The role of multicultural art education in a cultural diversified society

Abstract

This paper investigates art students’ and teachers’, awareness, attitudes and practices of multicultural issues in Art education. Particularly, the study focuses on Tigray Arts College, because, among the major goals of the college is: to produce students that are well acquainted with the knowledge and skills of developing and reflecting the cultural values of The Region State of Tigray. Theater, Music and Fine art educations are used as means of achieving this goal. The overall awareness levels of the respondents about multiculturalism were analyzed by using sixteen awareness-measuring statements for students and nine awareness-measuring statements for teachers. Accordingly, the findings of the study reveal that, majority of the respondents were found to have high level of awareness about multiculturalism. The overall attitude of participants toward implementing multicultural issues (by being sensitivity to ethno-cultural, religious and gender diversities) in their art practices was also studied. The study showed that majority of the respondents have positive attitude toward implementing the multicultural issues.