Mapping the Broad Field of Multicultural and Intercultural Education Worldwide

Book excerpt: The issues which are discussed in the 29 chapters of this volume address core matters with respect to modern diverse societies. The most important relate to the following: the societal needs of migrant populations and the educational needs of their children; the exclusivist policies which usually impact upon migrant groups; the need to enrich school texts and curricula with new intercultural and citizenship dimensions; the importance of integrating the notion of Paideia within the school ethos and educational programmes. This volume has a dual aim. The first aim is to envisage the field of Multicultural and Intercultural Education from different disciplines at the international level, describing the new educational and social conditions that have been created by recent migration and identifying new trends in the field. The second aim is to highlight the importance of Multicultural and Intercultural Education in the development of a new citizen, who moves around the world, interacting with different people, and has a dynamic and flexible identity with polymorphic personal, social and cultural characteristics – a new intercultural persona. To sum up, this volume highlights that authors coming from different continents share some common ideas and tend to believe in the notion of Intercultural/Multicultural Education as a useful new dimension within the dynamics of many disciplines, as a new inter-disciplinary approach that is embedded within them and which characterizes modern societies.