Globalisation and education: what is the role of literature and leadership?

Dr Mathew A. White
Geelong Grammar School
Geelong, Victoria, Australia

We are told that globalisation is here. It is discussed in government and academic journals from above, and schools and cafés from below. Its impact is measured in economic, political and medical terms at a dizzying speed. Reports appear in newspapers and recommendations are tabled to international and national political agencies. While the literature about the impact of globalisation from economic, political and medical perspectives has increased, and may induce panic in some, the discussion of globalisation and education has remained a largely overlooked area of debate (Apple 2000; Apple, Kenway and Singh 2005; Lingard 2000; Saul 2005).

However, as the defining of globalisation grows, teachers of literature would quickly agree that they are able to pinpoint readily the economic impact of globalisation upon their students. Considered by some as the sign of an educated mind, the study of literature appears to have been under attack in recent years (Bloom 1995). This article considers the role that the study of world literature in schools can play and how they can help teachers engage with the problems of globalisation in the context of multicultural Australia. While the problems of nation state identities and global forces formed by educational systems is an important part of this discussion, it will not be considered directly in this article (Bauman 2000; Smolicz 1999; Znaniecki 1968, 1998).

The affects of globalisation and global economic phenomena, such as the iPod, may not be fully embraced by all members of society. Nevertheless, it is clearly a part of the technological lives and aspirations of the students we teach. Globalisation is rewriting the way students communicate, create and interact with each other and the world around them, and it appears that it is creating its own discourse (text messaging and cyber bullying) that challenges previously accepted norms of behaviour. As our students leave secondary school and enter an increasingly smaller world, they are faced with complex issues. It is a world influenced by globalised networks of terror but will see more global travel than ever before (Sen 2006).

One of the most confronting issues for students will be negotiating their own cultural identity in an increasingly borderless frontier, within the cultures of others (Smolicz 1999). While students will have iPods and various brands of clothing in common, this presents an interesting set of questions: what other tools will they have at their disposal to take an active role in this global world? How should schools and teachers react to this phenomenon? Students in the future are more likely to work in different countries, experience cultures other than their own and live what Nóvoa (2002) expresses as ‘planet speak’.

When Azim Nanji (2004) delivered the International Baccalaureate Organization’s (IBO) 2003 Peterson Lecture, in the United Nations building in Geneva, he explained that the value of cultural pluralism was key in ‘rethinking a pluralistic vision for our world’ that encouraged peace and respect for others. He explained cultural pluralism as ‘the value that enables us to negotiate difference while being aware that we are another among others’ and that it ‘is the quality of mind and value that acknowledges and negotiates diversity’. It is a stereotype to state that education has the power to transform lives. However, many people can recall a powerful educational experience; be it the inspiration of an outstanding teacher, the turning point of appreciating a poem, or solving an equation that fosters a lifelong love of learning. Consequently, schools will play important roles in helping students to navigate the labyrinth of globalisation and it is vital that they consider carefully how they encourage their students to engage in its problems. Can the study of literature provide students with the emotional discourse to navigate the labyrinth of globalisation?

In his essay, On Exile, Saïd posits that ‘Most people are principally aware of one culture, one setting, one home; exiles are aware of at least two, and this plurality of vision gives rise to an awareness of simultaneous dimensions, an awareness that – to borrow a phrase from music is contrapuntal’. Saïd’s observations are particularly salient for the challenges facing teachers in multicultural countries, such as Australia. It is not unusual for a teacher to have a classroom filled with students from a diversity of cultural traditions, including some who may be exiles. The Australian education system is primarily mono-linguistic and does not always fully sympathise with the study of world systems. Recent political discussion has expressed the tension associated with forming values around the study, in primary and secondary schools, of civics and citizenship and the formation of the nation state.

In many instances, Australian students will be living Saïd’s plural vision and already be developing a contrapuntal awareness of culture and ethnicity. Because of this, an increasing number of students already have a positive disposition to ‘contrapuntal awareness’ because of their own cultural identity and experience. Nevertheless, as demonstrated by the violent tension between Serbian and Croatian fans at the 2007 Australian Tennis Open, it is one thing to discuss cultural pluralism and it is another to put it into practice. Saïd claims that because exiles explore physically and emotionally separate cultures simultaneously within their home and host culture, they develop a contrapuntal view and this provides them with a unique understanding of their cultural setting.

In many Australian schools, teachers do not have the experience of being in ‘exile’ and, consequently, one key to help facilitate the discussion of cultural identity is the study of literature, which can play an important part in imagining the experience of cultural pluralism. It is more likely that many students may have access to individuals who have lived Saïd’s expression of ‘exile’. Careful text selection could encourage creative class discussion about the role of identity and culture. Stereotypes that litter the Australian press and adolescent popular culture can be challenged thereby broadening students’ cultural vocabulary and understanding of themselves and each other as cultural values.

For example, in the Australia context, students could consider the works of indigenous writers such as Nugi Garimara, David Unaipon, Oodgeroo Noonuccal and Murri Murri. This could be formalised into the context of mapping the land, thereby permitting the students to be able to contrast the indigenous Australian perspective with a colonial vision. Furthermore, the literature and artistic traditions of the Asia-Pacific region could be compared and contrasted with the indigenous vision. Throughout conversations in the class, it would be vital that students maintain a journal expressing their views and opinions of the cultures of others, in relation to their own. In each conversation, emphasis on the positive aspects of the works should be stressed, so that there is a clear overview incorporated throughout the student’s curriculum (Smolicz 1999)

The study of world literature, or literature translated into a student’s mother tongue from a different culture, can provide teachers and students with the opportunity to explore, compare and contrast the value of cultural pluralism. For example, students studying ElSaadawi’s (1997) Women at Point Zero, Camus’ (2000) The outsider and Allende’s (1994) The house of the spirits have the chance to explore issues central to cultural pluralism, across a diversity of cultural settings, and develop what Saïd calls the contrapuntal view. In particular, in the constrained creativity of the English A1 commentary that demands students to explore the literary features and merits of the works in relations to their own cultural position.

One major difficulty facing teachers is that there is no specific pedagogy assigned for the teaching of world literature. While various literary approaches or course structures might lend themselves particularly well to colonial, postcolonial or multicultural readings, such as comparing Coetzee’s (1999) Disgrace;EM Foster’s (2005) A Passage to India with Mulk Raj Anand’s (1990) Untouchable, the teaching of world literature can raise more questions than answers. But, in its worst form, if handled poorly, cultural pluralism can simply be reduced to a discussion of the ‘exotic’ or the ‘other’ and reinforce negative cultural viewpoints.

As teachers examine these works, perhaps Nanji’s advice to ‘negotiate difference’, while being aware that we are ‘another among others’ offers salient advice as an approach to a text that focuses upon issues of individual and corporate identity. As Sen (2006) warns in his discussion of intercultural tensions in the modern era, there is much to be said about celebrating the difference in diverse cultural perspectives. As teachers, it is important that we stress to our students the significant of cultural pluralism as an agent in developing empathy for others, as we negotiate the labyrinth of globalisation together. Exploring world literature texts, searching for a better understanding of others, will be key as we move towards an international cultural democracy (Sen 2006).

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