Beyond Capital: Qualitative and Quantitative Approaches to Asset-Based Capital Theories

• In Event: 16.056 - Roundtable Session 4
  In Roundtable Session: 16.056-5 - Building on Strengths: Responses to Students' Positionalities and Social Locations

Abstract

For students in schools and higher education, social and cultural capital theory has been one explanation for social inequality in educational research. However, students from grades P-20 bring a wealth of prior knowledge—accrued from their home environments, community experiences, and cultural practices—into classrooms and postsecondary institutions. The purpose of this paper is to consider alternatives or expansions to cultural and social capital theory—namely, community cultural wealth and funds of knowledge—as a way to understand experiences of students of color throughout educational institutions. Specifically, we focus on the ways in which these theories, referred to here as asset-based capital theories, can be operationalized and examined in methods in order to guide future researchers’ work.

Authors

• Diane Nevárez, University of Southern California

• Jenna Sablan, Georgetown University