Journal of Literacy Research

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Complements or Conflicts: Conceptions of Discussion and Multicultural Literature in a Teachers-as-Readers Discussion Group Michael W. Smith, Dorothy S. Strickland, John Carman, Denise Dover, Bruce Fiegenbaum, Ronald Hess, Sonia Perez-Torres, Marcia Pheffer, Pat Richards, Pat Schiffner, Louise Smith, Monica Spencer, Kathy Szep and Richard Temperini Journal of Literacy Research 2001 33: 137 DOI: 10.1080/10862960109548105 The online version of this article can be found at: http://jlr.sagepub.com/content/33/1/137

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COMPLEMENTS OR CONFLICTS: CONCEPTIONS OF DISCUSSION AND MULTICULTURAL LITERATURE IN A TEACHERSAS-READERS DISCUSSION GROUP Michael W. Smith Dorothy S. Strickland RUTGERS UNIVERSITY

with John Carman Denise Dover Bruce Fiegenbaum Ronald Hess Sonia Perez-Torres Marcia Pheffer Pat Richards Pat Schiffner Louise Smith Monica Spencer Kathy Szep Richard Temperini

We examine the effectiveness of a teachers-as-readers discussion group in achieving its two major goals: suggesting how teachers can use multicultural literature to foster an ethical respect for others and engaging teachers in conversations about multicultural literature that challenge the patterns of discourse that prevail in school discussions of literature. Teachers of diverse backgrounds from urban elementary schools joined us for monthly meetings in which we discussed multicultural literature. The teachers also wrote in response to a journal prompt we provided. The analyses of the teachers' writing and the discussions suggest that although the group was successful in engaging teachers in discussions that challenge the patterns of discourse that typify school discussions of literature, that success may have come at the expense of achieving the goal of demonstrating that multicultural literature can foster an ethical respect for others. Our study has caused us to reexamine the assumptions with which we began our work, for it suggests that goals we once thought to be complementary may, at least to some extent, stand in conflict.

J LR v. 33 NO. 1

2001 pp. 137-167

because we share two major goals for our work with preservice and in-service teachers. Though we are of different races, genders, and generations, we are both members of multiracial families, a fact that has heightened our commitment to encourage the use of multicultural literature as a way to help students develop an ethical respect for others. That is, we believe multicultural literature has the capacity to enable readers to adopt the perspectives of literary characters who are very different from them and in so doing to begin to appreciate and perhaps even to apply those perspectives. We are also committed to fostering a kind of talk about texts that is at odds with the patterns of discourse that typify school discussions. That is, we work with teachers to help them encourage talk that more nearly resembles conversation than recitation (cf. Marshall, Smagorinsky, & Smith, 1995; Weiss,Strickland,Walmsley,&Bronk,i995).With these goals in mind, we invited teachers from two urban elementary schools to join us in a teachers-as-readers discussion group to read and talk about a variety of multicultural picture books, young adult novels, and adult short stories. In this study, we examine the effectiveness of the discussion group in achieving these two goals. In examining our practice, we were acting, in essence, as teacher-researchers, and our examination led us to experience what Cochran-Smith and Lytle (1993) see as one of the chief benefits of teacher-research: "When teachers themselves conduct research, they make problematic what they think they already know"(p. 64). More specifically, our research has caused us to rethink the goals that led to our forming the discussion group, for it suggests that goals we once thought to be complementary may, at least to some extent, stand in conflict. W E BEGAN TO WORK TOGETHER

J LR Smith & Strickland

Theoretical Background Teaching Multicultural Literature as a Means of Developing an Ethical Respect for Others What is respect? As we noted in our introduction, by ethical respect we mean provisionally adopting the perspective of another as best one can and considering how that perspective might be instructive. In their philosophical discussion of respect, Downie and Tefler (1970) amplify this definition by explaining that respect has two necessary components. First, "we respect [others] by showing active sympathy with them; in Kant's terms we make their ends our own" (p. 28). Second, "we respect them by taking seriously the fact that the rules by which they guide their conduct constitute reasons which may apply both to them and to ourselves" (pp. 28-29). The notion of respect for persons described by Downie and Tefler (1970)

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resonates with Taylor's (1992) discussion of respecting cultures in his influential philosophical essay on multiculturalism "The Politics of Recognition." Taylor notes that the politics of equal recognition has come to mean two very different things. On the one hand, it means recognizing the equal dignity of all citizens. On the other hand, he argues that the modern notion of identity has given rise to the belief that everyone "should be recognized for his or her unique identity" (p. 38). Taylor worries about the homogenizing effects of the politics of equal respect, for it "requires that we treat people in a difference-blind fashion" (p. 43). He argues further that in multicultural societies this leads inevitably to invoking dominant standards to judge all civilizations and cultures. What he proposes instead is adopting "the presumption of equal worth" in the "study of the other" (p. 72). Judgments of worth that come as a consequence of such study suppose that "we have been transformed by the study of the other, so that we are not simply judging by our original familiar standards" (p. 70). As Taylor suggests in his discussion of judgments of worth, provisionally adopting the ends of others and the rules by which they live does not mean remaining morally neutral. Like Enciso (1997), we want to encourage readers to talk back to texts. As Taylor (1992) makes clear, the kind of liberalism he advocates is a "fighting creed" (p. 62). Kane (1994) concurs, arguing that an attitude of what he calls "openness" does not lead to what Bloom (1987) calls an "openness of indifference" in Bloom's argument against what he sees as a moral relativism in the academy. Instead, Kane explains that openness means accepting the idea that one might learn from others while recognizing that one may ultimately wish to resist their rules. To put it simply, in Kane's words, openness means "treating others as innocent till proven guilty" (p. 25). What does it mean to respect a literary character? Paying literary characters an ethical respect is complicated by the fact that those characters are fictional constructs. Ethical respect, therefore, has to begin by provisionally regarding characters as people who are deserving of attention and concern. Rabinowitz (1987; Rabinowitz & Smith, 1998) calls this playing the narrative audience. He explains that although fictional narratives are artistic inventions, they pretend to be something else, usually biographies or memoirs. Playing the narrative audience means temporarily accepting that pretense, that is, pretending as one reads that one is doing more than looking at ink on paper, that one is, in fact, being invited into the lives of other human beings. However, paying respect requires something more from readers. It requires them to try on the perspectives of literary characters and to consider the possible implications of those perspectives on their own lives. Booth (1988) explains the benefits that readers gain by taking seriously the way

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characters guide their conduct. He argues that what gives stories their ethical force is that they are usually centered on characters' efforts to face moral choices. According to Booth, "In tracing those efforts, we readers stretch our own capacities for thinking about how life should be lived" (p. 187). An extended example provides an illustration. Before we began this study, Michael had discussed Alice Walkers "Everyday Use" (1992) in a multiracial book group he had initiated at a local adult education center. That story turns at least in part on the tension between two sisters, Dee and Maggie. Dee, the older, has a style and sensibilities that pushed her away from home, first through attending a school in the city and later by leaving home and forging an African identity. In contrast, her sister Maggie is shy and frightened. The story chronicles a visit by Dee, who has renamed herself Wangero Leewanika Kemanjo, during which she asks for quilts her grandmother made, quilts her mother had promised to Maggie. She argues for the quilts, which she plans to display on her walls, by saying, "Maggie can't appreciate these quilts! She'd probably be backward enough to put them to everyday use." Her mother retorts that it doesn't matter that Maggie might wear the quilts out for "She can always make some more.... Maggie knows how to quilt." Maggie, however, is willing to give up the quilts. She says,"She can have them, Mama.... I can 'member Grandma Dee without the quilts." But the narrator remains firm in her decision to give the quilts to Maggie. Dee/Wangero leaves after criticizing her mother and sister for not understanding their heritage and for being content to live as they always have. The story closes with the mother and Maggie's sitting next to each other on a bench, "just enjoying, until it was time to go in the house and go to bed." Michael had always read the story as illustrating the primacy of the family. But several African American participants in the group argued that, in their experience, progress toward racial equity was only made by those who thought first about the race. What Michael came to realize is that he did not pay Dee an ethical respect, but rather dismissed her. The comments of the others in the book club forced him to make a new assessment of Dee. Doing so complicated what had been a relatively unproblematic reading. Paying Dee an ethical respect forced him to consider whether his tendency to think first about interpersonal and familial relations as opposed to larger political issues was justified or whether it was a luxury that being White and being male afforded him. As a consequence, he left with a new appreciation both of the story and of his bookclub colleagues. As this example suggests, taking seriously the rules by which characters guide their conduct, that is, understanding characters on their own terms, is difficult for it requires readers to recognize that their personal

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experiences may be insufficient for genuine understanding. When readers seek to try on the perspective of a literary character, they must of course use their life experiences as aids. But they must always be alert to the fact they cannot pretend that their experience gives them a complete insight into what others have experienced. Dilg (1995) quotes Gwendolyn Brooks J LR to make a similar point: "There is indeed a new Black today... And he is Complements understood by no White; not the Wise White nor the Schooled White nor or Conflicts the Kind White" (p. 22). Recent research by Beach (1997) resonates with Brooks's argument. He found that denial of racial difference was one of the primary means by which students resisted multicultural texts. He also describes how recognizing the limitations of one's cultural stance can lead to important critical reflection. It is not just race, nationality, ethnicity, religion, and gender - what Fishman (1995) calls "A List" cultural markers - that may interfere with understanding. Age, geography, education, occupation, family status, and sexual orientation (Fishman's "B List") are among the other markers that affect an individual's perspective. Realizing the interaction among these markers leads to the recognition that individuals are not simply representatives of cultural groups. Fishman notes further that recognizing the interaction among cultural markers can help readers realize that although some differences may keep them from completely understanding the characters about whom they read, other similarities may provide readers a way into the story so that they begin to imagine that story world from the character's perspective. Before we close this section, we want to stress that we are not suggesting a simple equation between using one's personal experience and failing to pay an ethical respect. Readers have to use their personal experience. The question is how readers use it. Our goal is both to encourage readers to draw on their personal experiences as a resource they employ to understand others and to recognize the limitation of that resource. We want to discourage readers from substituting their experience as the primary focus of their concern, from using texts simply as a springboard for personal associations, and from reasoning unproblematically by analogy. Other goals for teaching multicultural literature. Our goal of fostering an ethical respect for others may seem obvious. However, as Marshall (1998) argues, it is at odds with how multicultural literature is often taught in school. Marshall contends that "For almost twenty years now, reader response theory and multicultural curricula have served as the twin engines of reform in the teaching of literature." The consequence of the relationship, he argues, is an emphasis by teachers on the process of identification,

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the effort of readers to make texts their own as they read them. According to Sims Bishop (1997), this emphasis is one of two major arguments offered in the professional writing in support of multicultural literature. Reisman (1994) provides a compelling example. She notes that when she read a story by Audre Lorde about a West Indian's experience in Harlem, she projected her Jewish background and experiences into the work. Reisman argues that her "inaccurate, but empathetically appropriate" (p. 20) response helped her realize the implications of Rosenblatt's (1978) theory of reader response for the teaching of multicultural literature. Reisman advocates eliminating references to cultural markers at the beginning of texts as a way to help students see themselves in those texts. Such a move, we think, has the goal of personal connection. It encourages students to see a story from their own perspective rather than from a character's perspective. Consequently, it is certainly consistent with the difference-blind strand of the liberal tradition and inconsistent with paying characters an ethical respect. The emphasis on personal connection may not honor Rosenblatt's writing in all of its complexity. (See Faust, 2000, for a recent call for a reconsideration of Rosenblatt's work.) However.as Hynds and Appleman (1997) argue, it does typify the influence that her theories have had. They contend that the insistence on "the private, personal nature of the literary reading process" is Rosenblatt's most famous and most influential contribution to the teaching of literature (pp. 274-275). We also believe that some advocates of multicultural literature who are part of the difference-recognizing tradition may posit different goals for the teaching of multicultural literature. For example, positing differences among readers of different races and cultures and noting how seldom these differences are reflected in the literature students read in school has led advocates of multicultural literature to explore how multicultural literature can have the effect of increasing students' of color engagement in literature. According to Sims Bishop (1997), this is the other major argument offered in professional writing in support of multicultural literature (cf. Desai, 1997; Diamond & Moore, 1995). Lee (1993) extends this argument by illustrating how culturally relevant (cf. Ladson-Billings, 1994) literature, in terms both of the content and the discourse styles employed, can be used to help students develop the interpretive skills they need to have meaningful transactions with canonical literature as well. Although we are strongly in sympathy with this goal, our concern is that if students are reading only that literature that celebrates their heritage, they are not getting the opportunity to broaden their appreciation of the cultures of others. Because many students, both urban minority students and their suburban counterparts, live in areas where they have little opportunity for meaningful interaction with individuals outside their own 142

cultural communities, we feel that teachers of literature should provide them with that opportunity. We hope that our discussion of the value of developing an ethical respect for others is persuasive. However, it is not critical for this study to establish that ours is the most important goal. What is important is to establish that there are other goals, and that our goal is, at least to some degree, at odds with goals offered by other advocates of multicultural literature. The existence of competing goals means that we had to do more than assess whether teachers' appreciation of multicultural literature increased. Rather, we had to examine on what that appreciation was grounded. Patterns of Discourse in the Discussion of Literature Our second goal for the teachers-as-readers discussion group extended beyond teaching multicultural literature to teaching literature more generally. We hoped to engage teachers in discussions that would challenge the patterns of discourse that prevail in schools. Cazden (1988) argues that school discourse at all levels is dominated by the initiation-recitation-evaluation (IRE) sequence. In this sequence, the teacher asks questions to which she almost invariably knows the answer, solicits a brief response from students, and then evaluates that response. As Cazden explains, the IRE sequence is so deeply ingrained in schools that it becomes the default option for teachers, IRE for teachers is "doing what comes naturally" (p. 54). Marshall et al. (1995) note that the strength of this default pattern makes it difficult, even for those teachers who are committed to change, to do so. The difficulty of changing patterns of discourse in discussions of literature becomes especially acute in discussions of multicultural literature. In the first place, as Dilg (1995) points out, in our culture, we lack established ways to talk about differences and as a consequences many adults "simply avoid engaging in ... cross-cultural discussions because they can be awkward, tense, or unsatisfactory" (p. 21). Moreover, as Hynds (1997) notes, in American schools, the political neutrality of teachers is a cultural norm. She argues that as a consequence "as teachers we silence too many conversations in our fear of stepping out of the politically neutral perspective assigned to us by society" (p. 266). If both students and teachers lack models for how to talk about difference, the default pattern of IRE will be especially hard to escape. Wertsch (1991) explains that when cultural tools such as patterns of talk become entrenched, participants tend to forget that those patterns are the results of conscious choices instead of being natural or inevitable. He notes further that "it is often only when confronted with a comparative example that one becomes aware of an imaginable alternative" (p. 126). Our second goal was to provide that comparative example. 143

JLR Complements or Conflicts

A Look at Related Research


The vehicle we chose to achieve our goals was a teachers-as-readers discussion group. The idea of engaging teachers and/or prospective teachers in reading groups is not new. As Levin (1997) points out, teachers-as-readers groups have a substantial history and are increasingly seen as an important alternative to one-shot in-service programs whose effectiveness is undercut by their brevity and their top-down structure. What is new, according to Levin, is teachers-as-readers groups that have multicultural literature as their focus. Two recent studies, however, have examined reading groups that focus on multicultural literature and are therefore useful in situating our work. Florio-Ruane and deTar (1995) studied the discussion that a group of six elementary teacher certification candidates and the director of their teacher education program had about six ethnic autobiographies. FlorioRuane founded the group in the belief that although social scientific accounts of culture have a tendency to generalize about groups, autobiographies have the capacity to offer access to an individual's unique experience and to place that experience within a specific socio-historical context, a justification we think pertains to fiction as well. Florio-Ruane and deTar began their work together when deTar challenged Florio-Ruane's initial characterization of the club's talk as cooperative. As a participant in the discussions, deTar had experienced "more of a struggle" (p. 18). Their subsequent analysis documents the conflict, struggle, and intellectually productive argument that lay beneath the surface of apparent cooperation and the way various members of the group were able to push others to think harder than they would have on their own. Flood et al.'s (1994) description of the book clubs they studied is strikingly different. They studied the discourse of four book clubs comprised of in-service teachers, preservice teachers, and administrators. The clubs were founded because teachers wanted to gain insights into the cultural backgrounds of the diverse students whom they taught. Flood et al. report that the clubs were effective in raising the cultural awareness of the participants. Interestingly, Flood et al. report that this awareness was achieved without the struggle and argument that marked the discourse of the group studied by Florio-Ruane and deTar. Instead, Flood et al. note that a camaraderie of trust and understanding developed among group members as they shared life stories. Comparing Flood et al.'s (1994) findings to those of Florio-Ruane and deTar (1995) helped us recognize that the conception of multicultural literature that informs a discussion group is likely to affect the patterns of

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discourse in that group. Florio-Ruane founded her group in the hope that it would encourage participants to articulate their own cultural identities and the impact of those identities on their attitudes toward and beliefs about different ethnocultural groups, a goal consistent with the differencerecognizing strand of liberalism. It is not surprising that recognizing differences might lead to conflict, struggle, and argument among those differences. On the other hand, Flood at al. (1994) sought a goal much more in line with the difference-blind strand when they argue that through multicultural literature "it is possible to develop personal understanding and expand one's view of other cultures - to see similarities between different cultural groups" (p. 17). Seeking similarities seems far less likely to result in any kind of conflict. Taken together, these studies suggest that different conceptions of both multicultural literature and discussion might inform a teachers-as-readers group. Smagorinsky and O'Donnell-Allen (2000) explain why understanding the informing conceptions of a social group is so important. They argue that sociocultural theory "implies that in order to understand mental functioning, researchers should analyze the context of development and the ways in which it provides problems, values, structures, tools, and implied trajectories for human action" (p. 165). A variety of recent research on classroom discussion makes a similar point. As Rex (1999) argues,"What counts as literate academic English knowledge is under continual historical and local reconstitution as knowledge is brought to, acted upon, and reconstructed in classrooms" (p. 70). In Applebee, Burroughs, and Stevens's (2000) study of 19 high school classrooms, they found little difference between the classrooms they studied and those portrayed in other large-scale examinations of classrooms. However, they also found tremendous variation among classrooms in what they call the domain conventions that govern student activity. Rogers (1997) makes a link to discussion of multicultural literature in her examination of how one teacher worked to establish norms that invited critical, social, and literary inquiry. What this research suggests is that through discussion, norms evolve that support certain kinds of talking and thinking and discourage others. However, knowing the goals of a teacher or in-service provider will not suffice in understanding those norms. In another study, Smagorinsky and O'Donnell-Allen (1998) illustrate how the norms that a leader is trying to establish maybe at odds with what is enacted in a group. Realizing that there are competing conceptions of both multicultural literature and discussion, we asked two questions about our study group: (a) What conceptions of multicultural literature were enacted in the study group? (b) What conceptions of discussion were enacted in the study group?

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JLR Complements or Conflicts

Method Participants JLR Smith & Strickland

We worked with 12 teachers in the teachers-as-readers group: 4 African American women, 1 African American man, 3 European American women of various ethnicities, 3 European American men of various ethnicities, and 1 woman from Costa Rica. Michael is a European American man, and Dorothy is an African American woman. Our two research assistants were European American women. (Although the European American participants discussed their ethnic heritage, none of the African American participants discussed a particular African or regional ethnicity.) All of the teachers worked at one of two K - 8 schools in one of New Jersey's specialneeds districts, districts designated by the state to receive special funding because a significant proportion of their students come from high poverty areas with a history of low achievement. One of the schools is our Graduate School of Education's Professional Development School and Dorothy had done extensive in-service work in the district. Although Michael was new to the teachers, most had had at least some contact with Dorothy through her previous in-service work. One impetus of the project was that the district in which the teachers worked had recently made a commitment to move to more literature-based literacy instruction. However, at the time of the study, the teachers were still required to use a basal series (they could supplement the basal with other texts) and they were responsible for their students' performance on a wide variety of reading sub-skills. All of the teachers indicated that they wanted to learn more about range of children's and adolescent literature that is currently available, especially the multicultural literature. They also displayed an interest in learning more about ways to lead student-centered discussions. As the teachers themselves noted, their efforts to cover curricular material resulted in their conducting teacher-centered discussions (cf. Brown, 1991). Participating teachers received approximately $1000 of materials for their participation; $300 of these materials were used in the reading group. Participants were free to order the other $700 of materials from catalogs that we brought to the sessions. Context The teachers-as-readers group had eight monthly meetings through the course of one school year. We met in the library of one of the participating schools. The meetings began with a short discussion of business issues,

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most often about procedures participants could use for ordering books. Once that discussion was completed, we moved to a discussion of the texts that participants had read during the time between meetings. Seven of these meetings were devoted to the discussion of multicultural picture books, young adult novels, or adult short stories, and the final meeting was devoted to a discussion of the experience of being in the group. We selected the children's and adolescent literature we discussed from a list provided by Professor Violet Harris, an expert on multicultural literature. We selected the adult stories from a group of stories Michael had used as coordinator of a People and Stories/Gentey Cuentos discussion group. (People and Stories/Gentey Cuentos is a program funded by the New Jersey Council for the Humanities that is designed to bring the discussion of multicultural literature to a variety of nontraditional sites.) All of our selections were informed by our belief that the primary goal of teaching multicultural literature is to help develop respect for individuals whose culture is different from one's own and by our belief that an individual's culture may be the result of a complex interaction of a variety of cultural markers. The texts we selected featured characters of a variety of races, classes, genders, ethnicities, and religious backgrounds. In order to give the study group something of the same feeling as an adult reading group, one of the participants brought refreshments. Researchers' Role

We were the leaders of the group. As we noted previously, we selected the texts that the group read. In addition, because we wanted to do some modeling of possible instructional approaches, we asked participants to write a brief journal entry for each of the sessions. We told teachers that we believed that there was a powerful link between reading and writing, and response journals were one way to develop that link. Table 1 indicates the books and stories we discussed along with the journal prompts that we used. In five of the sessions, we simply asked teachers to write for a page or so about any response they had to the reading. Three of the prompts were more directive. We sent memos to the teachers each month to remind them of the reading and writing they needed to do to prepare for the next meeting. Because we wanted to engage teachers in discussions that departed from the teacher-centered discussion they were used to, we tried as much as possible to participate in the discussions as equals. We began each session after the first one (for which there was no writing requested) by asking them to share the responses that they had read. For example, Dorothy began the March session as follows: "So to begin, please share any reflections at all. If you'd look at your response notes and maybe speak from those and

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Table 1. Texts and Writing Prompts Month October

Text(s) Writing prompt "A Visit to Grandmother" by William Free response Melvin Kelley (adult short story)

November

The Whispering Cloth by Pegi Deitz Shea (picture book) Been to Yesterdays by Lee Bennet Hopkins (poems for young people)

January

My Name is Maria Isabel (adolescent Free response novel) by Alma Flo Ada Too Many Tamales by Gary Soto (picture book)

February

"Everyday Use" by Alice Walker (adult short story)

March April

May

Maniac Magee by Jerry Spinelli (adolescent novel) 'Two Kinds" by Amy Tan (adult short story) Number the Stars by Lois Lowry (adolescent novel) Amazing Grace by Mary Hoffman (picture book) no reading

Select a poem or passage that you particularly like. Write a response to that poem or passage.

Track your understanding of the main characters in a three-column response. Put the character's name in the first column, a passage that affected your understanding of the character in the second column, and how your understanding has developed or changed in the third column. Free response Free response Free response

What makes a good discussion? Which of three book would you choose to teach?

then others can respond to you." In addition, we encouraged teachers to enter the conversation without being recognized. For example, in the November session Dorothy said,"Please don't wait for me to call on you. Just dig right in. Just anybody want to continue either of those poems?" Discussions regularly featured teachers' taking 5-8 turns without our speaking. When we did speak, we attempted to participate in the same fashion that the teachers did, by making statements related to the discussion at hand. We asked few questions, and when we did, they were centered on issues in the story that puzzled us or were requests for elaborations. For

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example, in the October discussion, one teacher noted that if she told her mother that she was treating her children differently,"I don't think she would have understood." After that turn Michael asked, "Would your mom not understand because she thought she treated you equally or because she thought the different treatment was right?" We thought that explicitly discussing our goals for the group would undermine our attempts to participate as equals; therefore, we did not discuss the conceptions of multicultural literature we presented in our framework until our final, stock-taking session Instead we took two different tacks. One was modeling the stance of ethical respect we were trying to foster. For example, in the first session, Michael began the discussion with an extended turn in which he worked to pay the African American characters in Kelly's "A Visit to Grandmother" (1992) an ethical respect. In that turn, he discussed aspects of his life that related to the story. He was careful not to equate his experience with that of the characters, but rather he used it to try to understand and assess the moral choices the characters made. His turn ended as follows: "And so I remember how I was feeling. So I guess what I wanted to wonder about first was, Did she do the right thing? How do you feel about it?" The second tack was to ask an occasional question to draw the teachers' attention to our concerns. For example, near the end of the first session, Michael took this turn following one in which a teacher compared the situation of the African American family in the story to a Puerto Rican family she knew: Which raises an interesting question for the group that I'll bet we'll come back to which is if you think about multicultural literature, does it have to have specific cultural elements or can you ultimately say, "Well, we're all like this." So it's interesting to the extent that one could say "Yeah, this reminds me of growing up as a White man in Ohio" - does that mean that this story isn't a multicultural story? In summary, although we chose the readings and assigned the writings, we tried to let the teachers pursue their interests in the discussion. After our first session, we began all of the other discussions by asking teachers to share what they had written. That sharing was the springboard for the subsequent discussion in which we tried as much as possible to participate as equals. Our research assistants acted as observers and very rarely offered a question or comment. Data Collection and Analysis We tape-recorded each of the sessions. Technical problems made one tape

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inaudible. We transcribed each of the remaining seven tapes, six discussions of literature, and the final session in which we discussed the experience of being in the group. We wanted to examine both the content and the conduct of the discussions. To investigate the content of the discussion, we divided the transcripts into content units, segments of discourse designed to make a single point. A preliminary analysis of the data suggested that content units had one of six foci: personal, personal-textual, textual, global, teaching, or teaching-textual. Our subsequent analysis confirmed that these six foci were descriptive of all but one of the content units. That content unit was eliminated from the data set. To examine the conduct of the discussion, we examined the relationship among turns. Our analysis was informed by the coding system used by Marshall, Smagorinsky, and Smith (1995) to analyze the nature of responses participants in discussions of literature made to each other. Our analysis suggested that slight modifications ofthat coding system were needed. Initially, each turn was coded as having one of the following eight relationships to the previous turn: elaboration, question, restatement, agreement, disagreement, evaluation, orchestration, no relationship. Our subsequent analysis suggested that we had defined elaboration to include both turns that genuinely built on the previous turn and turns that simply mentioned the previous turn in order to gain the floor politely. We distinguished between elaborations and mentions in another round of analysis. Table 2 summarizes the coding categories and gives a definition of each. In addition, we analyzed the length of each turn in communication units, a unit of discourse having the force of a sentence. Two graduate students in English education divided the turns into content units and then coded each turn and content unit. After completing their coding, they compared results and tried to resolve differences. They had initial agreement on 84% and ultimate agreement on 97% of the content units. They had initial agreement on 84% and ultimate agreement on 99% of the turns. A second set of graduate students in English education coded each turn that was initially determined to be an elaboration as either an elaboration or a mention. They had initial agreement on 85% of their coding and ultimate agreement on 97% of the coding. The units or turns on which they raters could not agree in their coding were ones in which the intent of the speaker was not clear. The vast majority of these units were elliptical constructions. If trained raters could not agree on the content or function of a unit or turn, we thought that any argument advanced using those units or turn would have a questionable foundation. Therefore, we removed them from the data set. In addition to analyzing the transcripts, we analyzed the teachers' final journal entries, both the one in which they discussed the impact their par-

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Table 2. Description of Coding Categories Content units Personal: content centers on speaker, speaker's family, speaker's cultural background, etc. without reference to the text under discussion Personal-Textual: content centers on how speaker, speaker's family, speaker's cultural background, etc. relate to the text under discussion Textual: content centers on characters, elements of text, and author's craft Teaching-Textual: content centers on how speaker would teach the text under discussion or on how the text has affected speaker's view of teaching Teaching: content centers on how speaker has taught or will teach without reference to the text Global: content centers on generalizations about people, teaching, and texts beyond the text under discussion Nature of response Elaboration: turn that substantively changes the previous turn by building on previous content or by offering an interpretation of what the speaker is saying Mention: turn that refers to previous turn in order to gain floor and then departs from substance of previous turn Question: turn that ask previous speaker to clarify or develop the previous turn Restatement: turn that makes effort to repeat or summarize previous turn Agreement: turn that simply states agreement with previous turn Disagreement: turn that simply states disagreement with previous turn Evaluation: a positive or negative comment on previous turn Orchestration: turn seeks to relate subsequent turn(s) to previous turn Wo Relationship: turn has no clear relationship to previous turn ticipation in the group had on their views about what makes a good discussion and their explanation of why they would choose one of three books to include in their curricula. We analyzed these by looking both for comments that indicated the teachers' conceptions of multicultural literature and discussion and for comments that indicated what they believed was our conception of these issues.

Results and Discussion Challenging Prevailing Patterns of Discourse Both the analysis of the literature discussions and the evaluations of their experience that the teachers provided strongly suggest that we were successful in achieving our goal of engaging teachers in discussions that

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challenge the patterns of discourse that typify school discussions. In fact, returning to the ideas of Smagorinsky and O'Donnell-Allen (2000), the data suggest that trajectory for future action implied by the group was to engage students in more student-centered instructional conversations. We turn first to our analysis of the literature discussions themselves. As Table 3 reveals, the two teaching categories comprised only 25% of the total content units. This suggests that the teachers were engaged in the discussions as readers rather than as teachers. Because our goal was to engage the teachers in discussions of literature that would provide an imaginable alternative to those that prevail in schools, it was important to us that the sessions focused on the literature itself rather than on teaching that literature. As one might expect, over three-fourth of the content units related to teaching came in the three discussions that centered on literature written for young people. Most obviously, this occurred because most of the teachers would be unlikely to teach any of the three adult stories in their classes. But it also seemed to be the case that the adult stories sustained a kind of readerly attention that the literature written for young people did not. Table 3 also reveals that although the texts were an important focus of discussions, participants sought to explore connections between their lives and the texts, used the texts as a springboard to share a personal experience, and used the discussions to comment about how people behave and how they ought to behave. The number of responses in these categories suggest that the discussion resembled grand conversations much more than they resembled the kind of gentle inquisitions (cf. Eeds & Wells, 1989) teachers in search of right answers often conduct. Our analysis of the responses displayed in Table 4 also suggests the extent to which the discussions were at odds with the kind of discussions that, according to Cazden (1988), prevail in schools. Questions comprised only 9% of the total turns. This suggests that the discussion moved forward on the basis of statements rather than questions, a pattern that clearly departs from the kind of question-based initiation of school discourse. Because sequences tended to begin with statements rather than questions, responses could not be mere recitation. In fact, 57% of the turns were initially coded as elaborations. Our subsequent analysis of these elaborations found that in two-thirds of these turns participants built on the previous turn, suggesting the kind of collaborative discourse that Flood et al. (1994) found in their study. In the other third of the turns initially coded as elaborations, speakers mentioned the previous turn but used it as a springboard to introduce a point that did not depend on the previous turn. In addition, 20% of the turns were coded as having no relationship to the previous turn. Both of these analyses suggest the fluidity of the discussions. Participants were able to explore points

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of personal interest and to change the direction of the conversation, a privilege reserved for the leader in school discussions of literature. However, many of the turns that were labeled as having no relationship to the previous turn in fact picked up on a previous turn rather than introducing a new topic. Only 7% of the turns were coded as agree, disagree, or evaluation, another obvious departure from the IRE sequence. This aspect of the discussions is more reminiscent of the patterns of discourse that Marshall found in his study of literature discussions in 12 secondary school classrooms (see Marshall et al., 1995, Chapter 3). Marshall noted that the relatively low proportion of evaluations in his study was surprising in light of the research of Cazden and others. What Marshall found instead was that teachers tended to replace evaluations with acknowledgments or restatements and would then weave students' responses into the interpretation the teacher was building. However, our discussions were also a departure from that pattern. None of the turns were acknowledgments, and only 1% of the turns were restatements. The number of elaborations suggests that the participants were able to develop their ideas and interpretations in the discussions. The group members' tendency to develop their own ideas is also suggested by the fact that the turns averaged 5.57 communication units. On average, the turns were over three times as long as the average turn of the students (1.8 communication units) in Marshall's studies and slightly longer than the turns of the teachers (5.4 communication units) in those same studies. Interestingly, the length of the turns were also three times longer than those members of adult book clubs took (Marshall et al., 1995). Instead of the quick give-and-take that characterized those discussions, in our group, speakers more often made extended observations.


In summary, although there were important differences among the discussions in the focus of the content units (differences that we discuss below), there were several features of the discussion that characterized all of the discussions. They were driven by statements and not questions. Speakers tended to develop their ideas in lengthy turns. Although they were free to change the direction of the discussion, speakers tended to gain the floor Table 3. Percentage of Content Units by Category Personal

Personal-Textual

Textual

Teaching-Textual

Teaching

Global

18

8

30

12

13

18

Table 4. Percentage of Responses by Type Elaborate

Question

Restate

Agree

Disagree

57

9

1

3

3

Evaluate 1

Orchestrate

Wo

6

20

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by elaborating or at least mentioning the previous turn. AU of these features are at odds with the kind of talk that characterizes discussions of literature in schools. These differences are especially striking in light of the fact that the teachers with whom we worked constructed the group as something of a course. As we noted, although we tried to participate in the conversations as equal members of the group, we were clearly the group leaders. Some of the teachers raised their hands when they wanted to enter the conversation, especially at the beginning of our work together. We were the only participants to have turns that were coded as orchestrations. Despite these similarities between our discussion and school discussions of literature, we want to stress that we recognize that many of the differences between our discussions and those that occur in school are a consequence of the fact that a teachers-as-readers group is a different context than an elementary school classroom. We also want to stress that our goal was to engage teachers in discussions that could provide an imaginable alternative for discussions that typically occur in school, a far more modest goal than effecting significant changes in the teachers' practice. Our analyses convince us that we were successful in providing an alternative conception of discussion. The comments teachers made in their final journal entries and in our final, stock-taking session support our analysis of the transcripts. Teachers unanimously noted in their journals that their participation in the group had affected the way they think about discussions. The most striking theme of the final journal entries was the importance of active engagement. As one teacher noted, "A good discussion is when most of the participants are really involved and sharing ideas." Another explained that "a good discussion is one in which everyone offers thoughts, ideas, reflections, learning experiences and other [relevant] pieces to a group." The teachers seemed to read the way we led discussions as an endorsement ofthat notion. Their comments suggested that what they saw us doing was being open to exploration in a way that was different from the way they led discussions in their classes. One teacher noted in the final discussion,"! think that one of the points of the whole program was not to tell us what you wanted.... I think I slowly discovered that, and I kind of, I think I'm trying to use the same thing in my class. You know, where I don't guide them and try to make them answer in certain ways." A second theme is that the teachers saw personal connections as a way to encourage that active engagement. As one teacher explained,"I particularly enjoyed our round-table discussions about the manybooks and pieces of literature because they led to lively talks about our personal experiences." Another noted:

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At first, I kept feeling as if I were in a therapy group for teachers. Much of what we did in the beginning seemed to revolve around our own feelings and interpersonal relationships (family). This struck me because I wondered what the classroom connection was and also because I'm an individual who craves intimacy. It would seem trite to resound teachers are people too, but we are. The human factor, the ability to appeal to other sen-

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sitmties, is crucial in discussion. Literature, particularly multicultural literature, is a perfect launching pad for the expression of one's experiences, ideas, and feelings.

The connection teachers perceived between active engagement and personal connection is evident in the other journal entry that they wrote for the final meeting. In addition to the final journal entry on what makes a good discussion, we asked the teachers to write about whether they would select Been to Yesterdays, Smoky Night, or The Whispering Cloth if they could only teach one of the three books to their classes. Been to Yesterdays (1995) is a collection of poems in which Lee Bennet Hopkins, a European American author, reflects on both the trials (his parents' divorce, his mother's drinking, a hand-to-mouth existence) and comforts (his grandmother's love, his ambition to be a writer) he experienced growing up in the 1950s. Smoky Night (1994), written by Eve Bunting and illustrated by David Diaz, chronicles the experiences of a young African American and his mother during the Los Angeles riots in the aftermath of the Rodney King verdict. It details how the boy witnesses looting, loses his home and cat, and comes to feel some kind of connection to the Korean grocer on his street who had experienced similar losses, someone of whom he had always been suspicious. The Whispering Cloth (19 9 5) .written by Pegi Deitz Shea and illustrated by Anita Riggio, relates the story of a young Hmong girl in a refugee camp in Thailand who comes to tell her own story through an embroidered story cloth, created for the book by You Yang. Been to Yesterdays was by far the most popular choice among both the African American and White teachers. When they explained their choices, one group of teachers noted that they made the choice they did because the book has what one teacher called "a universal theme." Another group noted that they would select it because their students could immediately relate to some of the situations in the book. As one teacher wrote, "I feel children can examine their own emotions and feelings through the words of Lee Bennet Hopkins." In the words of another: "I chose [Been to Yesterdays] because I feel that there are several situations described in the story which many of our students can identify with." As we explained in the theoretical background for this study, it is essential to examine the cultural norms that were enacted in the group, for those norms suggest the path of development that participation in the

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group encourages. The evidence from the final meeting of our teachersas-readers group suggests that our group came to value active participation informed by personal connections. The teachers'journals suggest that at least some of them planned to pursue the path of development suggested by the group. That is, some teachers used the alternative conception of discussion that they gained through participation in the group to provide the impetus for what Cazden (1988) calls deliberate action against the default option of 1 RE . Teachers noted that they learned that "everyone's thoughts and opinions are valuable" which encouraged them to talk less and to wait longer for their students to respond. Although they seemed to recognize that changing the patterns of discourse in their classes would not come easily, they appeared dedicated to making change. One teacher put it this way: "I still find it somewhat difficult. Short answers on the part of students paralyze the discussion. Nonetheless, I will continue making a great effort to bring'conversation' to my classroom." The teachers also noted that they embraced the trade books with which they became acquainted as tools to assist them in their effort to engage students in more active discussions. Repeatedly in our final discussion, teachers mentioned how important it was to have books that would interest students and encourage talk. As one teacher noted: Some of the things we had in our reading text, honestly are not interesting to me, and I don't know how I expected them to be interested in it.... The minute I went to a trade book that I knew in my heart was good, I just said I know this is a good book. I know they are going to love it.

Our aim of fostering discussions that challenge the patterns of discourse that typify school discussions, then, seemed, at least by the end of our work, to be a central value of the group. However, all the news is not so good, for our analyses also suggests that that our goal of encouraging the use of multicultural literature to help students develop an ethical respect for others did not ultimately become a cultural norm. Fostering an Ethical Respect for Others

Our final discussion suggests the extent to which our goal of encouraging teachers to see multicultural literature as a way to develop ethical respect for others somehow got lost in the shufHe. As we noted previously, in that session, teachers talked about how they have worked to have more conversation-like discussions with their students. They talked about how important "discussible" books and stories like the ones we read together were in that effort. They talked about how their district's reliance on a basal series

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made their efforts difficult. But they did not talk about their conception of multicultural literature, even when we asked them to do so. Fourteen pages into the discussion, Michael explicitly asked about the multicultural component of the study group: So I'm sort of wondering what you guys thought about the diversity, the multicultural part of it, and how your goals relate to the three strands [the three conceptions of multicultural literature that we discussed previously] or other ones that I haven't thought of. You know, why would you use these texts? In response, the teacher who had been talking about Maniac Magee said, "Characterization is what brought me to the book." Later, the teacher added, "Just fun stuff that kids would like." But there was no discussion of the competing conceptions of multicultural literature. Later Michael tried again by asking whether Maniac Magee, whose title character, according to one teacher, had "no race in him" would be a better book to teach than one in which the main character's racial or ethnic identification was clearly articulated. Once again, the teachers chose not to discuss this issue. Their failing to take up Michael's invitation is especially striking, because as we noted previously, the teachers constructed the group as something of a course and deferred to us as leaders. Our realization that our goal of encouraging teachers to see multicultural literature as way to foster an ethical respect for other may not have been realized sent us back to our data to see if we could understand why. We think now that we may have underestimated the force of our culture's reluctance to talk about difference (Dilg, 1995) and the impact of the cultural expectation that teachers be politically neutral (Hynds, 1997). But we have also come to think that our participation in the group may have been experienced as supporting difference-blind discussion. As we argued in the theoretical background, drawing on personal experience is not necessarily antithetical to paying characters and authors an ethical respect. It may be a necessary first step. However, when the personal experience of the readers becomes a substitute for engagement with the characters, readers are not paying the kind of respect we sought to foster. That was what happened in at least some of our discussions. Our discussion of "Two Kinds," a story by Amy Tan that she later made part of her novel The Joy Luck Club, provides an example. The following excerpt begins with Michael's second attempt to initiate discussion of what in the text may be culture-specific (relationships between turns are indicated in parentheses after the speaker; content units are indicated in parentheses after the content unit; slashes indicate communication units):

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J LR Complements C fï t

Michael:

__„ „ ., , Strickland

When I was reading, I was wondering about that stuff, about obedience ... is the conflict worse in this story because being a Chinese daughter meant being an obedient daughter in a way that it might not across cultures?/ I mean, I know my folks expected me to be obedient/ but - (personal-textual) Teacher 1 (elab): I am amazed at the way my own kids behave./1 remember m y fatner> n e SpamCed us very few times./ When we sat at the table, they were both teachers, and in [the country of her birth] you go home to have lunch./ Everybody goes home to have lunch, even if you're in high school and you go back to school in the afternoon./ If I didn't like the food, and I would say I don't like it, he would just look at me and I would eat it./ Never answered him back, never to my teachers./ My children were born and raised here and they're very different./ They're more open and opinionated./ You know, they argue with me /and they're very different./ It's just, it's just a different culture./ I have certain values from my culture, I'm not able to - (personal-textual) Teacher 2: When my father gave me one look, that was it,/ but my mother, I could talk back to./ And then [when] she told him I wanted to run away from home, (personal) Teacher 3 (elab): And I think what you said was so true;/ it was the time./1 never would think, even to this day I don't talk back to my mother/and it's not that I'm a goody-goody, but I just respect her./ And if I have an opinion that's different from her, sometimes I keep it to myself because she takes it in a very like, you know, she takes it too personally./ So I just don't want to deal with that,/ and I would just want to, you know, I won't go against her in any way and they are still Mommy and Daddy to me/ and I would never, ever talk back to them./ And with my daughter, like she said, it's different./ (personal) The raters coded the content unit that initiates this exchange as personal-textual because of the link Michael made to his own experience. They coded the next turn as personal-textual as well, because although it does not explicitly refer back to the text, it seems to pick up on the initiating turn. However, beginning with turn three, the raters saw a turning away from the story and from a consideration of the particular culture portrayed in the story to a sharing of how group members related to their parents. As we have explained, such a turning away is at odds with paying characters an ethical respect. Instead of trying on the perspective of others, the teachers shared their own. And as the comments of the teachers that we previously cited make clear, it was this kind of sharing that the teachers came to value.

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They enjoyed "lively talk" about personal experience. They saw the literature as a "launching pad" for the expression of "one's experiences, ideas, and feelings." Our discussion of "Everyday Use" by Alice Walker was an exception to the pattern of using personal experience to turn away from the story. Consequently, it helps illustrate what we mean by ethical respect and why we did not embrace the way the teachers used their personal experience in the discussion of "Two Kinds." The discussion of "Everyday Use" had twice as many text-based responses than did the discussion of "Two Kinds" (57% to 26%). In addition, in the discussion of "Everyday Use," 83% of the content units that referred to the personal experience of the reader were coded personal-textual, while only 57% of the content units that referred to the personal experience of the reader were coded personal-textual in the discussion of "Two Kinds." Numbers alone cannot tell the whole story, however. An excerpt from the discussion of "Everyday Use" indicates how the differences played out. The excerpt comes about half way through a discussion of how people regarded Dee, one of the main characters: Teacher 1:

So she really did not have a strong appreciation of her culture because, I guess to me, what Alice Walker always repeats in a lot of her work is that the first and foremost appreciation of your culture begins with your mother./ (textual) I mean how can you appreciate or even act like you're going to appreciate your culture [unless] you have this respect for your mother?/ That doesn't make sense./ (global) Teacher 2: Well, I think that you have to first get to the point where you can find dignity in all kinds of work./ And see it's easy to say now but when you have to - it takes a lot to appreciate your mother who's not doing what you think she should do./ Maybe not what someone else is doing./ You really have to grow to be able to see past that./ (global) If you notice, the picture that was painted, everything on the outside was rough,/ but you had to go a little deeper in order to see other qualities of the mother, like uneducated and the thing to do is maybe take this kind of piece and maybe read it with younger people./ It's just different kinds of minds that you bring to it and what it means to you./ (teaching-textual) Dorothy (elab): What about, just picking up on that. I'm not using the exact words, but often people will say - You know I never wanted to be like my mother/ but as I get older I find I'm my mother all over again./ You know, words come out of my mouth that are things that my mother said./ And I think

159


for the men here probably the same thing with fathers./ I'm just wondering about some other people too./ What does that mean to you in relationship to the story or to just life?/ (personal-textual) I think there's a tension here with Dee./ I think it's a tension that maybe goes beyond the story, (textual) When someone steps way outside of their culture that they've grown up in, they're drawn in two ways

__ _ „ ., .

Strickland

a t o n c e t r y i n g tQ find

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The excerpt suggests the extent to which the story was central to the discussion. Both Dee and her mother were evaluated on their own terms, which, we have argued, is at the core of treating someone with respect. Moreover, the first speaker made Alice Walker a participant in the conversation and provisionally adopted what she understood to be a rule that Walker suggests should guide one's conduct, a move suggested by the content unit coded as global. Teacher 2 picks up on the turn and also seems to consider the rule of conduct that she sees Walker suggesting. She goes as far as to argue for the importance of engaging students in considering the rule. When Dorothy makes a move to the personal, it is done to elucidate that rule. The discussion continued with the characters remaining the central focus for another 13 turns. A number of factors may account for the differences between the discussions. One could be that Michael read "Everyday Use" aloud at the beginning of discussion, whereas we began to discuss "Two Kinds" without a reading. However, nothing in the transcript suggested that the reading aloud affected the discussion. Another factor could be differences between the stories. Although on the surface, the stories seem to be well-matched (both are written by well-known contemporary writers and both focus on motherdaughter relations), "Everyday Use" features African American characters whereas "Two Kinds" features Chinese American characters. This is especially noteworthy, because five of our participants were African American and none of them were Chinese American. However, this would seem to have made personal connections easier to make in "Everyday Use." In fact, the African American participants noted that the story reminded them of similar situations they had experienced. The immediacy of those connections could have led to participants' detailing the connections rather than considering the text. However, unlike the discussion of "Two Kinds," rather than using those experiences to turn away from the story, they used them to explore their understanding of the characters. What seems to us to be most significant is the difference in the writing we asked them to do. In contrast to the free response we asked teachers to write when they read the other texts, when they read "Everyday Use," we asked them to track their understanding of one of the characters (see Table

160

l). The writing we asked them to in response to "Everyday Use" was much the most directed toward the text. Recent research and theory suggests why the difference in writing may be important. In his review of research and theory on autobiographical writing in the teaching of literature, Smith (1993) notes how different approaches to writing are informed by different conceptions of what is important in reading literature. Marshall et al. (1995) argue that the kind of writing that accompanies discussions of literature strongly suggests to participants the kinds of reasoning one ought to employ and the kinds of knowledge on which one ought to draw. What might we have implied by asking teachers to write open responses? Probst (1992) explains that open journal responses encourage readers to "respect their own readings" and to use the experience as a way "to articulate and investigate their own thoughts" (p. 64). Bleich (1975,1978,1988), another proponent of autobiographical writing in the study of literature, bases his approach on the assumption that "all people.young and old, think about themselves most of the time and think about the world in terms of themselves" (1975, p. 4). The teachers may have interpreted our asking them to write free responses as supporting the importance of a focus on the self, especially when that writing was experienced in contrast to the more textbased prompt of the previous meeting. We want to stress that we are not offering the journal prompt we used with "Everyday Use" as some kind of panacea. Our focus on the text brought with it an interesting problem: None of the White teachers participated in the 16-turn exchange that we discussed previously. When we talked about why, the White teachers noted that although they felt the discussion enriched their understanding of the story, they did not feel that their personal experience gave them anything relevant to contribute. Earlier we cited Dilg (1995) to argue that cross-cultural discussions are difficult, and this may explain their reluctance. However, it is interesting to note that the White teachers did not feel this same reluctance to contribute to our discussion of "A Visit to Grandmother," also a story about African Americans and the first story that we read together. It seems that as difficult as cross-cultural discussion are, they would get easier over time. Yet the White teachers participated freely in that discussion. In fact, a White teacher took the first extended turn in that discussion. Looking at that turn may be instructive: When I read this, the thing that struck me the most, I said to myself, there is every family in this country or in the world I think that at some point experiences some of the things that were in this story, I even made a comment in here saying that my mother and father should read this, and boy this is so much like my family. In the beginning when I read it, I felt sorry for the mother. I felt bad for the way she was being treated by Charles and then later

161


on I changed my opinion, and then I went back again and I said," Well maybe she did the best she knew how." But there were so many feelings in here I could identify with. J LR Smith & Strickland

The speaker clearly felt comfortable exploring what she thought were universal themes. Such a move is, as we have argued, consistent with the difference-blind conception multiculturalism and with the emphasis in on personal identification in reader response theory. Others followed her lead and took extended turns detailing their family circumstances. But in the discussion with a more focused attention on the African American characters, an attention at the heart of paying characters an ethical respect, the White teachers were silent. Their lack of response is reminiscent of the students in Beach's (1997) study who resisted engagement in multicultural literature because they did not have sufficient "background information" about the characters. Moreover, even the African American teachers who paid the characters an ethical respect did not reflect back on that experience when they thought back on our work together. The discussion of "Everyday Use" did not imply a trajectory for future action.

Conclusion We began our work with the teachers-as-readers group with two goals: suggesting how teachers can use multicultural literature to foster and ethical respect for others and engaging teachers in conversations about multicultural literature that challenge the patterns of discourse that prevail in school. The recitation pattern of discourse that prevails in many schools is rooted in power differentials between teachers and students. The teacher has the knowledge, the teacher controls the floor. Our desire to foster a different kind of talk led us to try not to exert our authority. We worried that our exerting authority would lead us and the teachers to "doing what comes naturally" Cazden (1988, p. 54), that is, to IRE. What we did instead was model an approach to discussion and a kind of instruction, writing free responses, in which we exerted as little control as possible. We now realize more fully the impact of the culturally ingrained reluctance to discuss difference that Dug (1995) describes and the penchant for political neutrality that Hynds (1997) discusses. Perhaps we should not have been surprised that the group members chose not to engage with the characters in the way we hoped they would, given that such engagement requires a sometimes uncomfortable sociohistorical awareness. Our approach left us no good alternative when the group began to use the stories as springboards for personal associations rather than as a means

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of developing an ethical respect for the characters about whom we read. Much as was the case in the studies of Rex (1999) and Applebee et al. (2000), the norms for discussion had been constituted in our local context. Our exerting more authority could only have been experienced by the teachers as our making a statement that they were not giving us what we wanted. And if they attempted then to do so, we were moving away from the conversation-like discussions we sought to foster. In short, we experienced the tension that Cochran-Smith (1995) and Mclntyre (1997) describe in their discussion of working with preservice teachers between inviting teachers to engage in discussion that might be new or uncomfortable and using our authority to impose those discussions on them. We think now that one way out of the tension we experienced would be to engage teachers in a broader range of instructional activities before discussion. Although the use of response journals is a popular way of enacting instruction from a reader-response perspective, it is not the only way. For example, in addition to writing we asked the teachers to do, we could have asked them to write from the perspective of one of a character, a suggestion Beach (1997) offers as away to help students move to engagement in multicultural literature. We could have involved the teachers in the some of dramatic activities described by Wilhelm and Edmiston (1998), activities designed to help readers enter story worlds and provisionally adopt the perspective of the characters about whom they read. Doing these activities before the discussions would have allowed us to encourage an ethical respect for the characters without radically changing our role during the discussions. In addition, we could have been conscious from the very start of making reflection on how our cultural positions affected our response a norm for our group. We could, for example, have asked the teachers to explain the characters with whom they most and least engaged and to consider what might account for that engagement. Although we cannot generalize from the context we examined to other in-service programs or to other discussions of multicultural literature, we think that this study may be instructive to other teachers and teacher educators. Our experience suggests that the marriage that Marshall (1998) described between multicultural literature and reader response pedagogies may be an uneasy one, though perhaps it does not have to be. If the goal for using multicultural literature is to foster an ethical respect for literary characters, our study suggests that we need to look hard both at the norms that characterize response-centered discussion and at the instructional strategies that have become commonplace in response-centered classrooms to determine whether they complement or conflict with that goal.

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Author Note


We would like to thank Mary Alice Gilligan and Frances Levin, our research assistants on this project, for their help coordinating the group and collecting and analyzing the data. Thanks also to Tieka Harris, Jean Riehl, Ruth Rosander, Jill Shennum, and Bill Stanzel for their work coding the data and to Mary Lee Donahue for her editorial suggestions on the manuscript. The project reported in this study was supported by a grant from the Turrell Fund.

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Manuscript received: March 19, 1998 First revision requested: February 9, 1999 Final revision received: June 19, 2000 Accepted for publication: July 8, 2000

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