ABSTRACT

Research within communities that have historically been failed by formalised schooling often describes teachers who have found it difficult to engage with the social and cultural differences of their students. In this article, I present the case of Richard, a teacher whose work entailed a particular set of demands generated by a complex range of intersecting factors – amount and nature of experience in teaching, and the context in which he worked, a school located within a remote Indigenous community in Australia. Richard’s descriptions of his experiences reflect a range of conflicting deficit discourses directed variously at his students, their families and community, as well as the school, its teachers, and himself. In this article, I use Bourdieu to explore Richard’s case, and suggest that the analysis of deficit discourses in teaching needs to move beyond their identification, and towards unravelling the complex structural and personal inter-relations at play. Understanding how and why such discourses can arise and persist in teaching may afford new directions for research and practice, enabling more productive support of teachers and their work with diverse groups of students.

摘要

在历史上因正规学校教育而失败的社区内的研究通常描述了那些发现难以参与学生的社会和文化差异的教师。在本文中，我将介绍 Richard 的案例，他的工作涉及一系列复杂的交叉因素所产生的特定需求——教学经验的数量和性质，以及他工作的环境，一所学校位于澳大利亚一个偏远的土著社区。理查德对他的经历的描述反映了一系列相互矛盾的赤字话语，这些话语以不同的方式针对他的学生、他们的家庭和社区，以及学校、老师和他自己。在这篇文章中，我使用 Bourdieu 来探讨 Richard 的案例，并建议对教学中的缺陷话语的分析需要超越它们的认同，并朝着解开复杂的结构和个人相互关系的方向发展。了解此类话语如何以及为什么会在教学中出现和持续存在可能会为研究和实践提供新的方向，从而为教师及其与不同学生群体的工作提供更有成效的支持。