Shared places, separate spaces: constructing cultural spaces through two national languages in Finland

ABSTRACT

Finland is a bilingual country with 2 national languages, Finnish and Swedish. The Swedish-speaking school institution aims to protect the minority language by maintaining a monolingual school space. In this article, the construction of linguistic and ethnic difference in educational discourse and practice related to the national languages in Finland is analyzed by using discourse analysis, feminist and post-structural theories. By analyzing ethnographic data and public debate, we argue that discursive and material practices related to spatiality have a significant role in constructing difference and otherness in the Finnish school context. Essentialist categories are produced but also contested from the positions within the cultural spaces at school and in society at large.

KEYWORDS:

• Language
• cultural space
• difference
• nation

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. The project was funded by Svenska Kulturfonden.

2. Recording the conversations was particularly necessary during the project, since most of the material was analyzed using a conversation analytic method (cf. Melander & Sahlström, 2010). Students were advised to switch off the microphone whenever they felt like they did not want to be recorded.

3. Pseudonyms are used for all the informants named in this article.