Approaches to Multicultural Education in the United States: Some Concepts and Assumptions

Review of the literature on multicultural education within the United States reveals that program proponents have provided no systematic delineation of the views. To promote conceptual clarity and to bring some order to the field's broad scope, the author suggests that extant programs can be organized into four approaches. Analysis stems primarily from the anthropological literature on acculturation, ethnicity, and cultural pluralism. A fifth approach is offered that builds upon anthropological definitions of both education and culture and provides one basis for the evaluation of the other four approaches.