Who knows? (De)legitimizing knowledges in a refugee serving school (research costs, part 2) (WhoKnows2)
Main funder
Funder's project number: 358097
Funds granted by main funder (€)
- 59 465,00
Funding program
Project timetable
Project start date: 01/09/2023
Project end date: 31/08/2025
Summary
In order to succeed at school, students have to acquire not merely knowledges but knowledges that are recognized and valued, i.e. legitimate, in their context. This is an especially challenging task for students who belong to cultural minorities and have already undergone (partial) schooling in an educational environment that is different from their current one, such as refugee-background adults in Finland. The project "Who knows?" investigates the legitimacy of knowledges in a Finnish school that serves refugee-background adults. The project will (a) generate empirical data to understand which knowledges surface in a school, (b) examine how these knowledges do (not) become legitimate in this context, (c) critically revisit the concept “funds of knowledge” (FoK), and (d) support teachers in seeing and challenging knowledge biases.
The site for this ethnographic study is a rural Finnish community college that offers a two-year basic education program which is populated by refugee-background adults from mostly Middle Eastern and African countries. Data will stem from about 100 hours of classroom/school observations, 60 hours of classroom/school audio recordings, 20 open-ended interviews with students and staff, and 10 hours of audio recordings and observations from on-site, PI-led teacher training workshops. These data will capture instances in which the legitimacy of knowledges is addressed, e.g. by students or teachers referring to policies or norms, emphasizing information, presenting themselves as knowledge authorities, or evaluating knowledges. Three years of data collection will be necessary to observe one cycle of the school’s program and hold 10-12 hours of workshops for and with the teachers. Thematic analysis will be applied inductively and deductively to identify themes and thematic clusters that speak to the legitimation processes of knowledges in this context; selected extracts will undergo fine-grained discourse analysis to identify discursive patterns that de/legitimize knowledges.
By bringing together foci on epistemology, legitimacy, and critical pedagogy and by producing new empirical evidence, theorizing it against the backdrop of the commonly used FoK approach, and feeding findings back into the field (teacher training), the study will be empirically, theoretically, and socially impactful. Ultimately, it is a step towards increased epistemic equity in educational settings.
The site for this ethnographic study is a rural Finnish community college that offers a two-year basic education program which is populated by refugee-background adults from mostly Middle Eastern and African countries. Data will stem from about 100 hours of classroom/school observations, 60 hours of classroom/school audio recordings, 20 open-ended interviews with students and staff, and 10 hours of audio recordings and observations from on-site, PI-led teacher training workshops. These data will capture instances in which the legitimacy of knowledges is addressed, e.g. by students or teachers referring to policies or norms, emphasizing information, presenting themselves as knowledge authorities, or evaluating knowledges. Three years of data collection will be necessary to observe one cycle of the school’s program and hold 10-12 hours of workshops for and with the teachers. Thematic analysis will be applied inductively and deductively to identify themes and thematic clusters that speak to the legitimation processes of knowledges in this context; selected extracts will undergo fine-grained discourse analysis to identify discursive patterns that de/legitimize knowledges.
By bringing together foci on epistemology, legitimacy, and critical pedagogy and by producing new empirical evidence, theorizing it against the backdrop of the commonly used FoK approach, and feeding findings back into the field (teacher training), the study will be empirically, theoretically, and socially impactful. Ultimately, it is a step towards increased epistemic equity in educational settings.
Principal Investigator
Primary responsible unit
Follow-up groups
Profiling area: Multidisciplinary research on learning and teaching (University of Jyväskylä JYU) MultiLeTe; Multiliteracies for social participation and in learning across the life span (University of Jyväskylä JYU) MultiLEAP; 2021-2026. Formerly RECLAS; School of Resource Wisdom (University of Jyväskylä JYU) JYU.Wisdom; School of Wellbeing (University of Jyväskylä JYU) JYU.Well
Related publications and other outputs
- Haavoittuneita ja kärsiviä? : siirtolaisnaisten toimijuus osana tutkimusta (2022) Ennser-Kananen, Johanna; et al.; A3; OA; 978-951-39-9423-5
- Imperial straightening devices in disciplinary choices of academic knowledge production (2021) Cushing-Leubner, Jenna; et al.; A1; OA
- ‘My skin is hard’ - adult learners’ resistance to racialization and racism (2021) Ennser-Kananen, Johanna; A1; OA
