AWFUL!!!
5/5/2007
We used this textbook in a college course entitled, "Teaching a Diverse Population."
To a person, we all thought this book was awful.
My biggest problem with this piece of work is that the author expects the reader to agree to a line of logic that is not supported by facts. Sure, there are facts interwoven in each chapter, but the facts don't match the logic.
If I turned in any of these chapters as an argumentative essay to my English Composition professor, I'd surely receive less than an "A."
Additionally, I could have done without the four letter words such as cun* (you fill in the last letter).
Laughable
3/13/2008My teacher actually uses this textbook's own inaccuracies and discriminations as examples of how NOT to address multiculturalism, it's that bad.
Couldn't give it a ZERO Which it Deserves
3/25/2008This book is HORRIBLE. If I wern't forced to use it in class I wouldn't even touch it. It is terribly slanted in a manner that a previous reviewer got right on. The whole book seems to be based on an incorrect perception that the European White Male is the reason for all of our social ills, not just racism.
An example is how Koppelman drolls on that the White European caused all the hatred in the Mexican population by stealing the Mexican land. He fails to cover the part a large majority of Mexicans are a mix of Native Americans and Spanish Conquistidor's. The Conquistidors plundered the land and slaughtered millions of Native Americans. So he overlooks the ills of the one race to set the Mexican up as a pure victim in this matter. His views are totally flawed throughout this book. And I am not letting Goodhart off the hook either.
Bottom line is: Unless you are absolutely required to use this book; DO NOT buy it. For a great perspective on diversity, see if you can find the aged, but fair and balanced "What you are is where you were when" by Morris Massey.
Understanding Human Differences is not the answer to promoting diversity, it promotes hate.
I am half hispanic and half white. So I have a Minority perspective as well as a white male perspective. Don't buy the hate!