ABSTRACT
Diversity is the reality of all our lives. It is the very essence of our planetary survival. Organically, human survival as a species relies on the interdependence of all life. Fundamentalist thinking, supporting dominator culture, denies this truth, socializing citizens to believe that safety resides in upholding the tyranny of the same, in protecting homogeneity. Describing what is meant by the dominator model in The Power of Partnership: Seven Relationships That Will Change Your Life, Riane Eisler writes: “Families and societies are based on control that is explicitly or implicitly backed up by guilt, fear, and force. The world is divided into in-groups and outgroups, with those who are different seen as enemies to be conquered or destroyed.” When diversity first became a buzz word for the inclusion of difference in the academic world and the workplace, it was presented as a rather benign concept, another version of the myth of our nation as a genuine melting pot where differences meet and converge. This concept of diversity has held sway in most institutional settings—from grade schools, colleges and universities, to the corporate world.
