ABSTRACT
This chapter highlights strategies to achieve diversity awareness at a liberal arts institution. It describes two course assignments used to teach diversity issues and two approaches to teaching about diversity in courses dedicated to examining racism and culture. Portfolio assignments were designed to help students explore their own social identity; gain a greater appreciation for people in social groups other than their own; examine privilege, prejudice, and stigma; and reduce prejudice. One component of the portfolio assignments was attendance at extracurricular lectures that allowed students to learn from the experiences of people with social identities that differed from their own and/or that of their instructor. Expressions of racism and sexism are far less overt than they have been. The interactive processes of helping students articulate the values, norms, expectations, practices, and settings of their own culture in relation to those of another culture were crucial to attaining the central goal of the course.
