Interculturality, Ethnicity and Multilingualism in Upper-Secondary Schools : An analysis of opportunities and obstacles in organisational and practical activities with newly arrived migrant students

• The purpose of the present study is to achieve a new level of knowledge of interculturality, ethnicity and multilingualism in conjunction with practical and organisational activities involving newly arrived migrant students in upper-secondary education. The analysis revolves around the following two research questions: (1) How do newly arrived migrant students produces interculturality, ethnicity and multilingualism in conjunction with practical activities in upper-secondary schools? (2) How do those involved produce newly arrived migrant students’ identity formation and reformation during teaching and learning activities in upper-secondary schools, and the significance of such processes to social integration? The empirical material used in the study consists of qualitative interviews, field notes and documents related to upper-secondary education obtained from a number of Swedish municipalities. Ten interviews have been conducted with newly arrived students attending different upper-secondary schools in Sweden. The dominant standard explanations of the category of newly arrived students (especially those who come from war zones) seem to focus on their psychiatric or medical needs. The common diagnoses that figure in the research include post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, recurring nightmares, emotional apathy, and flashbacks to traumatic events. Common explanations for absence in the school context include stomach aches, restlessness, anxiety, and depression, and competing explanations seem relatively de-emphasized. These may include (1) established inequalities in society and at school, (2) material and institutional difficulties in societal and school contexts, (3) bureaucratic hurdles in school and in the rest of society, (4) ethnic monitoring and social control in society and at school, (5) the humiliated identities of the actors in a societal and school context, (6) victimization in relation to the majority in the context; (7) demeaning ethnic categorizations in society and at school, and (8) discrimination in the school context and an overall societal context. Analysis of the collected empirical data in this study shows that the ethnic identities of newly arrived students are constructed and reconstructed during teaching and learning activities in upper-secondary schools. During these activities, an ethnified position of “us” and “them” is produced and reproduced between actors in the context of upper-secondary education. These positions are analysed in the present study as both an obstacle (“us” and “them” in the relationship between various ethnic categories of student and teacher, or as ethnified monitoring and social control in the school context) and an opportunity (a common ethnified “we” in the relationship between teacher and student). 

Subject headings

SAMHÄLLSVETENSKAP  -- Utbildningsvetenskap (hsv//swe)

SOCIAL SCIENCES  -- Educational Sciences (hsv//eng)

SAMHÄLLSVETENSKAP  -- Sociologi (hsv//swe)

SOCIAL SCIENCES  -- Sociology (hsv//eng)

Keyword

Intercultural perspective

ethnomethodology

trust

intercultural education

intercultural teaching

intercultural learning

ethnocentric pedagogy

conflict

social order

school context

inclusive educational context

social-pedagogical acceptance

dynamics of education context

culture

ethnic social control

ethnic monitoring

social pedagogical control

social pedagogical monitoring.

Sociology

Sociologi

Education

Pedagogik

Social Pedagogy

Socialpedagogik

Special Education

Specialpedagogik

Publication and Content Type

ref (subject category)

kon (subject category)