Where words collide: social class, schools and linguistic discontinuity

Abstract

The prestige accorded to standard language varieties, particularly within the field of education, together with language management role of schools with respect to the variety and the extent to which linguistic differences construct discontinuous relationships between the school and specific social groups provide the rationale for this paper. This qualitative study, based on a friendship focus group design, was conducted with two groups of 12-year-old children from contrasting ‘ideal type’, socio-economic groups over the period of one school year. Findings outline specific practices where the linguistic expectations and demands within school-space create different implications and outcomes for middle-class and working-class children as a result of their linguistic experiences in non-school space. The implications of these linguistic interactions on patterns of engagement with the school among the children in the sample are also considered.

Keywords:

• language variation
• linguistic discontinuity
• home–school discontinuity
• social class
• register
• language management

Notes

1. School space refers to all contexts and spaces within school where children engage in a range of formative interactions, included here are the classrooms, the corridors, yard space. The purpose here is to set up a broader context for the analysis of the differential experiences of children from different socio-economic groups as a result of cultural and linguistic practices that characterise this space. Non-school space refers to a variety of contexts outside the school that position children within cultural and linguistic fields that are drawn upon in the construction of individual and group identities. It is here that children acquire ‘commonplace knowledge’ through everyday forms of talk (Bernstein 1996). Fundamental to this are the implications in school space interactions for children who are socialised in contrasting socio-economic, non-school space settings.

2. See www.cso.ie.