Knowledge Construction in Multicultural Reading Projects

Sammanfattning: This paper researches the theoretical background needed for the implementation of literary texts with multicultural themes for use in EFL courses in Sweden and it offers several concrete didactical solutions for multicultural reading. The theory of multicultural education by J. A. Banks is presented with focus on the dimension of knowledge construction. The processes that are examined are the learning processes in the zone of proximal development by Vygotsky (1986), the concept of scaffolding by Woods, Bruner & Ross (1976) and the process of perspective-taking by Thein & Sloan (2013). These processes each employ a three-step sequence that moves students from their existing knowledge to new knowledge and revised personal opinions. The teacher’s role is to provide support during the learning process. The second part of the paper suggests different activities for the multicultural reading of a novel, used to make the process of multicultural knowledge construction and scaffolding visible. Teacher support includes text reduction, book discussion and language analysis. Discussion points found in Love Medicine start with revising the stereotypical images, discovering how personal experience influences knowledge or how ethnicity influences professional career choices. When teachers and students read literary texts with multicultural themes, students’ racial prejudice can be reduced (Banks 2004) and their ethical attitudes become more open (Thein & Sloan 2013). The literary work chosen for framing in the theory is Love Medicine by Louise Erdrich. The paper ends with a reflection over the limitations of multicultural reading projects.