Psychological anthropology is that branch of anthropology concerned with the interface between individuals and their culture. A natural concern for psychological anthropologists is how individuals are socialized, and particularly, as Henry Murray used to say, how one becomes in some ways like all persons, in some ways like some persons, and in some ways like no other person. Psychological anthropology as such is concerned mainly with the first two phenomena, leaving the last to psychology. We are here concerned with the ways in which we categorize or divide people into groups, or how they divide themselves.
The purpose of this paper is to review some significant research related to the very important social category or classification of ethnicity. I have chosen first to review the literature on some of the fundamental issues of ethnicity and schooling and then to discuss particular ethnic groups not only to provide a body of information, but also to suggest a number of unresolved theoretical and practical problems in our understanding of cultural pluralism, which I feel are best illustrated in the research on particular ethnic groups. The resolution of these problems I feel is critical: how we understand and use the concepts of ethnicity and cultural pluralism will affect our ability to educate a multi-ethnic school population.
I first review the concept of ethnicity particularly as it relates to schooling. At the outset I stress the importance of our recognizing the possibility of different educational values among various ethnic groups and how the ways in which a particular ethnic group evaluates competent performance may be in conflict with another group's view. This is especially significant if one is a minority ethnic group and the other is the dominant socio-cultural group. In my subsequent discussion of Spanish speaking groups in New York City, I illustrate these value conflicts and point to the kind of further research that is needed to increase our understanding of ethnic children in the schools. I next turn to Mexican Americans and review the research on the factors affecting their school performance, particularly again the educational values and attitudes of students, parents, and school people, but here I point to the unfortunate educational results of our failure to recognize properly the cultural differences that exist between and among Mexican Americans and Anglos and to adequately respond to them. A discussion of blacks follows. Here, rather than reviewing the research about cultural attitudes and values, about which much is already known, I have chosen to review some of the seminal works conceptualizing black culture, which have had a profound effect on how we view black culture in its complex relationship to the larger white culture of which it is a part. This discussion is important because our perspective dictates our choices in educating not only this group but also all minority ethnic groups with a distinct culture that is variously affected by the majority culture. In the next discussion of American Indians I review some of the issues already raised showing their distinct character when looking at American Indians, particularly the acculturation difficulties unique to these peoples. Here too our conceptualization of this cultural group, possibly the most removed from the mainstream culture, will affect any future action for improving their educational opportunities. Finally, I turn to the issue of cultural pluralism, the ways in which a particular group can have a repertoire of behavior, and the kinds of educational interventions that the society must provide in order to educate a multi-ethnic school population.
Ethnicity in the Schools
Ethnicity is here viewed as a complex interaction of a variety of factors which may create important differences among groups of individuals. First, in order for a concept of ethnicity to be effective for use in the United States it must contain the factor of nationality. Extensive studies have been done by applied anthropologists from Columbia University in the past ten years concerning the various nationality groups found in New York City, studied not only in New York but also in their countries of origin before and during the process of migration. We have been able to identify critical sociological dimensions that affect the move to the United States, such as the demographic composition of the migrant group and the types of migration which occur, particularly the circulatory (or shuttle) migration practiced by Dominicans and increasingly by Puerto Ricans. It is clear that there are differences among these nationality groups and that these differences are not clearly understood by the staffs of many schools. Language is one variable that distinguishes among the nationality groups, although it can also link them. While there are more refined differences among them, Spanish speaking groups are often lumped together: many teachers-indeed many New Yorkers-assume that Spanish speaking students are all Puerto Rican. Such inference of nationality from language is not welcome by, for example, the Dominicans to whom it is applied. In addition to language differences, nationalities differ in the legal definition of their stay in the United States. Puerto Ricans are legally citizens and legally residents in the United States. Dominicans are denizens. Those who are in the country legally are still waiting to meet eligibility requirements for citizenship. Even more confounding is the fact that an unknown proportion of Dominicans reside in this country illegally, that is they may have overstayed a visitor’s visa and they must actively seek to hide their status from authorities. Thus Dominican parents are much less able to participate in school politics or to provide the school with accurate data about family size, birth place, and so forth.
In addition to the differences by nationality, language and legal status, there are also differences on an additional set of factors which contribute to a meaningful definition of ethnicity. Differences along these variables can be found to some degree within all the nationality groups. These factors are important in influencing relationships among adults, among children, and between the groups and school personnel. They include skin color; educational background and attainment by parents; migration from either rural or urban backgrounds; occupation and income; religion; and dialect differences that are found within language groups.
Research I carried out at Teachers College's Center for Urban Studies and Programs in the early 1970s has strongly suggested that each of these variables can influence how a teacher responds to a child in class. Skin color is sometimes used by teachers as the sole criterion for judging a child's ethnicity and, through ethnicity, his ability; children of lighter skin receive more positive attention. Highly educated parents have been observed entreating and receiving special favors and treatment for their children. Teachers feel that children from rural areas face adjustment problems in New York City to a greater degree than urban children ("His parents are just peasant farmers-he has a long way to go"). Since teachers bear many norms of American culture as well as norms of the city culture, they also respond to occupation and money cues of parents. Dialect differences between spoken languages of the nationality groups are also used as cues to infer inferiority. Black English is "wrong"; Puerto Rican Spanish "does not sound good," and so forth. Observers have also described non-verbal communication habits being used as criteria for evaluation. For example, children attending a Spanish Heritage Day in a Spanish-dominant school assembly were upbraided (by a U.S. born, middle class black school administrator) for shouting approval and clapping and haughtily told that "here we express approval only with our hands, not our mouths."
We perceive ethnicity not as a rigid category, but as a semi-fluid interaction of the variables outlined above. Indeed while these variables produce a very large number of combinations and hence an enormous potential number of ethnic categories, the actual diversity is not so great. For example, there are few Dominican immigrants from urban backgrounds; most have not been granted citizenship; and most are lower class campesinos. More important, in any give interaction an individual may choose to accent one variable and play down others, for example, as when a rural Puerto Rican with other Puerto Ricans emphasizes his "Puerto Ricanness" but when with Dominicans emphasizes his common Spanish language or rural origin.
Conclusions
Let me end with a warning. We have been reviewing a wide range of literature on a number of ethnic variables as they relate to processes of schooling. It would indicate a serious misunderstanding if the information we have given about the various groups were used to construct yet more stereotypes, however refined, about these groups. The reader should remember that we have been dealing with the second aspect of Murray's aphorism. The other two still operate and, however much a child may be like other children because of ethnicity, there are still ways in which he is like all other children regardless of ethnicity. That is, he is still human, able to learn, able to think and able to feel. The ethnic differences we have been describing are small compared to these.
In other ways a particular child is like no other and knowing something about the culture from which he comes or the ethnic group to which he belongs does not excuse an educator from his obligation to know the child as an individual unique from other individuals and respond to his own special needs with a personally designed plan of instruction. The information about ethnicity growing out of research described in this article is, I think, important and valuable for educators to have, but it is not the only information that they need in planning their actions.
