Pathologizing the Language and Culture of Poor Children

Autor/inn/en	Dudley-Marling, Curt; Lucas, Krista
Titel	Pathologizing the Language and Culture of Poor Children
Quelle	In: Language Arts, 86 (2009) 5, S.362-370 (9 Seiten) PDF als Volltext Verfügbarkeit
Sprache	englisch
Dokumenttyp	gedruckt; online; Zeitschriftenaufsatz
ISSN	0360-9170
Schlagwörter	Income; Females; Linguistics; Academic Failure; Economically Disadvantaged; Interaction; Parent Child Relationship; Correlation; Elementary School Teachers; Vocabulary Development; Socioeconomic Influences; Teaching Methods; English (Second Language) + Suchen Sie Ihr Suchwort? Einkommen; Weibliches Geschlecht; Linguistik; Interaktion; Parents-child relationship; Parent-child-relation; Parent-child relationship; Eltern-Kind-Beziehung; Korrelation; Elementary school; Teacher; Teachers; Grundschule; Volksschule; Lehrer; Lehrerin; Lehrende; Wortschatzarbeit; Sozioökonomischer Faktor; Teaching method; Lehrmethode; Unterrichtsmethode; English as second language; English; Second Language; Englisch als Zweitsprache
Abstract	There has been a resurgence of deficit discourses that implicate deficiencies in the language and culture of poor students as the cause of their academic failures. An influential study by Betty Hart and Todd Risley concludes that high levels of academic failure among poor children can be linked to the quantity and quality of language interactions among poor children and their parents. However, strong claims about the language and culture of poor families are undermined by serious methodological flaws in the Hart and Risley study; an ethnocentric bias that takes for granted the normative status of the linguistic and cultural practices of the middle- and upper-income families in their sample; and the failure to make explicit the theory of language and culture that frames their analysis. But the fundamental problem with the Hart and Risley study--and deficit perspectives more generally--is that deficit thinking fails to consider linguistic and cultural resources all children bring with them to school. Ultimately, the remedy for disproportionate levels of failure among children living in poverty is a school curriculum that respects their background knowledge and experience and builds on students' linguistic, cultural, and cognitive "funds of knowledge." (Contains 1 note.) (As Provided).
Anmerkungen	National Council of Teachers of English. 1111 West Kenyon Road, Urbana, IL 61801-1096. Tel: 877-369-6283; Tel: 217-328-3870; Web site: http://www.ncte.org/journals
Erfasst von	ERIC (Education Resources Information Center), Washington, DC
Update	2017/4/10