With partners:
Student Snapshot
Non-Arabic students speak of how it feels to be the minority culture rather equal players in a diverse culture.
STUDENT: It is not as comfortable as you'd like to feel.
INTERVIEWER: Why?
STUDENT: Well, I mean, you think about that certain area and the history it has . . . living in Brunswick and Coburg most of my life, it's mostly an Arabic culture, you know, and that's what you get used to. You see your mates around, and you know in your own mind that it's a majority culture, but in my mind I believe that if . . . it would be good with more, different cultures.
STUDENT: Yeah, more different cultures.
STUDENT: Because there's a lot of Arabic people they think that they, like those people in school, they rule the school.
STUDENT: Yeah.
STUDENT: They own the school.
INTERVIEWER: How do they do that?
STUDENT: They say, like,
STUDENT: They gang up.
STUDENT: It makes us feel like we're down 'cause they're all Arabs and they're all against us. Like they've got a group and we're just multicultural.
Student Snapshot 1
INTERVIEWER: Do you rely on school for your close relationships?
MALE STUDENT: Yeah, I depend on the people here at school. They’re always here.
FEMALE STUDENT: It depends on the student… But I find that it’s more about the socialising. People come here for friends. But it really depends on the person.
Student Snapshot 2
INTERVIEWER: Are your friends mainly from the same background as you?
FEMALE STUDENT: No.
FEMALE STUDENT: Not really.
FEMALE STUDENT: No, no.
FEMALE STUDENT: We’ve got some Australian friends and that and they keep on asking questions like…
FEMALE STUDENT: They’ll like to know, they’re our friends.
FEMALE STUDENT: …yeah they always ask, oh, do you have to wear that scarf? Or, what happens if you, um, ‘cause like now it’s Ramadan right and they’re asking lots of questions, pestering us, like um, really can you eat now? Can you drink water? Oh, can you do this? Oh, can you do that?
FEMALE STUDENT: They should know, someone should have told them and stuff.
FEMALE STUDENT: No, it’s alright, I like it when like people ask me, I like telling them. Like if they ask about the religion, I like telling them…
FEMALE STUDENT: I like when they ask, it’s good.
Student Snapshot 3
The cultural make-up of the school environment can have considerable influence on how comfortable students feel at school. As the excerpts from Moreland City College’s Culture Club video below show, many students from Arabic-speaking backgrounds say they feel very comfortable at school which contrasts sharply with comments from a student with an Anglo-Australian background: “The place I feel least comfortable, like very uncomfortable, I would have to say is school. I stand out like a stick in mud for the simple fact that I have blond hair, blue eyes and the majority of my school has like a different ethnic background. The majority of them are Lebanese, Turkish. I’m one of the very few Australians that do come to this school.”
FEMALE STUDENT: The place that I feel the most comfortable is probably at school because that’s where I scream, shout, do everything I usually do normally and no-one’s got a problem with it and if they do they’ll just come out and say it which is really nice to know that they’re honest with me.
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Non-Arabic students at other schools are comfortable at school, but their comfort is lessened when they are excluded by use of languages other than English:
INTERVIEWER: So what do you think about being in a school and living in communities that have a large Arabic background population?
STUDENT: I think it's groovy but I wish they wouldn't talk in their own language a lot.
This comment brought a chorus of support from others who noted it happened all the time, that it was rude and that they were left unsure if they were being talked about. And this has implications for the school in fostering positive relationships:
INTERVIEWER: So do you have many friends from Arabic backgrounds?
STUDENT: Yeah.
STUDENT: Yeah, we do. Not a heap. It's just that I don't like it when they talk in their own language. I mean, yeah it's fine it they talk in their own language when they're by themselves, or when it doesn't concern me, but, yeah, when you're sitting in a group and all of a sudden they'll go off and talk to someone else, it's like, are you talking about me?
Student Snapshot 4
FEMALE STUDENT: I feel comfortable when I’m with my family, with my friends, at school, at home, but the least comfortable I am is when I’m with people that I don’t know. If there’s a group I don’t know, I just walk away.
Student Snapshot 5
FEMALE STUDENT: I feel most comfortable at home and at school with my friends when we go out because I can be myself even though I have expectations at home they don’t take over my life or anything.
Student Snapshot 6
FEMALE STUDENT: Where I feel comfortable is around my family, school, friends. I feel very comfortable because they know who I am and how I act around them. And where I don’t feel comfortable is around a crowd that I don’t know.
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