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Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #205366 in Books
• Published on: 2004-08-07
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 336 pages

From the Back Cover

• Readings, cases, and exercises organized in terms of three perspectives: individual, social group identity, and organizational diversity
• Twenty new experiential exercises, six new readings, and two new cases including Coca-Cola
• Classic diversity contributions by well-known authors such as Peggy McIntosh, Deborah 7annen, Milton Bennett, David Thomas, and Robin Ely
• Difficult-to-find, original teaching material on topics such as the business case for diversity, ethics, board diversity, the military, the media, cross-cultural management, and diversity audits
• Coverage of multiple aspects of diversity beyond race, gender, and ethnicity, such as communication, generational diversity; physical challenge and accommodation, and social class
• New pedagogical features such as assessment assignments, out-of-class writing projects, and Web-based exercises

About the Author

Carol E Harvey (Ed.D., University of Massachusetts at Amherst) is associate professor and former Chair of Business Studies at Assumption College. She holds an MBA and a Certificate of Advanced Studies from Northeastern University and an MA in Psychology from Assumption Colleges. She is a site visitor for NEASC (New England Association of Schools and Colleges) for college accreditation and consultant to businesses, particularly in the areas of mentoring and organizational development. Formerly employed as a manager at the Xerox Corporation, her research interests include implementing diversity initiatives in organizations and improving critical thinking skills in the college classroom. She is the co-recipient of the 2004 Roethlisberger Memorial Award from the Organizational Behavior Teaching Society for the best article from the Journal of Management Education for "Critical Thinking in the Management Classroom: Bloom's Taxonomy as a Learning Tool."

M. June Allard (Ph.D., Michigan State University) is professor and Chair of Psychology at Worcester State College. She is a social and experimental psychologist with research and teaching interests in international and cross-cultural psychology and in assessment and evaluation. A site visitor for NEASC (New England Association of Schools and Colleges) for college accreditation, she consults to colleges on assessment and conducts undergraduate program evaluations. A lifelong world traveler, she lectures on research and evaluation internationally in countries such as Morocco, Costa Rica, Poland, Mexico, Turkey, Nicaragua, Bolivia, Brazil, and Italy and has conducted research projects for the U.S. Peace Corps, UNESCO, and USAID and educational evaluation for the International Baccalaureate Organization (Cardiff, Wales).

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

Diversity is a more controversial topic today than it was when the second edition of this book was published four years ago. Due to immigration patterns, changing demographics, increasing global business, and technological innovation, there is no question that the composition of today's workforce is more diverse. However, recent high-profile lawsuits, such as Texaco, Denny's, and Coca-Cola, showcase the human, public relations, and financial costs of failing to understand and effectively manage this new workforce.

Consequently, learning how to motivate, communicate, and work productively with coworkers, subordinates, managers, and customers who may differ in significant ways is a necessary workplace skill. A recent survey of American colleges and universities found that 63 percent of them currently have or are planning to add a diversity course requirement to their curriculum. Organizations, too, recognize this need. Millions of dollars are spent every year on diversity training efforts.

Effective diversity management is a complex issue. We believe that both individuals and organizations need to begin the process by becoming more knowledgeable about their values and beliefs as well as those of people who may be different in their salient social identities. Increased awareness and heightened understanding become the foundation on which individual and organizational changes can build. Superficial diversity efforts, like unexamined thinking, often produce superficial results. Diversity efforts involve both individual and organizational development.

OBJECTIVES FOR THIS EDITION

Two goals motivated us to produce the third edition: first, to make teaching diversity-related courses easier for the instructor by providing a wide range of classroom material and instructor support material, and second, to make learning about diversity interesting, timely, and thought provoking for the students.

Teaching about diversity is more complex than teaching other courses. Clearly diversity is an interdisciplinary field. Much of its theoretical framework originates in the social sciences. Adapting and applying this material to organizational diversity issues can be a challenge. Because of the rapid increase in college-level diversity courses over the past ten years, many of those who teach in this field are struggling to find appropriate classroom materials that balance the theoretical with practical applications to meet the learning needs of their students. Although we teach in business and psychology, our contributors represent a wide range of additional disciplines such as sociology, history, and English. Teaching diversity-related courses can be draining for the instructor because these topics often challenge students' core beliefs, generate conflict, and require a high level of student involvement in the learning process.

There is little agreement among scholars on the definition of diversity, much less what should be included in a diversity textbook. Many books and courses focus only on some or all of the so-called primary dimensions of individual difference such as race, gender, ethnicity, age, sexual orientation, and physical/mental challenges, which was how we organized the first edition. Others extend the definition to include secondary dimensions, such as religion, social class, communication style, and family status, and this was one of the changes that we added in our second edition. Both the first and the second editions were organized by separating the readings, cases, and exercises into separate sections.

CHANGES IN THE THIRD EDITION

To meet these challenges, we gathered a wealth of information from those who best understand these issues: faculty and trainers who teach courses involving diversity. As part of the process, we compiled data from over 50 syllabi both from instructors who used our previous editions and from those who used other texts. In addition, our second edition was thoroughly reviewed by professors who used that book over several semesters and who told us frankly what worked in their classes, what didn't, and what they thought should be included in the third edition.

This wealth of information resulted in an extensive revision with many changes in terms of organization, content, and approach. In this edition, we divided the material into three logical sections working from the micro to the macro level. In the Instructor's Manual, available online and in print to adopters, these sections are all integrated into an analytical framework that incorporates the development of critical thinking skills.

• Section I—Individual Perspectives serves as a foundation to the study of diversity by increasing students' personal awareness in terms of ethnocentrism, values, stereotypes, conflict, and communication.
• Section II—Group Identity Perspectives provides a foundation of understanding for some of the complexities and issues of many different and multiple group identities.
• Section III—Organizational Perspectives examines diversity issues put into action within organizational contexts.

Reviewers told us that one of the strengths of the second edition of the book was the experiential material, and they asked us for additional exercises. As a result, we have added fifteen totally new exercises and revised and updated four from the previous edition.

Our analysis of adopters' (and nonadopters') syllabi for required readings revealed that there is no one authority in this field, and this is as it should be. By its nature, the study of diversity requires multiple perspectives. We have reprinted classic essays by major authors such as Milton Bennett, Peggy McIntosh, Thomas Sowell, Deborah Tannen, David Thomas, and Robin Ely. We added new material on ethics (McNett), the business case for diversity (Robison and Dechant), intercultural communication (Bennett), media (Allard #36), first-person accounts of experiencing diversity (Baldino, Diodati, Ross and Whitty), several Web-based exercises (Sherer #22 & #33, Harvey #48), and material on diversity in the NAFTA countries (Muller on Mexico, Hunt #3, and Mentzer on Canada). In addition, each of the three sections now begins with learning outcomes and ends with a capstone reading, assignment, or exercise designed to assess student achievement in terms of the material.

INSTRUCTOR'S MANUAL

In keeping with our belief that diversity is a complex subject to teach, we have prepared a comprehensive instructor's manual available through your Prentice Hall sales representative to simplify your class preparation work. The material includes sample syllabi; matrices for incorporating the readings, cases, and exercises text into Human Resources, Organizational Behavior, Diversity with a social science approach, and Management courses; teaching tips; website resources; suggestions for related assignments; answers to discussion questions; a list of suggested video resources; and PowerPoint slides. Adopters should contact their Prentice Hall sales representative for a user name and password for access to this site, which is located at www.prenhall.com/harvey.

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Customer Reviews

Great value, informative and insightful, but a bit dry at times
Having purchased this as the required textbook for my Cultural Diversity class, I foundd the best feature was the price! Most of my books were about twice as expensive as this one. The text itself was very interesting and insightful, but the reading tended to get a bit dry at times.

Is a required textbook for my managing diversity class

This isn't a bad book. It was required for a managing diversity class I am taking in graduate school. The content is short readings on various topics generally centering around cultural diversity and discimination. There are group exercises in between some of the readings. The book is very much centered around being used in a group-discussion oriented classroom. I don't think it is worth what is being charged for it, but as far as textbooks go, it is pretty inexpensive.