Celebrating diversity

In an earlier article I spoke of the need to help children in settings where most of them are not White British to understand something of the majority culture here.

One way that predominantly white settings attempt to reflect cultural diversity is to celebrate festivals. The same approach could be used to explore the majority culture. Burns Night, for example, can provide a starting point for looking at Scottish culture. It is comparatively easy (even outside Scotland itself) to find a piper who can come in traditional costume, play the bagpipes and talk about Burns Night.

There is nothing wrong with this. It can be great fun. However, it gets more difficult when we look specifically at English culture. Many English 'traditions', such as Morris dancing, were artificially resurrected at the beginning of the last century and have never really established themselves as true expressions of the community. In addition, the growth of urban living and the decline of Christianity mean that few festivals are celebrated very publicly in England. They tend to be more family affairs.