Exploring Linguistic Capital and Social Reproduction in Elite Bilingual Schools Across the Globe (Poster 8)

• In Event: AERA Poster Session Seven
  In Poster Session: Critical Perspectives: Leveraging the Influence of Languages in Multilingual Contexts

Abstract

This systematic literature review explores the ways elite bilingual schools operate as sites of social reproduction for wealthy middle and upper class communities across the globe. Applying Bourdieu’s concepts of symbolic linguistic and cultural capital, this review highlights how many of these elite bilingual school settings are designed and advertised as a means for elite families to access, maintain, and reproduce symbolic capital in the form of access to high-status languages and cultures with the express purpose of eventually converting that symbolic capital into social, material, and economic capital. This systematic critical literature review reveals these elite bilingual schools as especially fruitful sites for investigating the interrelationship between language, social class, and the political economy.

Author

• Benjamin M. James, University of California - Santa Cruz
  Presenting Author