college, they are bound by these sports and a lot of these sports are a limitation to you because you can’t really do anything else; you can’t study abroad, you have to be here during the summer. They have to be here because they don’t have money to go to college otherwise even though it is an honor to play for your school; they are literally bound by their athleteness. They can’t get away from it and they create an identity around it. (Private interview, August 8, 2012)

In the above excerpt, Monique had the changed realization that her boyfriend’s identity and behavior had to do with more than a mere gender issue but rather with a racialized gender that regarded Black males as worthy only in light of their athletic or rather physical strength. The realization was probably related to the course in Black American studies that she took after the class in this study as she referred to “a lot of professors naming it a second slavery,” or it could be related to some other educational experience. However, Monique’s changed interpretation of the outcomes of the interview with her ex-boyfriend suggests that the dialogic experience she had during this interview had impacted on her lived and learning experiences beyond the time and space of that stand-alone course.

A similar experience happened with Bonnie and about an issue that she, at first, did not want to acknowledge as institutional racism, that is, the issue of undocumented immigrants. In general, this topic was the most challenging to me, as the course instructor. On one hand, it was one that incited a majority of class resistance to any alternative views about children of undocumented immigrants who, according to an almost class consensus, were “defying the law” and were not “paying taxes.” On the other hand, I felt my limitation in speaking about this issue myself because I feared I was an example of the “model” immigrant in my students’ views, being legal and being a successful one (as a doctoral student at the time of the study, I could have been perceived as an academic achiever). To deal with my limitations, I decided to seek the support of a guest speaker. Jackie was a literacy coach for the local school district and supervised 10 English as a Second Language (ESL) teachers. I met Jackie when we were both enrolled in a master’s program in teaching ESL and remembered her as being an advocate for her students. Jackie’s advocacy was my initial reason for inviting her to class. Moreover, I deemed that her voice, as a White American, could be found more valid in the predominantly White context of the class than mine and even than that of the immigrant children featured in the documentary. Jackie’s class visit had the result of having many students revise their views about the fairness of immigration laws and of punishing children for the mistakes of their parents and of the system, but the most interesting result and the most surprising to me, the instructor, was what Bonnie wrote:

I very much loved what the guest speaker had to say. Even though I tend to travel a lot, it is not so much out of our country which does not enable me to be as cultured as I’d like to be. Her perspective on her bi-lingual classrooms was very eye-opening. Although I did not agree with her ideas of allowing all children to attend universities with or without SSID #’s, I do think that she is making an immense difference in these children’s lives. (Class web, Guest Speaker, November 7, 8:37 p.m.)

The author proposes that Bonnie’s use of the word cultured here was different than how she used it before. In the above excerpt, Bonnie expressed surprise and curiosity suggesting that she might not know much about the world of the other as she might have liked to. The guest speaker inspired Bonnie with her stories about her bilingual students and “opened her eyes.” She could still see points where she disagreed with Jackie but then Bonnie still acknowledged that Jackie’s stories about her immigrant students were educational to her. This was a breakthrough for Bonnie as far as dialogic pedagogy was concerned as this was one of the rare instances when Bonnie engaged the word of another and allowed it into her own worldview; I also contend that this was a breakthrough for the multicultural objective in Bonnie’s consciousness. However, Jackie’s visit was not the only propeller for Bonnie to dialogue about immigration. Weeks earlier, and despite what I considered then her staunch beliefs about undocumented immigrants, Bonnie posted a link on the class web from the local news. On October 12, 2011, and under the title “Deportation of Vets,” which she chose for her posting, Bonnie posted a web link without any comments. The link was broadcast on CNN on October 11, 2011, and was about two Mexican brothers who came to the United States illegally with their parents and served in the army during the Vietnam War. Both brothers were facing threats of deportation decades after being present in the States, serving in the army, wearing proudly the uniform of veteran soldiers, and having family members with American citizenship. It is interesting that despite Bonnie’s constant resistance to acknowledging any institutional and social discrimination against undocumented immigrants, the public discourse outside the class incited her to consider the issue from the perspective of those immigrants. Bonnie’s decision not to comment on the link poses a limitation to how far she interpreted those immigrants’ experience but that link also suggests that the dialogic word penetrated her consciousness in such a way that could mean an authentic transformation in her position toward this group of people. The author cannot claim that this transformation was complete or permanent but the author maintains that Bonnie, as a teacher, cannot comfortably claim that she does not know or fully comprehend the consequences of her beliefs and actions on her students. Perhaps this is why Bonnie decided to withdraw from the whole experience of the institution, as Carmen mentioned, and return to what she could have perceived as an educational setting that affirmed “her Christian worldview.”