This is an expanded version of a paper given at a conference held in Cape Town, South Africa from December 11-13, 2008 entitled "The Native Speaker and the Mother Tongue." In keeping with the conference's themes of exploring and interrogating the notions of "mother tongue" and "native speaker," I consider…

Poverty-related developmental-risk theories dominate accounts of uneven levels of household functioning and effects on children. But immigrant parents may sustain norms and practices--stemming from heritage culture, selective migration, and social support--that buffer economic exigencies. "Comparable" levels of social-emotional functioning in…

International research into educational decision-making has been extensive, focusing on the way in which young people and their families assess the different options open to them. However, to what extent can we assume that different groups of young people have equal access to the information needed to make such an assessment? And what role, if…

Policy reforms and rising income inequality transformed educational and economic opportunities for Americans approaching midlife in the 1990s. Rising income inequality may have reduced mobility, as income gaps increased between rich and poor children. Against the effects of rising inequality, Civil Rights reforms may have increased mobility, as…

In response to recent articles and ideas for experiential learning activities in human geography, this paper outlines a particular approach to learning about the body, difference, mobility and geographic space through experience. The Corporeal Marker Project designed and implemented by the authors provides a spatial experience of difference for…

The purpose of this project was to initiate a program of research to explore how instructional designers around the world use design to make a social difference locally and globally. The central research question was, "Are there social and political purposes for design that are culturally based?" A growing body of research is concerned…

The goal of this article is to examine different conceptions of identity and different processes of identity negotiation to make visible the implicit and explicit links between social practices and perceived risk, equity, and opportunities to learn for linguistically and culturally diverse students. The authors discuss analytic frameworks for the…

This paper presents evidence from the biographies of samples totaling 1,215 young adults in Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia, who all reached age 16 between 1986 and 1992, and whose subsequent life histories coincided with their countries' transitions from communism. The evidence is used to examine whether new classes are being created in the new…

Through the "Tuning-Latin America" competencies project, Latin American universities have been incorporated into the Bologna Process. In 2003 the European Commission approved an initiative of this project for Latin America and began to promote it among ministries, university presidents' organisations and other institutions in Latin…

The present study explored possible differences in reasons for withdrawing from higher vocational education between ethnic minority and majority non-completers in the Netherlands. Tinto's model on the departure process was used as a theoretical framework. A total of 1017 non-completers filled in a questionnaire regarding their reasons for…

This article constitutes a re-reading of and an attempt to rehabilitate Basil Bernstein, both of which are important in light of the interpretation of Bernstein as a proponent of the verbal deficit view, and the general discrediting of his work on social class differences in the British educational system, as related to what he later called…

Cultural capital is frequently referred to as a construct in the analysis of inequality in higher education. It has been suggested that variations in cultural capital contribute to social class differences in levels of participation, distribution of students between elite and other universities, and the likelihood of dropping out. However, recent…

In this article, the author discusses the educational and societal differences between Canada and the United States. He claims that an egocentric culture, committed to immediate gratification, stands in the way of a healthy response to change. People are always seeking accommodation to the changes around them. When people choose familiar behaviour…

This article reports on an interdisciplinary and collaborative educational module prepared for fourth-year Psychology and Social Work students at two higher education institutions in the Western Cape, South Africa. The aim of the module was to provide students with the opportunity to experience learning across the boundaries of institution,…

Teachers for the Future is a regional report that draws together and analyses research findings from a study commissioned by the European Training Foundation (ETF) in seven countries in the Western Balkan region, namely Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Kosovo, Montenegro and Serbia. The overall…