Developing a Confucian Model for Student Diversity: A Harmony-based Approach to Multiculturalism in Taiwan’s schools

Abstract

Purposes In recent decades, social, economic and demographic changes fuel the unprecedented challenges now facing East Asia’s education system (Hannum, et al 2010). Educational practitioners throughout East Asia now face the challenge of adapting to a changing student population—in terms of socio-economic class, language and ethnicity. In societies that have been culturally homogeneous over time, how are educators responding to these new forms of diversity? East Asian policymakers and teachers have turned to multicultural education as a strategy to address new forms of diversity (Yang, et al 2014). However, scholars problematize the import of multiculturalism to East Asia (Ho 2017). The fundamental U.S.-based assumptions of individuality and independence upon which the multicultural model rests contrast to the cultural importance of harmony in Confucian Heritage societies: China, Singapore, Hong Kong, Japan, Taiwan (Ho 2017; Nguyen, et al 2009). This paper explores a harmony-oriented alternative to the Western-based, multicultural model in Taiwan, where teachers are responding to the growing population of mixed-race youth from transnational marriage migrations. The children from these marriage (henceforth, “new Taiwanese children” or NTC) now comprise one out of every ten primary- and middle school-aged children in Taiwan (Kastner 2014). Theoretical Framework Building upon the works of educational anthropologists (Anderson-Levitt 2002), I conceptualize pedagogical practices as embodying both professional teaching knowledge and cultural values. In doing so, I examine the relationship between harmony (as a Confucian cultural value) and pedagogical practices for Taiwanese educators. My inquiry is guided by the question: How does the Confucian cultural value of harmony shape Taiwanese educators’ pedagogical response to NTC students’ academic and social needs? Methods Drawing on interview and participant-observational data from an ethnographic project in a Taiwanese public school, I explore how teachers understood and responded to student diversity in the classroom. Applying a constructivist grounded theory approach (Charmaz 2014), I coded data on themes of harmony, conformity, collectivity, and difference to discover patterns in culturally-based school responses to diversity Data Sources Data emerged from fall 2017 and fall 2018 fieldwork in Taiwan: classroom observations; interviews with principal, subject and homeroom teachers, students (NTC and non-NTC, across different achievement levels and socio-economic backgrounds); knowledge-exchange meetings with teachers to confirm my initial findings. Results and Scholarly Significance Preliminary findings show a pedagogical approach rooted in a Confucian worldview that upholds harmonious relationships, while acknowledging student differences. This approach of maintaining social harmony aimed to realize two goals 1) empowering NTC youth by addressing NTC’s academic needs, 2) maintaining strong school cohesion between NTC and non-NTC youth. Findings thus show promise in developing a Confucian-based model of diversity. Importantly, this harmony-oriented model suggests that the U.S.-based multicultural education is an approach that may inappropriately address diversity in East Asian educational contexts. More broadly, this work contributes to understanding how context is a crucial consideration for effective multicultural practices in the classroom and school. Particularly since multicultural research is predominately situated in Western context, this alternative model refines how we conceptualize and practice education in diverse societies.