Let see how the news encourage differences between inmigrants and native people

We have consulted two Spanish newspapers which talk about decreasing of social insurance budget because of crisis.  These two ones refer to the same event, but from different points of views.

On the one hand, in a newspaper called “Qué!” (http://www.que.es/ultimas-noticias/sociedad/201210301511-paro-afecta-doble-inmigrantes-espana-reut.html?anker_4 ) we can read this headline: “Unemployment affects double immigrants in Spain, according to the IOM” (International Organization for Migration). This newspaper explains this new using an objective method as it just says that more than a half of the foreigners who lost their jobs during the crisis also lack of social protection rights derived from Spanish Social Security system.

In addition, more than a half of foreign workers didn’t receive an amount equivalent to the minimum wage in 2010. A research has shown that the part of the native population who rejects immigration has grown since 2007 to 2010, achieving 20 %. Moreover, in general, the crisis and its consequences are triggering xenophobia.

On the other hand, there is another media that we consulted which is called “ABC” and is a conservative one. In this case, the title says: “The crisis demands savings in immigration costs “(http://www.abc.es/20121016/espana/abci-gasto-inmigracion-crisis-201210151941.html). Reading this paragraph, we, as readers, could think unconsciously and indirectly that immigration favors the crisis. So this is a proof that sometimes media encourages bad feelings against immigration in native population. As they make us thinking that crisis is, in some way, a consequence of the immigration.

Concurrently, if we go into the article “Understanding the alien in our midst: using citizenship education to challenge popular discourses about refugees” written by Jill Rutter, we can realize that it is something that, unfortunately, has been happening for a long time. For instance, we can read in his article that at the end of the nineteenth century “Jewish immigration emerged as a problem in popular discourse, with Arnold White, an anti-immigration author and campaigner, presenting the Jewish migrant as the pauper foreigner” in The Times newspaper. In that period the anti-immigration stance of politicians was reflected in the populist press, including the Daily Mail. Because of this, “the newcomers, referred to as aliens, were seen as: a cause of unemployment and overcrowded housing”.

As we can realize in the above information, we have always been under the influence of the media, which has encouraged as thinking what they want us to think.

Moreover, we could link what we have said previously with other news about immigration, which also belong to the same media, the one called “ABC” (http://www.abc.es/sociedad/20121202/abci-esclavos-espana-siglo-201211281343.html ).

In the above link we can read in the headline this: “Slaves in Spain in 2012”. It is about some cases of people who have not a residence permit and because of that they are considered as illegal people in Spain. Some people take advantage of the situation of these people, by forcing them to labor exploitation, to rape, etc. It is "a modern form of slavery".

Furthermore, the ONG called "Médicos Sin Fronteras", in November indicated that more than 50,000 people, mostly undocumented immigrant women, are victims of human trafficking in Spain for sexual exploitation, labor, organ trade, forced begging or forced commission of crimes. The article concludes that it is essential that the government, police and society do their best to avoid whatever kind of cases where people is enslaved and deprived of their human rights and dignity.

Actually, is embarrassing that 175 years after slavery was abolished in Spain, thousands of people are victims of sexual and labor exploitation in our country. We consider that the main reason that underlies the fact that some people exploit immigrants, and take advantage of their situation, is merely racism. But the problem is that the way  medias give importance or not to the immigrants, and specifically to those who lack of  human rights (like a home, social insurance or a dignified job), affects to what people think about it, particularly the new generations: children. 

For this reason, it is vital that media challenge racism through the great power they have of influencing individual’s thoughts. And talking about children, the school has to face racism by teaching multicultural aspects.

Simultaneously to  this point, as it is said in the text of Jill Rutter, the school has four key areas of work deal with racism:

• ·        Promote multi-agency working. School could collaborate with other institutions as police, youth groups, parents, several organizations.
• ·         Evaluate previous antiracist work.
• ·         Make sure effective sanctions against racism facts.
• ·         Use activities to develop, to promote diversity and equality.

 

Apart from taking that into account we can not forget that the key point is that schools and teachers can not challenge racism in isolation from the rest of society, they should work with other organizations in order to be more effective.

How we, as teacher, can challenge stereotypes in our pupils?

 

In order to answer this question, I have looked at what Vinsonneau suggests in his article called “Conflict between social groups: cognitive psychology and the reduction of conflict between groups” and taken some interesting ideas very useful for teachers.

According to what Vinsonneau says, “Providing superordinate goals is an efficient way, in the first instance, of getting the foreign groups to build mutually favourable images of each other, and of transforming their attitudes: each group is useful to the other in achieving the common goal [...]”.  On the basis of this idea, we could challenge stereotypes by separating our classroom into multicultural groups, and then ask them to do an activity in which they will have to “Find the treasure” by solving some enigmas. But they will have to work together, as each group will have a role. Here it is important taking into account what Vinsonneau says: “The goals to be achieved need to be attractive to, and wanted by, all groups involved: they must not be imposed; they must be important but also unattainable by any group on its own. For a cooperative venture to be effective it must also be a success: if it ends in failure the blame is laid on the group which we do not belong, that group becoming the scapegoat towards which hostility is directed and about which negative representations are formed”.

From my point of view, we should teach our pupils how to do critical reflections and to not to believe everything they hear about other cultures. In connection to that, we can ask them to bring to class every week a piece of new they find interesting in the newspaper in order to discuss it in class with their classmates and the teacher. Moreover, it is important that they also compare their piece of new with the same one but written by another newspaper (as Thomas asked us to do in class) so they will realize that not everything said by the medias is true. Once our pupils have the capacity of thinking by themselves, they will unlikely believe in people´s stereotypes. Many times, stereotypes are transmitted from generation to generation another times it is the media which introduces it in society´s mind. Taking this into account, it is essential that we teach our pupils to be critical and create their own point of view about the people they meet based on reasonable arguments instead of prejudices. 

In summary, if we want to challenge stereotypes in our lessons, cooperative activities are a useful tool which will help our pupils to change their mind about the others. Moreover, activities which require critical reflection are also a good option to fight stereotypes.