ABSTRACT
Multicultural education has always been motivated in part by the evidence of racial hostility and xenophobia in British society. It is concerned with the response education should make to cultural pluralism. Multicultural education is commonly defended now as an absolute of the curriculum and educational practice generally, rather than as a reform which aims at improving the education of Black children. This chapter argues that education has its duty primarily to the needs of the individual child, and the rights of parents and communities are subordinate to those rights. This leaves a role for the culture of the child's community, but it can seem merely therapeutic or motivational. Teachers need to be sensitized to spot and correct the implicit and explicit racism in teaching materials, teaching and organizational styles, school and classroom structures, and social relations. A wide variety of methods has been used in this style of antiracist training, including racism awareness experience.
