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

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 intervie...

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Published in:Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education Vol. 39; no. 1; pp. 98 - 113
Main Authors: Wright, Jan, Cruickshank, Ken, Black, Stephen
Format: Article
Published: Taylor & Francis Ltd Feb2018
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Online Access:View this record in EBSCOhost
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        10.1080/01596306.2016.1232536
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        atl: Languages discourses in Australian middle-class schools: parent and student perspectives.
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        au:
          Wright, Jan
          Cruickshank, Ken
          Black, Stephen
        affil:
          Faculty of Social Science, University of Wollongong, Wollongong, Australia
          Faculty of Education and Social Work, The University of Sydney, Sydney, Australia
          Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, University of Technology, Sydney, Australia
      su:
        Language & education
        Speech & social status
        Language policy
        Education of the middle class
        Cultural identity
        Lingua francas
        Multiculturalism
        Social classes
        Australia
      sug:
        subj:
          Australia
          Language & education
          Speech & social status
          Language policy
          Education of the middle class
          Cultural identity
          Lingua francas
          Multiculturalism
          Social classes
      keyword:
        language policy
        Languages
        linguistic capital
        middle-class schools
        parents’ and students’ attitudes
        parents' and students' attitudes
        social class
      ab: 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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      custom: Copyright of Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education is the property of Taylor & Francis Ltd and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites without the copyright holder's express written permission. Additionally, content may not be used with any artificial intelligence tools or machine learning technologies. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use.
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