As the demographics of communities become more culturally diverse, understanding the local cultural community context becomes increasingly important to community life and work. This paper presents an undergraduate community psychology course that positions local cultural and community perspectives alongside international and global perspectives. The author describes an undergraduate community psychology course that was developed as a part of a campus-wide initiative that aims to represent the Native Hawaiian culture and worldview across the curriculum. The course was designed around a framework that represented multiple layers or strands of knowledge representing the international, national, and local community worldviews.
This paper describes the development of the local strand of knowledge which included 1) considering the cultural, historical, social, political, and environmental context of the local setting, 2) engaging and collaborating with local scholars and cultural practitioners, and 3) selecting resources representing the local cultural and community context as it relates to community psychology principles and perspectives. Results of students’ course evaluations are provided and confirm the importance of including local cultural and community perspectives in community psychology courses. The application of the course development framework to other community contexts is discussed.