Foundations of cultural diversity Terms mid-term exam
1. Social Justice Approach
Definition = Looks at how societal structures advantage some groups, disadvantage other groups,
and what we can do to balance out those differences.
2. Ideology
Definition = The big, shared ideas of a society that are reinforced through institutions and are hard to
avoid believing. These ideas include stories, myths, representations, explanations, definitions, and
rationalizations.
Example: The societally shared belief that everyone has an equal chance to participate in society and
that success is due solely to one’s skills and abilities is the ideology of meritocracy.
Application Sentence: The math book communicated the ideology of capitalism in the word problem
about buying and selling land for profit.
3. Critical Theory
Definition = A body of scholarship that examines how society works. This scholarship offers an
examination and critique of society by engaging with questions of social justice and change.
Example: LatCrit is a theory derived from Critical Theory by way of Critical Race Theory that examines
how Latinx people experience oppression related to intersections of race, class, gender, and sexuality
along with immigration status, language, and culture.
Application Sentence: The critical theorist critiqued the science curriculum for presenting the
infallibility of positivist science and the scientific method.
4. Social Stratification
Definition = The process by which social groups are relationally positioned and ranked into a
hierarchy in which groups have unequal value. This ranking is used to justify the unequal distribution
of resources among these groups.
Example: People without disabilities are (often unconsciously) seen as more valuable than people
with disabilities and this is why there are many locations and activities that are not accessible to
people with disabilities.
Application Sentence: Due to social stratification, students with a low socioeconomic status have a
lower social ranking, which justifies their disproportionate tracking into VMBO schools.
5. Positionality
Definition = One’s social group memberships that affect where one stands in relation to others in
society and shape what one can see and understand about the world.
Example: Because I am a White person and do not encounter racial discrimination, it is easy for me
to misunderstand or dismiss claims from members of other races that racism exists.
Application Sentence: The teachers did not understand from their positionality that the parents
could not attend the school meetings because the parents could not afford childcare for their
younger children and did not have access to transportation.
, 6. Socially Constructed
Definition = Not inherently true but created and maintained as meaningful by a group in a given
place and time. Once society agrees to this meaning, it becomes real in its consequences for people’s
lives.
Example: The norms elicited by the phrase “doe normaal” are socially constructed expectations for
an individual’s behavior.
Application Sentence: Children’s socially constructed views about what counts as knowledge is
shaped by the intersection between their social class and the institution of schooling.
7. Deep Culture
Definition = The unspoken, unconscious, and/or emotionally laden norms, values, practices, patterns
of communication, language, laws, customs, and meanings shared by a group of people located in a
given time and place.
Example: In the deep culture of dominant Dutch society, individuals are expected to chart their own
path but also to belong to the group, to distinguish their individual skills through official certifications
and to advance within their networks, but not to stand out too much.
Application Sentence: When the adolescent boy looked at the floor instead of into the teacher’s eyes
when they were talking, the teacher interpreted it as disrespect due to the expectations for eye
contact in the teacher’s deep culture.
8. Socialization
Definition = The systematic training into the norms of one’s culture that involves the process of
learning the meanings and practices that enable one to make sense of and behave appropriately.
Example: Babies begin to be trained into a particular gender role even before birth when friends and
family choose gifts, decorations, or clothing with a particular style or color according to whether they
are told the baby is a boy or a girl.
Application Sentence: The students were socialized to develop and express independent thought
through classroom discussions and grading procedures that rewarded the uniqueness and depth of
each individual’s perspective.
9. Group Identity
Definition = Affiliations with others who share the physical and/or material conditions evaluated as
important to social life in a deep culture. Some identities are chosen by an individual whereas other
identities are assigned by other people based on appearances and assumptions.
Example: I identify as a White, middle class, cis-woman. People assume I am a Dutch citizen because
of the way I look, but I am actually an immigrant.
Application Sentence: Teachers and students with different group identities may struggle to
understand each other’s ideas, values, and behaviors.
10. Dominant Culture
Definition = The norms and values of the group at the top of the social hierarchy. This group has the
most power to reinforce and reproduce those norms and values.
