WESTERN KENTUCKY UNIVERSITY

WESTERN KENTUCKY UNIVERSITY

HISTORY 505-CULTURAL DIVERSITY IN AMERICAN HISTORY
Sections 500, 610, 620, 630
Spring Semester 2000
5:15-8:00 P.M./6:15 P.M.-9:00 P.M. (Eastern)
Thursdays
Instructor: John A. Hardin, Ph. D.

Course Description:

A topical study of cultural diversity in American history and its influence on the society's social, political, and economic institutions. Designed to assist teachers in incorporating knowledge about cultural diversity in their classes. As a major class project, students will be expected to develop instructional materials suitable for use in elementary and secondary classes. [This course is intended for elementary and secondary school teachers.]

Goals:

1. To provide students with an advanced understanding of the concepts and historical problems associated with cultural diversity throughout American history.

2. To cultivate an understanding of diverse cultures in American history and how they relate to each other via published research, lectures, class discussions and other resources.

3. To create instructional materials relative to historical cultural diversity for use in the contemporary elementary and secondary classrooms.

Objectives:

1. Each student will be expected to read and be prepared to discuss assigned selections.

2. Each student will be able to cultivate an understanding of diverse cultures in the United States and how they relate to each other via published research, lectures, class discussions and other resources.

Requirements and Evaluations:

1. Attendance is mandatory. Every absence over two will reduce the final grade by a entire letter. If you must miss, please contact the instructor.

2. Each student will be expected to submit an annotated bibliography by mid-term of the key resources used in the development of the final unit. Value: 20% of the final grade.

3. Each student will submit on the last day of class (May 4, 2000) an instructional unit focused on cultural diversity in American history. It must be suitable for use in a contemporary elementary or secondary school setting and with students of all cultures. Value: 80% of the final grade.

The thematic design of the unit should meet the following criteria for successful evaluation:

A. The unit must focus on at least three (3) specific cultural groups in American society. Each culture group should have distinct continental origins. For example, a unit on Mexican-American, Japanese-Americans and Native Americans would be appropriate. Creating units on all European, African or Asian cultures would not.

B. The material must be designed for a specific level, i. e., elementary, middle school and secondary. The length is to be no less than fifteen (15) pages and not greater than twenty-five (25) typed including goals, objectives, desired outcomes, measures, pictures, drawings, exercises, etc.

C. The unit must include an appropriate annotated bibliography of content materials on which the unit was based.

D. The unit must be written in literate prose and free of any egregious errors in syntax or grammar.

4. Each class will focus on a specific issue in cultural diversity in American history. The first week of classes will be lectures and discussions conducted by the instructor. Students will be expected to read assigned articles and materials and be prepared to discuss them. Also, students should be prepared to visit the WKU Kentucky Library and University Archives or a research center with appropriate materials. For students at Extended Campus locations, a visit to Bowling Green may be necessary. Students in the Hardin County area may find a visit to the UL library more convenient. Students in Owensboro might check the resources in the local college and public libraries before traveling. Students may wish to check the Kentucky Commonwealth Virtual Library. Use the following active link: Kentucky Commonwealth Virtual Library Home Page In any event, graduate students are expected to be professional in research and writing.

Office/Phone:

200 Ivan Wilson Fine Arts Center. (270) 745-2344. If Professor Hardin is not in the office, please leave a message between 8:00 A.M. and 4:30 P.M. Office hours are by appointment only.

Special note:

Students with disabilities who require accommodations (academic adjustments and/or auxiliary aids or services) for this course must contact the Office for Student Disability Services, Room 445, Potter Hall. The OFSDS telephone number is (270) 745-5004 V/TDD.

Please DO NOT request accommodations directly from the professor or instructor without a letter of accommodation from the Office for Student Disability Services.

Required texts (available in a paperback versions in the campus bookstore):

T.H. Breen, ed. The Power of Words: Documents in American History, Volume II: From 1865. Addison-Wesley, 1996. Ronald Takaki. A Different Mirror: A History of Multicultural America. Little, Brown and Company, 1993.

Reading assignments:
Non-text materials will be put on reserve in the extended campus libraries/offices. Bowling Green students will use the Helms-Craven Library Reserve Desk. This schedule does not have assignments for all fifteen weeks. I will be adding additional readings as the term progresses. The materials will be accessible to all sites. If discussion on any given night is carried forward to the next class, the reading assignment schedule will be adjusted accordingly.

First week. Takaki, A Different Mirror, pp. 1-76. Introduction and raison d'être for the course." Chapter Preface," from Teresa O'Neil, ed. Immigration Opposing Viewpoints (San Diego: Greenhaven Press, 1992), 22-23.

Second week "America Welcomes and Assimilates People of All Backgrounds," O'Neil, Immigration, pp. 24-31. Class handouts: George Bornstein, "From Frederick Douglass to the Commitments" and Lawrence Hirschfield, "A New Look an an Old Notion: Seeing Race."

Third week. Takaki, A Different Mirror, pp. 77-165. "Ethnic Diversity in the Colonial Era: Africans, Native Peoples and the "giddy multitude." "Slavery is Just," from William Dudley, ed. Slavery Opposing Viewpoints (San Diego: Greenhaven Press, 1992) pp. 65-71

Fourth week. "Slavery is Evil," Dudley, Slavery, pp. 72-80; "The U.S. Constitution Supports Slavery," Dudley, Slavery, pp. 213-217; "The U.S. Constitution Does Not Support Slavery," Dudley, Slavery, pp. 218-226.

Fifth week. "Memorial and Protest of the Cherokee Nation, June 22, 1836," Documents Vol. I to Accompany American History: A Survey, by Alan Brinkley, et. al. (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1992), pp. 190-193.

Sixth week. Takaki, A Different Mirror, pp. 166-276. Immigrants in the early 19th century: Irish, Germans, Mexicans and others. "Ethnic Groups Never Truly Melt into American Culture," O'Neil, Immigration, pp. 49-55.

Seventh week. Takaki, A Different Mirror, pp. 277-372. Late 19th century cultural diversity: Chinese, Japanese, Filipinos, Hawaiians. "The Chinese Should Be Kept Out of the United States," O'Neil, Immigration, pp. 189-198; "The Chinese Should Not Be Kept out of The United States,"

Eighth week. O'Neil, Immigration, pp. 199-209; "Memorial of the Chinese Six Companies to U.S. Grant, President of the United States (1876)," from T.H. Breen, ed., The Power of Words: Documents in American History Vol. II From 1865 (Addison-Wesley, 1996) pp. 35-37

Ninth week. "Congressional Report on Indian Affairs (1887)," Breen, The Power of Words, pp. 37-39; "Tragedy at Wounded Knee," Breen, The Power of Words, pp.39-41.

Tenth week. Takaki, A Different Mirror, pp. 373-428. European cultural diversity: Jews, Italians, and Slavs. "James H. Patten, Chairman of the National Legislative Committee of the American Purity Federation, Testimony Before Congress (1910)," Breen, The Power of Words, pp. 118-120; "Mary Antin, The Promised Land (1912)," Breen, The Power of Words, pp. 72-74; "Josiah Strong, Our Country (1885), Breen, The Power of Words, pp. 87-88; "I. F. Stone, 'For the Jews-Life or Death?' (1944)," Breen, The Power of Words, pp. 176-178.

Eleventh week. Late twentieth century cultural diversity: Vietnamese, Koreans, Thai and others. "Yoshiko Uchida, Desert Exile (1942)," Breen, The Power of Words, pp. 178-180; "Los Angeles Times, 'Asian Influx Alters Life in Suburbia' (1987)," Breen, The Power of Words, pp. 271-274.

Twelfth week. Illegal immigration and other cultural diversity issues. "A. Philip Randolph, 'Why Should We March?' (1942)," Breen, The Power of Words, pp. 181-182; "Cesar Chavez, 'God Is Beside You on the Picket Line' (1966)," Breen, The Power of Words, pp. 278-279;

Thirteenth week. Martin Luther King, Jr., 'Letter From Birmingham Jail' (1963)," Breen, The Power of Words, pp. 216-218; "Malcolm X, 'The Ballot or the Bullet' (1964)," Breen, The Power of Words, pp. 219-221.

Works Supporting Cultural Diversity in American History:

Binder, Frederick and David Reisner. All the Nations Under Heaven: An Ethnic and Racial History of New York. (Columbia University Press) 1995. 353pp. ISBN 0-231-07878-1 $29.50 cloth.

Brown, Dee Alexander. Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee: An Indian History of the American West. Holt, Rinehart and Winston. 1971. E81 .B75 1971.

Eisen, George and David K. Wiggins, eds. Ethnicity and Sport in North American History and Culture. (Praeger Publishers) Paperback, 1995. 0-275-95451-X. $19.95.

Franklin, John Hope and Alfred A. Moss, Jr. From Slavery to Freedom: A History of African Americans. McGraw-Hill, 1994. E185 .F825 1994.

Dalton, Harlon L. Racial Healing: Confronting the Fear Between Blacks and Whites. Doubleday 256 pp. HC 0-385-475160-0. $22.50. E185.615 .D35 1995.

Dominguez, Virginia. White By Definition: Social Classification in Creole Louisiana. Rutgers University Press. 325pp. 0-8135-1109-7. Paper $16.95.

Ehle, John. Trail of Tears: The Rise and Fall of the Cherokee Nation. Anchor (Doubleday) 432 pp. E99 .C5 E45 1988.

Hampton, Henry and Steve Fayer. Voices of Freedom: An Oral History of the Civil Rights Movement From the 1950s Through the 1980s. Bantam. E185.61 .H224 1990.

Lerner, Michael and Cornel West. Jews and Blacks: A Dialogue on Race, Religion and Culture in America. (Plume) 0-452-27591-1 $12.95.

Polenberg, Richard. One Nation Divisible: Class, Race and Ethnicity in the United States Since 1938. Penguin. HN64. P75.

Schultz, April R. Ethnicity on Parade: Inventing the Norwegian American Through Celebration. University of Massachusetts Press. 1995. ISBN 0-87023-939-2. 176pp. $25.00 cloth.

Takaki, Ronald. Strangers From a Different Shore: A History of Asian Americans. Penguin. 0-14-013885-4. 584pp. $13.95.

West, Cornel. Race Matters. Boston: Beacon Press, 1993. E185.615 .W43 1993.

__________. Beyond Eurocentrism and Multiculturalism. Monroe, ME.: Common Courage Press, 1993. E185.615 .W425 1993.

Williams, Gregory Howard. Life on the Color Line: The True Story of a White Boy Who Discovered He Was Black. Plume. 0-452-27533-4. 352pp. $12.95.

Williamson, Joel. New People: Miscegenation and Mulattoes in the United States. Free Press. 1980. E185.62 .W54.

Works Challenging the Concept of Cultural Diversity in American History:

Hacker, Andrew. Two Nations: Black and White, Separate, Hostile, Unequal. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1992. E185.615 .H23 1992.

Jacoby, Russell. Dogmatic Wisdom: How the Culture Wars Divert Education and Distract America. Anchor(Doubleday) PB 0-385-42517-1 $12.95 288pp.

Schlesinger, Arthur M. Jr. The Disuniting of America: Reflections on a Multicultural Society. New York: W. W. Norton. E184 .A1S34x 1991.

Adapted from: Western Kentucky University, Libraries Update, 4 (Fall 1991): 1-2.

Ethnic and Cultural Diversity In America: An Overview of Resources in University Libraries.

Our ethnically diverse and multicultural society, of which the university is a microcosm, presents unparalleled opportunities and challenges for a university library to build useful collections that cover a broad spectrum of interests, issues, and information for diverse populations. Terms like "affirmative action," "quotas," "diversity," and "multiculturalism" have shaped discussion for increasing numbers of books and journals. This article focuses on recent books acquired by WKU Libraries that describe either specific American ethnic minorities or that treat particular issues currently debated.

Also, the reader will find suggestions on how to identify other relevant works by using the online catalog TOPCAT. Among major general sources are two award winners: Harvard Encyclopedia of American Ethnic Groups (Reference E 184 .A1 H35); and, We the People: An Atlas of American Ethnic Diversity (atlas E 184 .A1 A479 1988), also located in the reference area.

For specific ethnic or racial groups, the following titles merit attention: African Americans: Middle Passage by Charles Johnson, a fictional but realistic account of the slave trade in the 1830s, won the 1990 National Book Award (PS 3560 .03735 M5 1990); Black Women in the United States History, a 16-volume set published in 1990 (E 185.86 .B543 1990); Martin Luther King, Jr. and Civil Rights Movement, a 14-volume series published in 1989; and The Schomburg Library of Nineteenth-Century Black Women Writers in 25 volumes appeared in 1988.

To locate additional resources on this topic on TOPCAT, key in s=Afro-Americans. Asian Americans: For Asian American resources, one can use the Dictionary of Asian American History, published in 1986 (reference E184 .06 D53) for a compact historical overview; or, a more detailed account is Roger Daniels' Asian America: Chinese and Japanese in the United States Since 1850 (E184 .O6 .D36 1988). When searching TOPCAT, key in s=Asian Americans or s=Japanese Americans. Indians of North America: The topic of Indians of North America (TOPCAT search: s=Indians of North America) yields 144 citations to resources in our collection. One specific citation is Psychocultural Change and the American Indian: An Ethnohistorical Analysis (E98 .P5 F74 1987). Hispanic Americans: A representative work about Hispanic Americans is Chicano Politics: Reality and Promise, 1940-1990 by Juan Gomez-Quinones, (E 184 .M5 G634 1990). A useful potpourri of information is published in the Hispanic Americans Information Directory, 1990-1991(Reference E184 .S75 H566).

To search on TOPCAT, use s=hispanic, s=Mexican Americans, or s=Hispanic Americans. Jewish Americans: An important reference work is Jewish-American History and Culture: An Encyclopedia edited by Jack Fischel and Sanford Pinsker (Reference, E184 .J5 J48 1992). For additional titles about Jewish Americans, search under the subject words s=jew, s=jewish; or s=Jews-United States.

To locate other books on more general topics discussing ethnic and cultural diversity, try the following subject searches on TOPCAT: affirmative action, multiculturalism, cultural diversity, minorities, race relations. Always feel free to ask a librarian for additional assistance in using the online catalog or the microfiche catalog to find all the material you need for research, personal interest, or other projects.

Book titles treating general issues of cultural and ethnic diversity are: Shelby Steele. The Content of Our Character: A New Vision of Race in America, 1990 (E 185.615.S723); M.A.Z. Kamau-Collier. Phoenix Arising: A Psycho-cultural Perspective on African American Issues up to the 21st Century, 1990 (E185 .625 .K28 1990); Madeleine F. Green, ed. Minorities on Campus: A Handbook for Enhancing Diversity (LC 3731 .M5574 1989); Richard C. Richardson and Elizabeth Fisk Skinner. Achieving Quality and Diversity: Universities in a Multicultural Society (LC 3727 .R52 1991) Dinesh D'Souza. Illiberal Education: The Politics of Race and Sex on Campus (LA 227 .4 .D77 1991).

Addendum. Since this article was published in 1991, additional titles have been added. Therefore, the works above constitute a starting point for your data collection. The article did not address other groups to be discussed this term. Use the following subjects in TOPCAT: s=Society of Friends [for Quakers], s=Amish, s=Mennonites, s=Shakers, s=Puerto Ricans. Also, in October 1993, the Non-Circulating Periodicals Department in Helms Craven Library has begun receiving the Louisville Defender. This weekly publication focuses on the Louisville and Kentucky African American communities. Microfilm copies of 1951-1968 issues of the Louisville Defender are also available. However, they are not indexed. Students should use the Internet with care and select websites/ materials relevant to cultural diversity in American history. The presence of material on the Internet does not mean that it is accurate or inaccurate; it means that it is available for worldwide use.

(PLEASE NOTE: Since publication of this document, the WKU Libraries have moved to a different catalog search engine. You may use the following active link for access to the WKU Libraries catalog: TOPCAT 2000 There will be some slight differences in accessing research data. Students should be aware of the Kentucky Commonwealth Virtual Library which enables you to use other libraries across the state. JAH)

HISTORY 505 On Reserve in Helms-Craven Library Selected Documents in Binder

1. "Chapter Preface," from Teresa O'Neil, ed. Immigration Opposing Viewpoints (San Diego: Greenhaven Press, 1992), 22-23.

2. "America Welcomes and Assimilates People of All Backgrounds," O'Neil, Immigration, pp. 24-31.

3. "Ethnic Groups Never Truly Melt into American Culture," O'Neil, Immigration, pp. 49-55.

4. "Slavery is Just," from William Dudley, ed. Slavery Opposing Viewpoints (San Diego: Greenhaven Press, 1992) pp. 65-71.

5. "Slavery is Evil," Dudley, Slavery, pp. 72-80.

6. "The U.S. Constitution Supports Slavery," Dudley, Slavery, pp. 213-217.

7. "The U.S. Constitution Does Not Support Slavery," Dudley, Slavery, pp. 218-226.

8. "Memorial and Protest of the Cherokee Nation, June 22, 1836," Documents Vol. I to Accompany American History: A Survey, by Alan Brinkley, et. al. (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1992), pp. 190-193.

9. "Solomon Northup, On Work in the Cotton Fields, 1854," Documents Vol. I, pp. 218-219.

10. "The Confessions of Nat Turner," Documents Vol. I, pp. 219-221.

11. "The Chinese Should Be Kept Out of the United States," O'Neil, Immigration, pp. 189-198.

12. "The Chinese Should Not Be Kept out of The United States," O'Neil, Immigration, pp. 199-209.

Useful materials: (not on reserve--first come, first serve)

Various authors.The Schomburg Library of Nineteenth-Century Black Women Writers (25 volumes) 1988. Dictionary of Asian American History, (Reference E184 .06 D53)

Daniels, Roger. Asian America: Chinese and Japanese in the United States Since 1850(E184 .O6 .D36 1988).

French, Laurence. Psychocultural Change and the American Indian: An Ethnohistorical Analysis (E98 .P5 F74 1987).

Gomez-Quinones, Juan. Chicano Politics: Reality and Promise, 1940-1990 (E184 .M5 G634 1990).

Gale Research, Inc. Hispanic Americans Information Directory, 1990-1991 (Reference E184 .S75 H566).

Green, Madeline, ed. Minorities on Campus: A Handbook for Enhancing Diversity (LC 3731 .M5574 1989)

Fischel, Jack and Sanford Pinsker, eds. Jewish-American History and Culture: An Encyclopedia
(Reference, E184 .J5 J48 1992).

Franklin, John Hope and Alfred A. Moss. From Slavery to Freedom: A History of African Americans, Seventh Edition. McGraw-Hill, 1994.

Hine, Darlene Clark. Black Women in the United States History (16-volume set),1990 (E 185.86 .B543 1990).

Martin Luther King, Jr. and Civil Rights Movement, (14-volume series), 1989.

Kamau-Collier, M. A. Z. Phoenix Arising: A Psycho-cultural Perspective on African American Issues up to the 21st Century, 1990 (E185 .625 .K28 1990)

Kentucky Commission on Human Rights. Kentucky's Black Heritage. (1971). E185.93 .K3 A47.

___________________________________. Teacher's Manual for Kentucky's Black Heritage (1975). Non-circulating item in the Kentucky Library. E185.93 .K3 A47

Manual. Richardson, Richard C. and Elizabeth Fisk Skinner. Achieving Quality and Diversity: Universities in a Multicultural Society (LC 3727 .R52 1991).