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Australia is one of the most multicultural countries in the world. It is therefore essential that Australian society has access to the literature exploring the stories and experiences of people from multicultural backgrounds. Multicultural literature must authentically explore the challenges of people from diverse backgrounds, adjusting to a culture different from their own. ‘Growing Up Asian in Australia’ by Alice Pung is an anthology of stories that provides a thorough insight into the lived experiences, challenges, and successes of Australian people from multicultural backgrounds, particularly those of East-Asian origin. Vanessa Woods, in her story ‘Perfect Chinese Children’, cleverly uses language features to construct the setting and to represent the contrast between cultures, providing readers with an insight into the challenges faced by people with diverse cultural backgrounds. Australian society must have access to literature, like the stories from ‘Growing Up Asian in Australia’, which helps them better understand and appreciate people from multicultural backgrounds. Both people with diverse backgrounds, and the general population, must develop strong literacy skills to succeed in an increasingly multicultural Australian society.
Alice Pung, an accomplished writer of Cambodian ethnicity, is the editor of the 2008 integrationist anthology Growing Up Asian In Australia. This anthology contains a selection of short stories, poems, and personal accounts which collectively communicate the lived experiences of people from multicultural backgrounds. This anthology successfully provides sensitive insight into the stories of people from multicultural backgrounds by dismounting perpetual stereotypes, including the ‘Yellow Peril’ and the ‘model minority’, and highlighting the common humanity of Australians from multicultural backgrounds (Dempsey, 2008). Taken from various perspectives of people from multicultural backgrounds living in suburban and metropolitan Australia, this anthology focuses on themes of prejudice and discrimination, poverty and socio-economic disadvantage, and cultural identity and belonging. Vanessa Woods’ story ‘Perfect Chinese Children’ epitomizes the lived experiences and challenges of people growing up in Australia who come from a multicultural background. This story underlines Woods’ human experiences as she attempts to find belonging amidst the intense academic pressure imposed by her impoverished family, and the bullying and ostracism she suffered at school.
Woods establishes the setting using vivid imagery to provide insight into the disadvantaged living conditions of Australian people from multicultural backgrounds. ‘Perfect Chinese Children’ takes place in a cramped and inhospitable apartment in the metropolitan area of Sydney since it allows Woods to expose the poverty and economic disadvantage faced by people from multicultural backgrounds. Woods vividly describes the living conditions of her family’s residence when expressed, The priceless antiques give this apartment the ambiance of a refugee camp (Pung, 2008, p.114). Woods purposely details this stark and uninviting imagery to provide readers with candid insight into the disadvantaged and inequitable living conditions of Australian people from multicultural backgrounds. Woods’ insight into the setting proves critical in justifying Woods’ mother’s searing academic expectations and ambitions to have a child who is a doctor or a lawyer (Pung, 2008, p.220). Woods sheds light on her underprivileged living conditions to encourage readers to feel empathy towards people from multicultural backgrounds in Australia who are economically disadvantaged.
Woods’ effectively constructs social detail of the contrast between different cultures to underscore the challenges faced by people from diverse backgrounds. Woods privileges her experiences as a victim of prejudice and bullying by recounting students pulling the corners of their eyes and singing offensive rhymes going around like wildfire (Pung, 2008, p.118). Woods skilfully uses this imagery to teach readers about the racial segregation and systematic discrimination suffered by multicultural groups of East-Asian origin in Australian suburban schools. This social detail accentuates the social injustice that stems from deficient cultural awareness and acceptance of diversity. Woods encourages readers to empathize with her experience by detailing how facing exclusion forced her to question her place within Australian society, as portrayed by her longing to ‘escape being the human turd’ (Pung, 2008, p.119). Graham (2013) suggests this self-deprecating humor is a stereotypical Australian characteristic and henceforth emphasizes the will for people from a multicultural background to be treated fairly, despite being different from the general population. This language fuels readers with the message that marginalization resulting from racial division needs to be bridged to create an inclusive society where diversity is welcomed and accepted.
In an increasingly interconnected and multicultural society, literature is integral to understanding people from multicultural backgrounds. Bista (2012) states that multicultural literature plays a vital role in transforming society to ensure equality and social justice by providing authority and voice to minoritized societal groups. As children’s minds are impressionable, the literature they read about Australian cultural diversity shape how they perceive people from multicultural backgrounds. Research proves children’s literature exploring Asian-Australian identities demystifies multicultural Asian communities throughout Australia as they help students better understand the stories and experiences of Asian-Australian migrants (Cole & Bui, 2007). As exemplified by Woods in ‘Perfect Chinese Children’, Australian school children’s explicit marginalization and bullying of people from multicultural backgrounds arise from entrenched stereotypes and a lack of understanding of cultures other than their own. According to Guntarik (2013), multicultural Asian literature helps challenge restrictive assumptions and stereotypes about Asian culture and people and acknowledges Asia’s close relationship with Australia. Society must, thereby, have access to literature which accurately depicts the lived experiences of people from multicultural backgrounds.
Insufficient access to multicultural literature hampers Australian society’s potential to learn about the experiences of people with diverse backgrounds. Research indicates children have previously had inadequate access to culturally diverse children’s literature which reflects cultures beyond dominant white, middle-class groups (Boyd, Causey & Galda, 2014). Suppose people do not have access to sources of literature depicting the experiences of people from multicultural backgrounds. In that case, they will have a restricted understanding of how diversity is central to the growth of Australian society. An investigation concluded that students chose not to explore multicultural literature provided by school libraries as they predominately use libraries to access prescribed texts (Lafferty, 2014). This issue becomes mirrored by Woods through the discrimination and cruelty inflicted by the school children against East-Asian cultural groups; singing offensive rhymes and imitating their facial expressions (Pung, 2018, p.144). Thomas (2016) argues that people from multicultural backgrounds have been portrayed inaccurately in children’s literature throughout history. A lack of authentic multicultural literature heightens the risk of people from multicultural backgrounds being marginalized and viewed insignificantly by the general population. This reinforces the importance of authoritative and insightful literature to people from multicultural backgrounds. Limited access to multicultural literature has allowed inaccurate stereotypes of foreign cultures to perpetuate; accordingly, Australian society must have access to literature that provides them with an understanding of people from multicultural backgrounds.
Teachers need to fulfill twenty-first-century literacy demands by embedding multiliteracies to meet the learning needs of people from multicultural backgrounds. White, Mammone, and Caldwell (2015) believe bilingual multicultural students face challenges of transitioning between the languages spoken by their families and written modes of communication at school. This disadvantage preserves the literacy achievement gap between the general population and students from multicultural backgrounds, primarily those who are gradually learning the English language. A study conducted by Ollerhead (2019) concluded that teachers need to implement trans-semiotic literacy approaches through multimodal and multisensory resources to enable multicultural students to participate in literacy learning confidently. This emphasizes that traditional modes of print-based learning impede multicultural students from being able to learn literacy productively. As explored through Woods’ insight into her poverty and adverse living conditions, external factors affect multicultural students’ literacy learning. Research points out that multicultural students from low socio-economic areas are disadvantaged from insufficient access to sophisticated twenty-first-century technologies applicable to multimodal literacy learning (Walsh, Durrant & Simpson, 2015). People from multicultural backgrounds must have equitable access to multiliterate learning experiences to ensure they receive a chance of achieving the educational outcomes needed to be successful.
Multicultural literacy must be embedded in the Australian curriculum to enhance education and employment prospects for people from multicultural backgrounds. The inclusion of Asian literacy as a cross-curriculum priority is crucial for fostering different cultures and experiences which reflect the contemporary context of Australian society (Gauci & Curwood, 2017). Henderson, Allan, and Mallan (2020), corroborate this viewpoint by arguing that embedding multicultural literacy in the Australian curriculum exposes students to world views that contradict their own and allows them to think critically about different perspectives through reading literature about the diverse Australian cultural experiences. It was evident the Australian school children who discriminated against Woods had not been taught multicultural literacy which promoted the importance of treating different cultural groups harmoniously and inclusively. Woods’ underpins teaching multicultural literacy to Australian children is critical in breaking cultural barriers and developing productive and amicable relationships, thus allowing people from multicultural backgrounds to succeed and contribute to Australian society. However, a challenge to multicultural literacy is that teachers lack confidence in implementing Asian literacy as a cross-curriculum priority due to a lack of knowledge about Australia’s exclusive multicultural history (Salter & Maxwell, 2015). The implementation of multicultural literacy, therefore, affects multicultural Australian people’s ability to build the literacy skills needed to communicate with and form cooperative relationships with the general Australian population.
In her anthology ‘Growing Up Asian in Australia’, Pung has included various poems, short stories, and texts which provide insight into the human experiences of Australian people from multicultural backgrounds. Vanessa Woods’ story ‘Perfect Chinese Children’ vividly showcased the disadvantage and hardship experienced by Multicultural Australians from low-socioeconomic backgrounds by establishing the setting through her effective language choices. Woods constructed social detail of the differences between cultural groups to portray the challenges faced by Australian people from multicultural backgrounds. Society must have access to authentic and quality literature which allows them to understand better the experiences and challenges faced by people from multicultural backgrounds. Australian society must be taught literacy skills, whether it be through multiliteracy or multicultural literacy, which allows diverse cultural groups to reach their full potential. Since Australia is one of the most multicultural countries in the world, Australian society must have access to literature and literacy learning needed to create a harmonious and productive society that provides equal chances for everyone, despite their cultural differences.
References
- Bista, K. (2012). Multicultural Literature for Children and Young Adults. The Educational Forum, 76(3), 317-325. doi: 10.1080/00131725.2012.682203.
- Boyd, F., Causey, L., & Galda, L. (2015). Culturally Diverse Literature. Reading Teacher, 68(5), 378387. https://doi.org/10.1002/trtr.1326.
- Cole, D., & Bui, H. (2007). Teaching Asian-Australian Identities through Literature. Literacy Learning: The Middle Years, 15(3), 2938.
- Dempsey, M. (2008). Growing Up Asian in Australia. Bookseller + Publisher Magazine, 87(8), 39.
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- Lafferty, K. (2014). ‘What Are You Reading?’: How School Libraries Can Promote Racial Diversity in Multicultural Literature. Multicultural Perspectives, 16(4), 203-209. doi 10.1080/15210960.2014.951888.
- Ollerhead, S. (2019). Teaching across Semiotic Modes with Multilingual Learners: Trans Languaging in an Australian Classroom. Language and Education: Translingual and Trans modal Complexity and Innovation in English-Language-Dominant Southern Schooling, 33(2), 106122. https://doi.org/10.1080/09500782.2018.1516780.
- Pung, A. (2008). Growing Up Asian in Australia. Black Inc.
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- Thomas, E. (2016). Stories Still Matter: Rethinking the Role of Diverse Children’s Literature Today. Language Arts, 94(2), 112119. http://search.proquest.com/docview/1835329714/
- Walsh, M., Durrant, C., & Simpson, A. (2015). Moving in a Multimodal Landscape: Examining 21st Century Pedagogy for Multicultural and Multilingual Students. English in Australia, 50(1), 6776.
- White, P., Mammone, G., & Caldwell, D. (2015). Linguistically Based Inequality, Multilingual Education and a Genre-Based Literacy Development Pedagogy: Insights from the Australian Experience. Language and Education: Language in Epistemic Access: Mobilising Multilingualism and Literacy Development for More Equitable Education in South Africa, 29(3), 256271. https://doi.org/10.1080/09500782.2014.994527.
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