Language, Class and Education

Rampton, Ben; Harris, Roxy; Collins, James; Blommaert, Jan

doi:10.1007/978-0-387-30424-3_6

Cited by 24 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 9 publications

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“…The Bernstein hypothesis regarding class, codes, and education reproduction had an analytical and empirical robustness reflected in subsequent research in both the United Kingdom and the United States (Bernstein 1975, 1996; Hart and Risley 1995; Heath 1983; Lareau 2003). For a variety of reasons, too complex to summarize here (Collins 1988; Ohmann 1987), the Bernsteinian question—what is the role of language in educational reproduction—was dropped as part of the general turning away from structuralist accounts (Rampton et al. 2008).…”

Section: Theoretical Context: Social Reproduction Social Polarizatiomentioning

confidence: 99%

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Migration, Sociolinguistic Scale, and Educational Reproduction

Collins

2012

Anthropology & Edu Quarterly

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Migration-based language pluralism and globalized identity conflicts pose challenges for educational research and linguistic anthropology, in particular, how we think about education and social inequality. This article proposes new conceptual tools, drawn from linguistic anthropology as well as world systems theory, for analyzing the role of schooling in social reproduction and for investigating the dynamics of globalized social polarization. It grounds the argument in an ethnographic study of Latino migrant schoolchildren in upstate New York. [scale, migration, globalization, social reproduction, linguistic anthropology] We live in a globalized world, one characterized by extreme economic inequality and mass migration. Together these features pose significant challenges for many parts of society and for our traditions of inquiry. Migrants seek better lives but encounter new forms of social and economic discrimination, and host societies rely on migrant labor but are increasingly troubled by migrant difference. The Anthropology of Education traditionally investigates the role of social, cultural, and linguistic difference in schooling, but now such differences and the institutional responses they engender are influenced by economic inequalities having national and international dimensions. The Linguistic Anthropology of Education, which rightly prides itself on its sophistication about context in language and learning, must now grapple with globalized processes that result in new forms of linguistic inequality and social polarization.This article explores these issues through a theoretical argument in section two, which frames the analysis of an ethnographic case in section three. The theoretical argument presents three interconnected positions. First, the tradition of social reproduction analysis remains relevant for an anthropology of education because we live in an era of widening, not lessening, economic inequality; but older frameworks must be rethought because they were formulated in and for a period prior to the profound social, cultural, and economic changes we associate with "globalization." Second, we need tools for understanding and investigating how new social divisions and polarizations-that combine ethnolinguistic and ethnoracial differences with social-class divisions and conflicts-play themselves out in schools and the wider society. Third, linguistic anthropology, with its understanding of the situated nature of all meaning-making and its sophisticated study of ideology, offers valuable resources for such inquiry; but it requires as well attention to scale, and in particular, concepts of sociolinguistic scale that encompass global system dynamics as well as operations of power.As anthropologists and language analysts we are interested in how people experience global processes like migration and new forms of cultural and linguistic diversity and how that experience is given shape and meaning by the way they use language and the way language is used with them. Accordingly, our primary empirical...

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Section: Theoretical Context: Social Reproduction Social Polarizatiomentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In addition to these social and economic changes, there were also substantive changes in academic frameworks for understanding the world. Early reproduction analyses were formulated with a structuralist intellectual confidence that did not survive the intervening decades of reflexive, postmodern uncertainty (Bauman 1997; Rampton et al. 2008).…”

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confidence: 99%

Migration, Sociolinguistic Scale, and Educational Reproduction

Collins

2012

Anthropology & Edu Quarterly

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“…Prestigious languages (e.g. English or French) were a way of becoming a well-paid global elite, while the LM were often in poverty (Rampton et al, 2008). Hence, many LM students are in lower socioeconomic status (SES) families, though there are exceptions (Slootman, 2019).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Toward equitable education in the context of a pandemic: supporting linguistic minority students during remote learning

Choi

Chiu

2021

IJCED

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PurposeWithout universal access to a Covid-19 vaccine, many countries seek to prevent coronavirus outbreaks by closing schools and having students learn remotely. This study aims to examine its challenges for linguistic minority (LM) students and some practical strategies – both generally for all students and specifically for LM students.Design/methodology/approachThis study synthesises the research literature and practices across countries on equity and remote learning. It helps (1) understand the differential difficulties during an epidemic across primary, secondary and tertiary school students, especially LM students from low socioeconomic status (SES) families who lack economic, human, cultural or social capital in family or school contexts, based on Bourdieu's theory, and (2) identify additional resources and flexible, creative solutions for improving access and learning conditions for LM students. The authors discuss examples from 13 countries and territories (including developed and developing economies) of transformations of in-class learning to online learning in part or whole.FindingsThe limited economic, cultural and social capital of LM students, especially from low SES families, and their schools, along with communication barriers hinder their remote learning. Crisis-induced school budget shortfalls require creative ways to transition teachers, students and parents to remote learning and to provide customised support for LM students. Schools can (1) partner with non-governmental organisations, religious organisations, businesses and government services to access/share remote learning resources for LM students; (2) help teachers, students and parents develop needed skills (via online systems, peer support groups and hotlines); (3) restructure teacher lessons and duties for remote teaching; and (4) capitalise on technology (e.g. texts, chats, whiteboards) to support LM students' remote learning – some of which can exceed their traditional face-to-face learning experiences.Originality/valueThis article is among the first to examine how the Covid-19 crisis disproportionately affects the remote learning of LM students, to specify effective, practical remedies and to inform suitable education and social policies across countries.

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“…The relationship between language and social class is complex and very much related to the geopolitical context in which language policy is enacted (e.g. Gonzalez & Melis, 2014;Rampton, Harris, Collins, & Blommaert, 2008). In Australia, discourses associated with language provision in schools are integrally connected to Australia's history as a colony, its foreign policy and trade concerns, and as end point for immigration from Europe and more recently Asia and the Middle East (Clyne, 2005;Lo Bianco, 2008).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Languages discourses in Australian middle-class schools: parent and student perspectives

Wright

Cruickshank

Black

2016

Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education

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Much of the literature on social class and language study in schools argues that for middle-class parents and their children, languages are chosen for their capacity to offer forms of distinction that provide an edge in the global labour market. In this paper, we draw on data collected from interviews with parents and children in middle-class schools in Australia to demonstrate how a complex amalgam of elite, cultural identity and/or trade language discourses came into play to explain the choice (or not) to study a language and the choice of specific languages. For many of the parents languages provided a limited form of 'civic multiculturalism', as a means of better understanding and respecting the 'other'. We argue that the value attributed to high status languages via this discourse, means their continued presence in schools hoping to attract middle-class parents, but their relative absence in schools with largely working-class populations, where more 'practical' concerns dominate.

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Language, Class and Education

Cited by 24 publications

References 9 publications

Migration, Sociolinguistic Scale, and Educational Reproduction

Migration, Sociolinguistic Scale, and Educational Reproduction

Toward equitable education in the context of a pandemic: supporting linguistic minority students during remote learning

Languages discourses in Australian middle-class schools: parent and student perspectives

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