Sunday, September 23, 2007

insider vs. outside debate

The insider vs. outside debate is very interesting to me. I chose to write this blog before reading the articles for this weeks class. I wanted to document my views and opinions prior to reading the articles so that I can compare the ideas that I have now to the ideas I have after reading the author's views.
I feel that it is important to read books that are from a variety of perspectives. While I believe that insider views in multicultural literature are critical to help everyone better understand differences, I do not think that their views are the only useful ones. I think that books writen by outsiders can be equally as valuable. It is possible for all authors to gather enough credible information to incorporate into their books in order to make them useful to their audience. If anything, I think that it is even more valuable to readers to read books that are written by a variety of authors both from inside and outside perspectives. In my opinion multicultural literature celebrates the differences among the people in our society-so then shouldn't we celebrate the differnces among the perspectives of the author's of these texts? I believe we should.
Although I believe that insider and outsider perspectives are equally important, I also hope that the outsiders do justice to the people that they represent in their books. Proper research and full consideration of those incorporated into the literature is essential. I also think that with the combination of insider and outsider perspectives there will be many more books available for people to read in order to gain knowledge about different cultures, races, ethnicities, genders, etc.
In closing, it will be very interesting to see if my views change at all after reading the articles about the insider vs. outsider debate. I also look forward to reading what other people have to say about this topic.