School, Diversity and Multiculturalism: Monisha Dutta

Image: LifePage.IN

It is an accepted fact that India is an extremely diverse country with multiple languages, dialects which change every 500 km you travel, cuisines, faiths and beliefs. To add to this, the complexity of a deep-seated caste system of our social fabric. And if we factor in the issue of ‘class and its inequality’, we won’t find a more complex social diversity across this world in one country. Our policymakers have tried to address this issue through a plethora of government policies and rules related to caste and class like reservations of jobs and other such moves. In fact, the constitution enshrines the concept of Equality to all.

When we see the ground reality of our society, despite all our good intentions, we are driven by societal practices and behaviour which tend to only enhance biases and prejudices. While we claim through slogans like ‘Unity in Diversity’, however, discrimination based on all forms whether caste, class, region, religion, language continues to prevail. In fact, individual identity is defined by each of these in our society. There is no respect for diversity. We just tend to tolerate it and live with its practices in our day to day lives, without even being conscious of it.

As we all know, all this exists, but what is the solution to make our nation and society respect the diversity of our land and people.

This brings us to a very pertinent question. Where do we learn about social behaviour? Our responsibilities, our rights, our duties? Where is all this taught?
Schools! That’s where we learn this. Or do we?

There’s a subtle difference between schooling, Education and knowledge. While we know that knowledge is imparted in schools, however, the concept of schooling has a slightly different connotation.

A reference to Cristopher Winch a British philosopher of Education would be helpful. In his paper on the Aim of Education, he says that the “ fundamental perspective on education is that it needs to serve a purpose and that education cannot be purely for its own sake, in isolation to the societal needs and societal expectations from an individual”. 

And this is where schools come in.