BEYOND “TOLERANCE”: BELONGING, POWER, AND INTERCULTURAL SAFETY IN GREEK LOWER SECONDARY CLASSROOMS

Dionysios Anastasopoulos

Abstract


This critical and theoretical essay discusses the weakness of the concept of toleration as a normative horizon for addressing cultural and linguistic diversity in Greek lower secondary school and suggests the redefinition of belonging, power and intercultural safety. Based on these debates of contemporary times concerning the relationship between multiculturalism and interculturalism, and on the scholarship that promulgates equity literacy and culturally relevant pedagogy, intercultural education is understood as the project of democratic change as opposed to a collection of technical interventions. The importance of belonging is demonstrated by means of empirical research in the field of school belonging and diversity climate that enables the proposing of belonging as the key factor that connects school structures and classroom practices to the motivational, social-emotional and academic performance of students, especially immigrant, refugee and minoritised learners. The concept of intercultural safety is designed as a relational and institutional state, which is based on affective hospitality and critical consciousness, and opposed to forms of understanding the narrow concept of safety as comfort of one. On a micro level, the classroom practices, teacher identity, as well as the language policy are presented in the essay as frontiers through which the symbolic power is exercised and challenged. Such insights are then applied to the Greek lower secondary situation, including the inclusionary policy, intercultural teacher training, citizenship curriculums and the psychosocial requirements of migrant and refugee young people. It is stated that to go beyond tolerance into intercultural safety and belonging, teacher education, curriculum and school governance should be coordinated and that Greek lower secondary schools ought to be structured in a way that all students are made to feel they can be recognised and legitimate members of a democratic community.

Keywords


intercultural education; multiculturalism; interculturalism; school belonging; intercultural safety

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References


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DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.46827/ejes.v13i10.7046

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