Introduction
Over the past around thirty years, the Hispanic population has manifested tremendous growth in the American country. Hispanics consist of about eleven percent of the American population, with the inclusion of over three million dwelling in Puerto Rico’s Commonwealth. A clear estimation of thirty one million individuals has the Hispanic identification. The American Hispanic population was the biggest minority group by the year 2006 (Enrique, 2011). Above seventy percent of the Hispanic population concentrates wholly in five states, which are Florida, Arizona, California, New York and Texas. Mexican is the biggest Hispanic ethnic subdivision in America that consists of almost fifty eight percent of the people. Hispanic is a term generated by the American federal government in the early 70s while trying to offer a common denominator to a massive, but diverse, population with a link to the Hispanic culture or language from a Spanish-speaking nation (Arreola, 2004).
However, the term Latino is gaining an acceptance increasingly among the Hispanics, and the term mirrors the population origin in Latin America. The Latinos or rather the Hispanics are people that originate from over twenty countries but live in America and view themselves as members of a certain group. Many Hispanics manifest mixed race characteristics and in an attempt of classifying them into racial classes, people mistakenly use the term as a race. While Hispanic is definitely not a race, t is more of an ethnic classification. Hispanics are individuals that have resided in the American country for a long period of time. The Hispanic ancestors are like native Indians and most of the early settlers (Arreola, 2004). The earliest settlement that occurred in North America was in Florida by individuals that came from Spain.
Cultural Overview
People identify the Hispanics as a group since there are some particular common traits in the Latino sub-groups. Some colonial and traditional Spanish values surpass the various Hispanic cultures. They tend to be more traditional or rather conservative in their cultural lifestyle. The male’s machismo succinctly separates the Latino men from their Anglo counterparts. The female individuals also have a very active and different role to play from the Anglo female. Many of the Hispanics exhibit an equivalent nostalgic longing for their original country. In addition, there are significant differences in the Hispanic society in relation to consumption habits, behavior and aspirations. Their upbringing experiences mould and shape them into their present characters. Most important of all Hispanics place much value in the sense of belonging to a group. In the ancient past, the Hispanic family was a closely-related group and the most essential social unit (Bills & Vigil, 2008). The family term goes way beyond the typical nuclear family. The Hispanic basic family unit has the inclusion of not only children and parents, but the extended family too. In many Hispanic families, the family head s the father, and the mother just takes the rest of the household responsibility.
People that are within a family bear a moral responsibility in assisting other family members that are experiencing any form of financial issues. Family ties are very important and strong such that when a person travels to another region, they end up residing with either friends or relatives. The families usually come together to celebrate all kinds of events like baptisms, weddings, and first communions. Hispanic families enforce the essentiality of good manners, honor and authority respect among their children. The preservation of the Spanish language among family members is a common practice in many Hispanic households. The family is the unit that unifies the Hispanic community since it is the nucleus of their lives. They demonstrate a firm identification with their family members. Strong sentiments of solidarity, reciprocity and loyalty are common among family members. In Hispanic families, the family’s needs often override the personal needs. In fact, this is evident to the extent that a person’s self-confidence, identity, security and worth have their relationship with the family members as a determinant (Moore, 2010). The family concept can extend to a network of organizations, neighbors and friends that formulate one’s community. This network is a support mans when addressing various crises and problems that may take place. Generally, the family concept assists the family in surviving the complexities that occur in life.
The Hispanic culture traditional gender roles affect family and marriage dynamics to a great extent. Machismo describes maleness and the expectation s that a man should be strong physically, brave, and the family’s authority figure with an obligation of providing and protecting his family. The woman’s complimentary role bears the referral of Marinismo, referring to a female who is responsible, self-sacrificing and religious for running the home and being able to raise the children appropriately (Enrique, 2011). Motherhood is a vital objective for women in the Hispanic culture, and the society expects a mother to sacrifice for her young ones and take proper care of her elderly relatives. Though the need and acculturation for the female people to be employed have created an impact on these gender roles, they still retain their traditional positions. To engage Hispanic audiences fully in learning processes, specific attention should be focused in maintaining and gaining trust. Greater educational efforts embrace and acceptance will occur in learners only if the Hispanic societal leaders include their involvement towards the planning, evaluation and delivery of the educational efforts.
Note that the physical distance held between Hispanics when taking part in a conversation is much closer than it is in other cultures. Manifesting respect for learners is among the top most vital aspects entailed in the Hispanic culture. Teachers require paying personal attention to the learners in various activities like being sensitive to their individual cultures, greeting every single learner and handing them papers and writing materials individually. Educational level differences, cultural values, income values, and language skills among the Hispanics require being put under consideration by catechists and educators when planning various educational programs. Though Hispanics share a similar language, their cultures tend to vary in a considerable manner. Churches, recreational centers and local libraries may be effective and appropriate places to host educational programs that consist of Hispanic audiences (Moore, 2010). Among the Hispanics, information passes orally most of the times. Churches and grocery stores are the major places where people visit each other and exchange information.
In the Hispanic world, religion has played a distinctive role traditionally in their daily activities. Above ninety percent of them is Roman Catholic. People view Catholicism as predominant religious beliefs in Hispanic societies in America. In the recent past, some faith denominations have experienced flourishing within the American Hispanic community. The church impacts community affairs and family life, giving spiritual meaning towards the people of the Hispanic culture. Each local society celebrates its patron saint’s day with larger ceremony and importance than people do for birthdays. The society often fathoms religion as focusing on a church or other forms of worship places. Though many religious practices occur in churches, there are also public altars where people practice their faith. In the Hispanic culture, religion is central to family life and marriage (Karsten, 2006). Their religious beliefs include an evident comprehension of the Bible and other religious materials and offering guidance on the manner in which they should live at a personal level within the family context. Religious institutions like the church are an additional source of support and guidance for families during troubling times.
History
The Hispanic culture originated from the Europe Southwestern region called the Iberian Peninsula. Sometime before the late sixth century BC, the area’s first inhabitants who are the Iberians, started to interact with a nomadic group from Central Europe, the Celts. The two groups created a group of people called the Celtiberians, a sub-group of the Celts. Under the Roman rule, the region earned the name Hispania in the 19 BC (Bleichmar, 2012). Moreover, its inhabitants learned the Latin language from the Roman merchants, soldiers, administrators and settlers. When the classic Latin of the elite Roman classes intermingled with the pre-Roman-speaking Iberians, Carthaginians, and Celts a language group called Vulgar Latin emerged. It aligned with the basic Latin models but added and coined words from other language groups. Even after the Eastern Europe Germanic tribes, invaded Hispania, Latin remained as the official language of culture and government until around AD 719, when the Moors, the Arabic-speaking Islamic individuals completed their regional conquest (Karsten, 2006). Arabic and another related dialect came to be widely spoken in the Islamic Spain except in lesser remote Christian kingdoms located in the Northern region. The Christian kingdoms re-conquered the Moorish Spain, thus leading the country linguistically cum culturally, militarily and politically.
The Hispanic culture just as any other culture across the globe has a lot to contribute towards the society as a whole. In school children and students learn about cultural diversity. In addition, they learn much about its importance in building a society firmly and its unifying essentiality towards the world as a whole. As for the Hispanic culture, people view it as a very unique culture that respects values such as unity, love and appreciation among others. The fact that this culture depicts and demonstrates a lot of unification among its people shows learners how ready the Hispanic people are in working together even with other people from other cultures. This also accompanies the effort of quick and easy relationship building among people of different cultures due to acceptance and embrace of each other. If diverse cultures are able to accept each other’s differences and join forces, more goals will be achieved than in an isolated operation. Another moral contribution from the Hispanic culture is that they portray the different strengths and weaknesses available in their community (Bleichmar, 2012). Through this learners are able to witness and apply the importance of supporting each other since nobody is perfect. Furthermore, comprehending culture such as the Hispanic culture helps in overcoming any kind of ethnic or racial divisions in order to decrease or rather evade misunderstandings, violence or opportunity loss.
Inclusionary Practices
Encouraging dialogue is a much better alternative to debate since debate may bring a sense of violence in case the students do not agree to a specific perspective. With dialogue the learners communicate in a softer tone and mood which may enhance understanding. Including some tactical teaching strategies such as interactive lectures, discussion lessons and case studies is very appropriate (Chong & Baez, 2005). These teaching approaches are able to create a good learning atmosphere because the staff appears more approachable from this perspective. The teaching staff should provide the students with an opportunity to become creative and design their own activities that support Hispanic culture integration into their community. After this they should further have a chance to demonstrate the activities either in groups or individually, thus putting the teaching into practice through showcasing the importance of embracing the culture.
Parent/Community Involvement
Learning how integrate the Hispanic culture is a very vital aspect in accepting and promoting cultural diversity in the classroom or rather school setting as a whole. In order to boost the children’s learning process, it is important to include the people that they look up to in the society. This is obviously their parents, guardians and all other senior elders of the community. A student may be having some issues in accepting the Hispanic culture or even in participating in some of the curriculum activities. However, with the inclusion of their elderly guardians and parents this may appear to be a whole lot easier. Parents may serve as a catalyst in boosting the learning process (Garcia, 2001). This is because such a child may only do the expected when they see their parents doing the same. In this way, they will learn to accept and appreciate the culture more whole-heartedly though the help of their parents. Since the Hispanic people are very united, the parents may feel a sense of belonging and acceptance with the inclusion of the parents in the learning process. The interacting groups and intermingling people would catalyze the learning process of Hispanic culture acceptance in the community.
Conclusion
The Hispanic people are a very interesting group that has originated from very far. It may appear as a small minority group to other communities having a superiority complex, but they are more than what many fathom. Their culture is very outstanding especially since it entails many moral and cultural values of respect to each other. They may face some challenges but they are a strong-based culture that should be accepted by all in the American country. With the integration of the Hispanic culture in the school curriculum many students will embrace it gradually as they grow up.
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