Language Teaching in the South Sulawesi Boarding School Classroom: A Multicultural Approach

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Nowadays, multicultural education is one the most popular terms used in pesantren (boarding schools). In addition, Islamic values and belief recognize pluralism and diversity. This research tries to explain various practices and processes in the pesantren intended to reduce prejudice and discrimination. Moreover, the school maintains programs to achieve equal opportunity and social justice for all santri (students). This research tries to explain the curriculum is organized around concepts basic to each ethnic from several different group. The pesantrens are located in South Sulawesi, Indonesia. The research design is qualitative approach. Data collected from conducting interview and observational field data. Furthermore, data elaborated on grounded theories analysis. The study is ongoing research to pursue PhD in education at Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia. This study shows that stakeholders in pesantren work with content integration and various practices deal with the extent to which teachers use examples and content from a variety of culture to illustrate key concepts, principles and theories in their subject area or discipline. Then, teachers conceptualize multicultural education as content related to various ethnic and cultural group. Another important dimension of multicultural approach in Arabic language teaching is pesantrens culture and organization that promotes gender, racial and social class equity.

Stream: Literacy, Language, Multiliteracies; Languages Education and Second Language Learning

Paper: A paper has not yet been submitted.

Ismail Suardi Wekke is awarded Ford Foundation International Fellowship Program on 2005 to pursue his PhD program in Arabic Language Education at Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia. Earned master degree from Islamic State University of Malang in 2002 and completed research in education, language and culture at North Carolina, USA in 2003. Joining The Center of Human Security Studies, Paramadina University, Jakarta, as associate researcher since May 2006. His research interests are language teaching, education and gender.

Maimun Aqsha Lubis a senior lecturer in The Faculty of education, National University of Malaysia. Graduated from National University of Malaysia (UKM). Past experience before chairing a lecturer in UKM was in Universiti Brunei Darussalam, Universiti Islam Antarbangsa Malaysia and Universiti Sumatera Utara, Indonesia.