Diversity and Your Department

Susanne Hillman. (2015). Facing Injustice: Video Testimony in the College Classroom. Presented at the Teaching Diversity Conference, UC San Diego. Retrieved from https://diversity.ucsd.edu/_files/tdc%202015/Susanne%20Hillman.docx

In this paper, Professor Hillman presents her use of Videotaped testimonies of survivors and witnesses of the Holocaust, the Rwandan genocide, and the Nanjing massacre in teaching tolerance and empathy in the history classroom. She argues that "approaching the breakdown of equity, diversity, and inclusion within specific historical contexts equips students with the conceptual tools to recognize injustice and exclusion in the present." This method has cross-disciplinary possibilities.

Auerbach, Arthur H. "Teaching Diversity: Using a Multifaceted Approach to Engage Students." PS: Political Science & Politics 45, Issue 3 (July 2012): 516-520. (PDF)

The author of this article details the content and methods he used to teach a political science course on diversity in society. He used inclusive methods in his pedagogy and brought in non-traditional sources to show a variety of perspectives. While this article is based on a political science course, the methods used are applicable to most disciplines.

Case, K. A. (2011). The class interview: Student engagement in courses covering sensitive topics. Psychology Learning & Teaching, 10(1), 52-56. (PDF)

This short article describes activities that psychology classes can partake in during the first day of classes in order to loosen up and prepare students for tackling more sensitive topics. This article is especially recommended for professors teaching intro or lower level classes.

Coleman, M. A. (2007). Transforming to Teach: Teaching Religion to Today's Black College Student. Teaching Theology & Religion, 10(2), 95-100. (PDF)

This essay examines the ways in which postmodern pedagogies are received (and rejected) by black students in religion classes. In some ways, this work may feel reductive to Reed professors, as Coleman struggles to introduce a classroom style that is already firmly established at Reed, but there are some generally useful lesson ideas to be found in this short piece.

DeTemple, J. (2012). Home Is My Area Code: Thinking about, Teaching, and Learning Globalization in Introductory World Religions Classes. Teaching Theology & Religion, 15(1), 61-71. (PDF)

This article examines the benefits and challenges of discussing globalization within the context of an intro religion course. Although the students in DeTemple's class may have had more problems grasping the ideas of globalization than the average Reed class would, the article still provides potentially helpful insight into managing the varying worldviews that come together in an intro religion course.

Neal, L. S. (2013). From Classroom to Controversy: Conflict in the Teaching of Religion. Teaching Theology & Religion, 16(1), 66-75. (PDF)

In this article, Neal examines the way a certain project they assigned in a religion class caused conflict throughout campus, and how conflict can be both productive and harmful to the classroom environment. This highly pertinent article addresses many of the subjects broached by trigger warnings from a different angle. This is recommended for all professors.