Empathy, Diversity, and Poetry: The Position of Multicultural Literature in Digitalized Network Society

Abstract

Poetry is more than just a literary expression. It may produce empathy and cultural competence vitally needed to navigate today’s digitalized network society when cultivated in the right way. This paper elaborates empathy on diversity through poetry. This is a qualitative research conducted in two layers of analysis: textual analysis of the poems and analysis of students’ responses on the empathy and diversity issues. The two poems on diversity are an Indonesian poem I See Indonesia by Soekarno and a Taiwanese poem Song of the Island by Chen Li. 75 respondents from English Department of Bina Nusantara University, Jakarta Indonesia and Aletheia University, New Taipei-Taiwan were involved. The results show that the two poems have reflected and produced empathy both in the authors and the readers. It is also concluded that poetry is utilized beyond its literary function in navigating diversity through cultivating empathy in studying poetry and multicultural literature as the research has proven that almost all (96.66%) of Indonesian students agree that multicultural literature helps them develop their CQ (Cultural Quotient/Competence) and 86.66% of Taiwanese students also agree and believe the same. Most of them finally believe that CQ positively contributes to their preparation of their future profession.