THE PROBLEM WITH ETHNOCENTRISM

The limiting hazards of assumptions, final

vocabularies, and grids

Prepared by Dr. Martin Barlosky, Faculty of Education, University of Ottawa

Ethnocentrism: definition

The interpretation and evaluation of what is culturally and conceptually unfamiliar exclusively in terms of one’s own values and beliefs, which are uncritically regarded as superior and true. M. C. Escher,

Rind, 1955 Woodcut

Prepared by Dr. Martin Barlosky, Faculty of Education, University of Ottawa

Remember Saul Steinberg’s visualization of ethnocentrism…

Where we stand is

over-determined by where we sit.

Prepared by Dr. Martin Barlosky, Faculty of Education, University of Ottawa

Ethnocentrism: consequence

As a result we are unable to seeWhat is familiar in the strange,And what is strange in the familiar.

We become incapable of irony, imagination, and empathy.

Man Ray,Cadeau,

1921

Prepared by Dr. Martin Barlosky, Faculty of Education, University of Ottawa

Ethnocentrism entraps and limits

Ethnocentrism or cultural naïvité and conceptual parochialism entraps possibility within the limits of what is presumed to be unalterably given.

Prepared by Dr. Martin Barlosky, Faculty of Education, University of Ottawa

Ensnaring the imagination

It ensnares us in the reproduction of what israther than allowing us to imagine and to create what might be better.

Prepared by Dr. Martin Barlosky, Faculty of Education, University of Ottawa

Paula & the Professore

We see both struggle with expectation, presumption, and habit as they attempt to become teachers in cultures new to them.