Social Diversity Narrative

Social diversity can be defined in many ways, but in my opinion I believe that it is a society that  coexists regardless of different races, cultures, political and religious stances, gender, and sexuality. All of these aspects define a person, but the differences between all of us is what makes our society unique. Every person brings forth a different mixture to 'pour' into our societal melting pot. Multiculturalism, on the other hand, is the recognizing of differences within a society and encouraging others to promote and be proud of their societal differences and backgrounds. Unfortunately, I did not grow up in a very diverse area. I grew up in a predominately white neighborhood and the most cultural diverse thing to us was perhaps Red Dragon, our local Chinese Restaurant. So it is safe to say that I was somewhat sheltered to what diversity was as a child. My parents were accustom to diversity, but my brother and I were not. So when I went away to University of Iowa last semester, I was able to actually open my eyes and see the beauty of this nation's melting pot. I learned new things about all the different people that make up our society and how important diversity is in a society. It brings forth new ideas, new customs, and new ways to present a problem. In my personal life, class played a big role of diversity, even though I lived in a ritzy town, my family was not one of big money. We were in no means poor but we certainly did not have what everyone else in the town did. So I did, in some ways, have an understanding of the diversity of social classes within a society.

In fourth grade, a girl from Japan moved to our school and she spoke maybe five words of English. For some reason, my three other girlfriends and I decided to take her under our wings. We took it upon ourselves to teach her the basics of English. So everyday during silent reading time we would go out in the hallway with the permission of our teacher and use flashcards and English/grammar books to teach her the basics. I'm not going to say four nine-year-olds taught this girl all the English she knows but we definitely taught her something. In return, we all learned something as well. We learned about the difficulties of coming to not just a new town, but a new continent! We all became her best friends and when we would go to her house, her mom and her would teach us about culture back in Japan. She always made us homemade dishes and we heard about certain traditions her family followed. I no longer keep in touch with this girl, but she certainly taught me a lot about how diversity makes up and shapes a society. It predisposed me to the different experiences others may have encountered opposed to just my own.

I am interested in either researching abortion (teen pregnancies), suicide,  drugs/drug abuse,  alcoholism, or violence in schools. I think all of these topics are especially important because of our generation these negative issues seem to be increasing. All of these, aside from violence in schools, pertain to my major which is nursing. I may be dealing with individuals with drug/alcohol abuse, with those who attempt suicide,  those who are interested in abortion, and teenage girls who become pregnant.