Language Diversity in the Classroom - ymerleksi - home

The Language Debate 125scholarly schoolmaster who is ‘‘disgusted’’ by the ‘‘howlers’’ of... his pupilsaffords one striking example of this kind’ (p. 206).Flugel’s main authority here is Ernest Jones, the pioneer of psychoanalysisin Britain, and Freud’s biographer (see Jones, 1918).2. Bernstein himself (1971, 1972a) analyzed constructed data (see also Rosen,1972, for a criticism), and the practice was more common than might beimagined, especially among ‘deficit’ theorists. Nowadays, the enormousbenefits arising from constructing the data that are to be interpreted haveproved most appealing to discourse analysts.3. Lady Plowden died in 2000, aged 90, and Corbett’s obituary in The Guardian(3 October) made a point of mentioning that her life of voluntary serviceconstituted one of the last examples of the ‘great and the good’ caste at workin British public life, in which leadership roles on national bodies andcommissions were traditionally filled by members of that caste. So, perhaps ahint of Lady Bountiful ‘as we do ourselves’ was to be expected. ThePlowden Report, and ‘Plowdenism’, were heavily criticised from all sides, but itis instructive to remember the arguments made for parental involvement, forsensitive pre-school provision, for greater and more comprehensive attentionto the very real problems of poor children at home and at school. For a usefulretrospective, see Halsey and Sylva (1987).4. Cross-cultural sensitivity remains key, however. Seeing how well disadvantagedchildren do on essentially middle-class tasks can be very useful, forexample provided the aim is to get some measure of likely problems inclassrooms where such tasks are commonly encountered, and not to assessbasic ‘deficiency’. Similarly, while it is not unreasonable to probe nonstandard-dialect-speakingchildren for their knowledge and use of standardforms, it is absurd to use the findings as indications of maternal-varietydevelopment (see Baratz, 1969; Edwards, 1977a, 1977b).5. One doesn’t have to go to the Caribbean, however. In 1983, BBC televisionbroadcast a series called Auf Wiedersehen, Pet, about Geordie brickies who goto work in Germany. The English newspapers carried stories from viewerswho were appreciative, but who asked for subtitles. (The show made a briefreappearance at Christmas 2004.)6. The Council has been described as a ‘right-wing pressure group’ (Crowley,1989).7. It would also be naïve to assume that those who have achieved positions ofsocial security will necessarily be sympathetic to those they have left behind.The person who has climbed the ladder of success may be more likely to stepon the fingers of those following than to help them for to bring others ‘up’ isto dilute the singularity of one’s own attainments. A more elegant expressionof the same idea is found in Julius Caesar (II.i.2227), when Brutus observesThat lowliness is young ambition’s ladder,Whereto the climber-upward turns his face;But when he once attains the upmost round,He then unto the ladder turns his back,Looks in the clouds, scorning the base degreesBy which he did ascend.