Young Tornedalians in education : the challenges of being national minority pupils in the Swedish school system

Peer reviewedPublisher PD

Tornedalian Teachers’ and Principals’ in the Swedish Education System: Exploring Decolonial Pockets in the Aftermaths of ‘Swedification’

This article explores decolonial pockets among Tornedalian teachers and principals by scrutinising the pre-requisites for school staff to integrate Tornedalen’s minority culture and practise the Meänkieli language in ordinary teaching and learning. It also investigates the challenges and opportunities aligned with such en-deavours. The data collection is based on qualitative focus-group and individual interviews with teachers, principals and pupils at upper secondary schools in two Tornedalian municipalities, in Northern Sweden. The findings reveal a practice in which teachers’ and principals’ Tornedalian cultural background is either more or less prominent, depending on the occasion. Particularly in the classroom context, teachers are obliged to mute and put aside their minority language, Meänkieli. Thus, they transform their behaviour and adopt a Swedish manner of conduct in their contacts with pupils. Consequently, teachers’ Tornedalian cul-tural identity becomes less prominent. Simultaneously, Swedish school culture takes precedence, and its authority controls what can be seen as proper educational subjects as well as the classroom’s social interactions. The analysis, guided by decolonising perspectives, reveals that minority language and cultural practices are mainly alive and active in the unofficial settings of the schools. These manifestations of resistance against the Swedish language and Swedish culture’s dominance of school practices, which remain alive in these decolonial pockets, is not organised and not part of official school practice. However, the conversations with school staff and pupils revealed that the competence, desire and strategies exist to ignite a pedagogy more inclusive of minority perspectives that can facilitate the transfer of Tornedalian minority knowledge and perspectives to pupils. This could empower decolonial Meänkieli practices and revitalise Tornedalian culture among young Tornedalians

Den subtila ojämlikheten : Om grundskolors materiella förutsättningar och elevers utbildningsmöjligheter

The aim of this thesis is to examine compulsory schools' material conditions in relation to students' learning opportunities and schools staffs’ opportunities to educate. The thesis consists of four published peer-reviewed articles. The empirical data was collected through extensive fieldwork during 2010-2011 in three Swedish schools (ages 14-15), characterized by different social demographics. The material is primarily classroom observations, semi-structured interviews and policy documents. Analysis in the thesis draws mainly on Pierre Bourdieu’s theoretical framework, but also on contemporary developments institutional habitus by Diane Reay and positional capital by Jacques Lévy. Also, materiality as an educational concept is used to reflect and discuss schools’ prerequisites as institutions of education. The first article investigates how school practice emerges for pupils and the importance it has on their perceptions of their own lives in the school, it also considers and discusses the utility of the theoretical tool school habitus. The study was furthermore a critical examination of the reproductive and/or social levelling effects that school practice could have on pupils. The second article explores and compares the schools' access to ICT and classroom teaching. The third article examines the role of the family and its importance for school staff and pupils in the daily operations of the school. In addition, it scrutinizes how socioeconomic conditions affect the middle- and working-class schools' abilities to navigate in relation to families. The fourth article examines material conditions in all three schools with a focus on pupils and school staffs’ perceptions and actions in school practices, and how materiality shapes schools' institutional habitus. The analysis displays that schools’ materiality has major significance for the forms of institutional habitus and which ideals and values about education are developed in the different schools. It also displays that schools’ material conditions are closely interwoven with pupils’ educational backgrounds and the socioeconomic structure of the local neighbourhood. Schools’ material preconditions affect the pedagogical work of the teachers in classrooms and principals’ acting space to follow and implement the schools’ missions according to steering documents. Viewed as preworld, the local area and resources in the schools shape pupils’ sense of worthiness and thus their visions of a possible future in regard to educational and- workinglife carriers. The thesis discusses and concludes that the title The Subtle Inequality illustrate a process where phenomenon such as school choice, teacher shortage or schools’ abilities to compete are taken for granted. They are seen as “natural” and given, thus they hide the existing, objective material preconditions as the sources that shape differences in the educational system. To overcome these differences, the thesis reflects on the need to give all schools in Sweden equal material starting points

Young Tornedalians in education : the challenges of being national minority pupils in the Swedish school system

The Tornedalians are a national ethnic and linguistic minority group in northern Sweden who live along the Torne River Valley (Tornedalen) in municipalities that border the neighbouring country of Finland. This minority group has been subjected to marginalisation, racialisation and assimilation politics driven by Swedish colonial and nationalist interests and ambitions since the end of the 19th century. In the so-called 'Swedification' of Tornedalen, the education system has historically been a tool used to oppress and undermine the population's culture and language, Meänkieli. Few studies have scrutinised contemporary conditions concerning the relationship between Tornedalians and the education system. This article examines the challenges and obstacles that young Tornedalians encounter in their quest to learn about and practise their minority group status within the Swedish upper secondary school system. The data consists of interviews with pupils, teachers and principals at upper secondary schools in two municipalities in Tornedalen. Drawing on postcolonial perspectives and theories of nationalism, the analysis suggests that colonial conceptions and processes are still at work in the region through the medium of the educational system. School practice is described as an 'all-Swedish' institution that is saturated with its majority culture; in other words, Tornedalian culture and Meänkieli are repressed due to the power, domination and precedence of Swedish values in school practice. Thus, the effects of Swedification policies are still at play in Tornedalian schools. However, there are promising pedagogical opportunities to enhance and develop the learning practice of Meänkieli and Tornedalian culture due to pupils' interest in minority issues, combined with teachers' knowledge of these matters. A conclusion drawn in the article is that there is a need for teachers to bring these minority issues into ordinary teaching and modify the curriculum so that, to a greater extent, it integrates and enforces elements of local minority language and culture into ordinary school practice

Збірник праць Тернопільського осередку Наукового товариства ім. Шевченка, Т. 6 : Актуальні питання екології та охорони здоров’я

Затверджено до друку вченою радою ДВНЗ "Тернопільський дер­ жавний медичний університет імені І. Я. Горбачевського" (протокол No40 від 10.06.2011р.). Редакційна колегія не завжди поділяє погляди авторів статей. На палітурці автопортрет Тараса Шевченка, створений поетом у 1849 році.У збірнику вміщено 22 статті українських і зарубіжних авторів, у яких висвітлено проблемні питання екології та охорони здоров’я. Наведено результати досліджень довкілля на Тернопільщині та в інших регіонах України, перспективу впливу нових векторних біотехнологій. Обговорено стан медичної допомоги населенню, заплановану реформу системи охорони здоров'я та її вірогідні наслідки, вплив інфекцій на демографічні показники. Низку праць присвячено досягненням у клінічній медицині.The book contains 22 articles by Ukrainian and foreign authors who have highlighted issues of ecology and health. The results of the research environment in Ternopil region and in other regions of Ukraine, new vector-term impact of biotechnology. Discussed the state of medical care, the planned reform of the health system and its likely consequences, the impact of infections on demographics. A number of works devoted to advances in clinical medicine.Видання здійснено за фінансової підтримки ДВНЗ “Тернопільський державний медичний університет імені І. Я. Горбачевського"

The school-family relationship in socially divided Swedish lower secondary schools

This article examines the school-family relationship in order to understand what significance the family has for teachers, students, and head teachers. Drawing on theory by Reay (2004), this article deploys family and school habitus to analyse two Swedish lower-secondary schools with different social structures. The data consist of interviews and observations. Results indicate that one of the schools has a compatible habitus – that is, similar values among its families about education – which simplifies the relationship and allows it to be used to strengthen and develop school practices. The other school has a diverse habitus – that is, different values among its families about education. Therefore an equal relationship is more difficult to facilitate, because the families have different abilities to take on this responsibility. This article concludes that developing a pedagogy that fully integrates and acknowledges students’ ideas and life experiences is a potential force to change a school’s habitus, diminish the importance of the family habitus in schooling, and ensure that students receive equivalent education

Tornedalian Teachers' and Principals' in the Swedish Education System : Exploring Decolonial Pockets in the Aftermaths of 'Swedification'

This article explores decolonial pockets among Tornedalian teachers and principals by scrutinising the pre-requisites for school staff to integrate Tornedalen's minority culture and practise the Meänkieli language in ordinary teaching and learning. It also investigates the challenges and opportunities aligned with such en-deavours. The data collection is based on qualitative focus-group and individual interviews with teachers, principals and pupils at upper secondary schools in two Tornedalian municipalities, in Northern Sweden. The findings reveal a practice in which teachers' and principals' Tornedalian cultural background is either more or less prominent, depending on the occasion. Particularly in the classroom context, teachers are obliged to mute and put aside their minority language, Meänkieli. Thus, they transform their behaviour and adopt a Swedish manner of conduct in their contacts with pupils. Consequently, teachers' Tornedalian cultural identity becomes less prominent. Simultaneously, Swedish school culture takes precedence, and its authority controls what can be seen as proper educational subjects as well as the classroom's social interactions. The analysis, guided by decolonising perspectives, reveals that minority language and cultural practices are mainly alive and active in the unofficial settings of the schools. These manifestations of resistance against the Swedish language and Swedish culture's dominance of school practices, which remain alive in these decolonial pockets, is not organised and not part of official school practice. However, the conversations with school staff and pupils revealed that the competence, desire and strategies exist to ignite a pedagogy more inclusive of minority perspectives that can facilitate the transfer of Tornedalian minority knowledge and perspectives to pupils. This could empower decolonial Meänkieli practices and revitalise Tornedalian culture among young Tornedalians

Skolledarskap i Sverige : en forskningsöversikt 2014–2018

The purpose of this research overview is to understand the main contemporary research objects that characterizes the research field of school leadership in Sweden. Published literature within the field between 2014 and 2018 together with a mapping of research interests from 99 university teachers in the state funded education programme for principals, form the understandings of the field. The results indicate that the field is constituted by the interests of foremost understanding governance, policy, inspection and school leaders work and pedagogical leadership. A need of systems thinking, investigations of skills and competences, and lack of critical research are examples that calls for new directions in future studies within the field

Tornedalingar om minoritetsskap : ras och platsens betydelse för dekoloniala motståndspraktiker i majoritetssamhället

This article is based on an interview study with young and adult Tornedalians, a relatively unknown minority group in the northern part of Sweden. It scrutinizes the informants experiences of identifying with, and navigating within, a minority position in relation to the majority society's discursive ideas and conceptions about them as national minority group. Through decolonial perspectives focusing on race and place, the analysis illuminates how societal prejudices construct the region of Tornedalen as uncivilized, and where Tornedalians are considered to embody a "problematic" racialised position. At the same time, however, the informants express practices of both colonial awareness and decolonial resistance. In this way, the customs, culture, political power, and norms related to urbanisation of the Swedish majority society are questioned and challenged from a Finno-Ugric minority standpoint, with emphasis on nature values and knowledges linked to a rural lifestyle

Om betydelsen av skolhabitus i högstadiepraktiken

Artikeln studerar hur grundskolepraktiken framträder för elever och vilken betydelse den har för deras uppfattningar om sin tillvaro i skolan. Den fokuserar skoleffekter relaterade till sociala och pedagogiska aktiviteter. Artikeln bygger på en studie som genomfördes i en åttondeklass på en högstadieskola där en majoritet av eleverna kommer från familjer med hög utbildningsnivå. Empirin består av intervjuer, klassrumsobservationer och policydokument. Studien visar att de ideal skolan grundar sin praktik på, skolhabitus, får olika konsekvenser beroende av hur väl elever kan förkroppsliga dessa ideal. Beroende på framgångar i detta avseende följer ett mer eller mindre positivt bemötande och större eller mindre frihet i klass-rummet