Migration & Culture in Educational Relationships
Focus & objective
> Problem statement
> Role & meaning of culture in educational relationships
> Three core themes in transcultural educational practice:
o Conceptualization of the notion of ‘culture’ within educational relationships(i)
How to understand the concept of culture, what is it and how do we
understand it
Linking this to educational relationships and practices
o Cultural identifications & belonging in western multi-etnic societies (ii)
Shaped by educational relationships
Processes change
o International collaboration in schooling & psychosocial care (iii)
In global context
Activities & evaluation
> Lectures
> Reader – thematic listing of academic contributions
> Ppt-presentations lectures – cf. Toledo
> Integration of (& critical reflection on) reading material during lectures
o Course content that is not represented in reader
o Lectures develop an integrative reflection on reading material
o Lectures imply a critical approach to reading material
> Written examination – three open questions (with course material)
o Move between content and relate to each other
o Linken leggen tussen de verschillende lessen en teksten
> Interactive approach during lectures
Reader in de cudi -> aanvulling van de theorie, maar niet voldoende!!
> Ook de lessen zijn te kennen
Structure & scope
1. PART I – Conceptualization of the notion of ‘culture’ in educational relationships
2. PART II – Diversity in western multi-ethnic societies – Cultural identifications &
belonging in educational relationships
3. PART III – Transcultural educational practice in global context – international
collaboration in schooling & psychosocial care
,PART I: Conceptualization of the notion of ‘culture’ in educational relationships
4. Part 1 = the longest and most complex one
5. The role of culture in (child) development: Core models
o Wat is cultuur? Wat is het concept? Wat is het werk van cultuur?
6. A gradual conceptualisation of culture
7. Implications for transcultural educational practice
o Global context -> looking at schooling
Literature: De Haene, L., & Derluyn, I. (2015). Development and parenting in cultural context:
Meaning systems, migration and social condition. In: Bosmans G., Noens I., Bijttebier P.,
Claes L. (Eds.), Diagnostiek bij kinderen, jongeren en gezinnen. Deel II: Ontwikkeling in
context . ACCO, 145-168.
Three subjects:
THE ROLE OF CULTURE IN (CHILD) DEVELOPMENT
> Core models that understand the role of culture
o How culture regulates and impacts development
o Conceptualizing the impact of culture
> ‘Social-ecological model’ & ‘developmental niche model’
o Bronfenbrenner & Harkness and Super
> Cultural meaning systems in understanding & coping with developmental &
educational concerns
o Assessing and coaching processes
> Culture is something that is shared -> it is linked to a specific social position
A GRADUAL CONCEPTUALIZATION OF CULTURE = A LOT OF THEORY
> Static notion of culture: etno-specificity
o Referring to patterns and meanings and understandings and attitudes that
belong to a specific etno-cultural group
o The features of a group
o Horizontally shared by members of a cultural group
> Dynamic notion of culture: discursive perspective on culture/ creolization
o First layer being added
o Towards the understanding of the dynamic layer
> Locus of social inequality
o Second added layer
o Social inequalities
o Culture and social conditions
> Discipline (theory/practice) as cultural institutions
o Third added layer
IMPLICATIONS FOR TRANSCULTURAL EDUCATIONAL PRACTICE
> We take the outcome of the conceptualization and look to how this implies specific
ways of approaching transcultural ways of practice
> Intercultural communication
> Diagnostic/ethnographic assessment
> Models of transcultural psychosocial intervention
,PART I – NOTION OF CULTURE: CONCEPTUALIZATION:
THE ROLE OF CULTURE IN (CHILD) DEVELOPMENT:
CORE MODELS
Centrale modellen ter ondersteuning van de les; Literature
8. (a) Harkness, C. M., & Super, S. (1986). The developmental niche: A conceptualization
at the interface of child and culture. International Journal of Behavioral Development,
9, 545-569.
9. (b) Weisner, T. S. (2002). Ecocultural understanding of children’s developmental
pathways. Human Development, 45, 275–281.
10. (c) Bose, R. (2014). Bangladeshi parental ethnotheories in the United Kingdom:
Towards cultural collaborations in clinical practice. Clinical Child Psychology &
Psychiatry. Epub 2014, April 16.
CASE MATERIAL
11. Two cases from own research and clinical practice
12. Important starting point for the classes
CASE 1 – Kindergarten school participation of a toddler in a Belgian-Turkish family
Composition case: it’s a prototype, it’s not real
This case is based on work as a post-doctoral researcher
13. Studying a kindergarten developmental stimulation program for immigrant families
living in the city of Genk
o 2,5-6 years old
o Population -> large concentration of 2nd and 3rd generation immigrants
The intervention was set up because children from these families do not easily or frequently
enter or participate in kindergarten, they’re also not frequently at school
The studied child = a toddler, 4,5y
--> Teachers are concerned about the cognitive and linguistic development
14. They contact the center where the service is provided
15. They also wonder about the level of the mother’s presence
16. How to address this concern towards the parents
o The parents are absent in a school context
o They know that the grandparents live in the same house
o Father is 3rd generation and was born in Belgium -> Turkish roots
o Mother is a recent newcomer -> migration for marriage, she is very absent
from all the school activities
17. The child is sometimes at school, sometimes he stays at home
o The teachers conclude that speaking Dutch would be very good for the child
--> conversation with the parents is not that easy because the teachers don’t know how to
put everything, how to say everything
CASE 2 – Social isolation & cultural identifications in an Iraqi adolescent
, --> 15y old girl
18. Referred to the clinical center by the family doctor
19. He feels worried that the girl may be developing a depression
20. He is worried because he observes that she is withdrawing from social interaction,
increasing from school interaction
21. Family recently escaped Iraq -> father was politically involved and was persecuted
and had to escape
22. The girl started wearing a veil and looks very sad
23. The school starts a conversation with the parents, the conversations happens in
English
o The father gets really aggressive and says that the veil is really important in
their culture
o The school now is worried that the father is also aggressive at home
o The father states that physical punishment is part of the education and
doesn’t understand why schools don’t do this anymore
Discuss where you recognize the work of culture in these two cases
CASE 1:
Differential values regarding school participation at toddler age
Differential school systems
Language differences -> can cause stress for the child, but also for the mother
Acculturation stress
Keep speaking the foreign language
Grandparents live in the same house
Representations of minority groups -> strengthening isolation?
Mass and economic migration
Impact of larger and broader integration policies (segregation)
Extended family network -> they speak foreign language because it’s easier and it’s a
use
Collective cultures
Mother: separation from Belgian culture?
Ethnic clustering in neighborhood (cultural groups living close by each other -> keep
speaking own language because it’s easier)
o Protecting role
o Risk of segregation
CASE 2:
Different rules for different cultures
Cultural gap between home and school
Wearing a veil
Mother came to Belgium for marriage
Hijab – religion in identity construction
Political migration
Religious identification -> part of social belonging of isolation
Gender roles: cultural religious practices
CASE 1 AND 2
Cultural loss in diaspora -> cultural continuity