Constructing Danish membership: A critical analysis of social representations of culture and deviance in the multilingual classroom

Bach, Sara Saaby

4. term

Psychology, Master

2018

2018-05-31

85

Specialet undersøger folkeskolen som en central arena, hvor dansk national identitet og medlemskab bliver formet i praksis. Med afsæt i den aktuelle integrationsdebat analyseres, hvordan læreres forståelser af kultur og kulturel afvigelse i flersprogede klasser påvirker kategorier for tilhørsforhold og tosprogede elevers muligheder for at blive anerkendt som danske. Undersøgelsen er et kvalitativt casestudie af fire folkeskolelærere baseret på semistrukturerede interviews og forankret i kulturpsykologi og kritisk diskursanalyse. Interviewene fortolkes gennem Social Repræsentationsteori og Kulturelt-historisk Aktivitetsteori for at belyse, hvordan institutionelle praksisser både afspejler og former viden og identiteter. Fundene peger på, at lærere ofte bruger kultur som forklaring på det enkelte barns adfærd, opfattelser og følelser og dermed repræsenterer kultur som en relativt fast beholder omkring individet. Denne forståelse kan utilsigtet legitimere assimilationskrav og bidrage til at placere tosprogede børn uden for den implicitte nationale/kulturelle gruppe. Specialet argumenterer for, at en mere teoretisk informeret og dynamisk kulturforståelse i uddannelsessystemet kan understøtte inklusion og styrke tosprogede elevers muligheder for medlemskab.

This thesis examines the Danish elementary school as a key site where national identity and membership are constructed in everyday practice. Against the backdrop of ongoing integration debates, it analyzes how teachers’ understandings of culture and cultural deviance in multilingual classrooms shape categories of belonging and affect bilingual pupils’ chances of being recognized as Danish. The study is a qualitative case study of four teachers based on semi-structured interviews, grounded in cultural psychology and critical discourse analysis. The interviews are interpreted through Social Representation Theory and Cultural-Historical Activity Theory to show how institutional practices both reflect and produce knowledge and identities. Findings suggest that teachers frequently invoke culture to explain individual children’s behavior, perceptions, and emotions, thus representing culture as a relatively fixed container around the person. This view can unintentionally legitimize assimilation and contribute to positioning bilingual children outside the school’s implicit national/cultural in-group. The thesis argues that adopting a more theoretically informed, dynamic concept of culture in education could better support inclusion and foster membership for bilingual pupils.

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