Family, Culture and Community (Avi Morancy)

 

TABLE OF CONTENTS. 

Overview. 

Types of Families. 

Community Challenges. 

The Education of Culture. 

Ways to help. 

In a child’s life, the most important things to consider is not their milestones or their gender but the culture and community that they are born into. No one has the same culture or family and some kids may be from blended families and mixed cultures which gives them a more unique outlook on the world. In addition, there are multiple types of culture and family and, as discussed by Vygotsky with the sociocultural theory, the impact that family has on a child is profound enough to be carried with them for generations. This article will discuss the multiple types of families and explain ways that a child can be affected by them as well as provide an overview of what can be expected of a child within these types of families and how to better understand and help them grow. 

Types of Families.

There are multiple families living within the world from the traditional nuclear family to the non-traditional nuclear family to the culturally diverse and to the average American family. Within the context of a child’s life, their main influencers before school are the community and their family which is, of course, dependent on the culture that said community and family originate from. Immigrant families are often from different parts of the world, assimilating into the American culture and raising a bicultural child whilst, on the other side of things, some immigrant families remain very traditional in their culture and it is the kids who try to blend in to American society so that they are not outcasted and pushed aside. Aside from those families, they are also families that have different ethnic and race backgrounds because of adoption and losing their family through death or abandonment. 

In these types of families, the child will almost always be a different ethnicity or race from the parents who have taken them in. In some occasions, they are the same ethnicity and race but it is more likely that little Hikaru is adopted by “Susie” who might even be a single mom or divorced, introducing another family type into the dynamic. Additionally, two people of different races and or ethnic backgrounds can also get together, having a child that is considered of mixed heritage who learns both of their cultures from their different parents. No matter how it is spun, it is clear that adoption, immigration, mixed heritage, and so forth are only just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to family dynamics but with all these different types of families—how are the children affected by this and how is the community that the family live in and or try to assimilate into become affected by this as well? What are the challenges that the child and community face and how does the education system fail these children? We will look into these in the upcoming sections of this article and perhaps help shed some light on the development of children within diverse families. 

Community Challenges. 

The challenges that a child faces within their community from diversity can be told in a variety of ways. Most notably, however, they stem from lack of knowledge, racism, homophobia, and stereotypes. These things harm the child as if their family cannot exist peacefully, they will turn towards the next best thing to help them develop and gain their own independence which may hurt them in the long run. For many diverse families, whether they are gay or of a different ethnic race and background, the largest challenge that they face from the community is backlash from the lack of knowledge. Of course, the family are not responsible for teaching the community about themselves and neither should the child be but when a community is raised in a certain culture of their own, whoever enters this culture is almost always forced to assimilate and become a part of them or face being ostracized or having their child isolated. 

Many of the challenges that these families face are lack of a proper social life, trouble with finances and jobs, hate crimes, stereotypes, and more. For a developing child, either born or moved into the community, these challenges affect them from birth and may hold a significant negative impact (or positive, if they are taught to be proud in their heritage and who they are) that will be seen in the next generation and onward. Many things can be done to combat this, or to improve the lives of these families, but perhaps the most influential of them is the education of culture which will be talked about below. 

The Education of Culture. 

In a community that is just now starting to see diverse families, the education of culture is something that is strictly important in both educational spaces and communities themselves. When a diverse child is given the space to speak about their culture and embrace it, they are more socially inept and successful within their lives versus people who have assimilated into a culture that is not theirs and clashes repeatedly with the assimilated culture and the culture of their family. By creating an environment in which a child can successfully be themselves and integrate their culture into their environment, you are setting the child up for success and a stable life further down the road. When the child is, however, not able to do so, their chances of having this plummet and they tend to become rebellious and antagonistic against their own culture, citing it as the reason why they were outcasted as a child. 

For the education system, learning about different cultures is essential into being able to handle different types of children. Learn about blended families, gay families, single parent families, and the like. When a child of a different culture is not taught or treated properly, they will grow up to think that the world is against them and, while in some cases this is true, being the shining light in the child’s bleak present will help encourage them in being able to understand themselves and be who they are without insecurity. 

Ways to Help.

As discussed in the previous sections, the culture of a family can not only be very diverse from the traditional nuclear family simply based on who marries who but they can also be diverse in ways that they raise their children, how they have children, and what they teach their children before school becomes a factor in their lives. To further help diverse families without silencing their culture and trying to force them into a new one is by first teaching the community about their culture. Make it a point and a priority that everyone in the community understands the family’s culture and who they are as people. Additionally, the education system is also taught in the same manner as, again, not all children are like. Providing the tools for the family to successfully combine their culture with the one of the community they live in can also be a way to help and support the family, fostering both community group and child development as the saying goes, it takes a village to raise a child.