From Deficit to Asset: Locating Discursive Resistance in a Refugee-Background Student’s Written and Oral Narrative

ABSTRACT

This article examines how a refugee-background student of Somali Bantu heritage employs linguistic resources to make sense of his experience with forced migration, resettlement, and formal education. Much of the educational research on refugee-background students (and other groups of English learners) propagates a deficit orientation in which educational gaps and challenges, rather than educational resources and potential, are the central focus. In contrast, this student’s written and oral narratives construct a different identity, reframing his experience in terms of asset rather than deficit. Our discussion of asset discourse focuses on three central themes: agency, critical awareness, and contribution. This analysis suggests broader implications for research in educational linguistics and related fields.

KEYWORDS:

• Adolescent
• agency
• case study
• English learner
• identity construction
• refugee

Notes

^1. We use the term refugee-background rather than simply refugee, in recognition of the fact that the label of refugee represents only one aspect of a student’s identity and can carry negative connotations (Keddie, 2012; Shapiro, 2014).

^2. Pseudonyms are used for the student and his hometown.

^3. Indeed, the conflation of the two groups often leads to inaccurate characteristics of Somali Bantu, such as the frequent use of the descriptor “nomadic,” which applies to some groups of ethnic Somalis, but not to most Somali Bantu (Huisman, 2011).

^4. It was not until 1972 that a decision was made to use the Roman alphabet as a script for the Somali language. Although literacy rates increased significantly in the years following this decision, efforts were hindered by limited funding and mounting political tensions prior to the outbreak of civil war in 1991 (Bigelow, 2010; Lehman & Eno, 2003). Furthermore, because this script was based on a dialect used primarily in northern Somalia, it was of limited use to Somali Bantu, most of whom speak a different dialect.

^5. These comments come from a related project in which Shapiro was invited to conduct individual interviews with faculty/staff at one college regarding their experiences working with refugee-background students. This happened to be the same state college that Najib had attended, and several of the interview participants mentioned Najib voluntarily as one of their most memorable students.

^6. Much of the data collection and analysis for this project was completed by Shapiro, who received human subjects approval from the IRB at Shapiro’s institution. However, because this is a co-written piece, and because MacDonald examined much of the data in order to validate findings, the use of “we” seems appropriate.

^7. This memoir began as an assignment for a sociology class, but Najib continued working on it with a writing tutor after completing the course.

^8. We decided to use topic, rather than narrative or anecdote, as the unit of analysis, because some of Najib’s stories overlap and many are accompanied by commentary that is not in itself narrative but, instead, shows how Najib “makes sense” of his experience (Esin et al., 2014, p. 214).

^9. Two years after our interview, Shapiro invited Najib to be a guest speaker at a community gathering of refugee-background youth. He gave an informative and engaging talk about why students should go to college and what they would need to be successful there. Both Najib and the students in the group said they wished for more exchanges of that kind in school.