Inclusion and Language Education in Disadvantaged School Contexts

Abstract

Over the past few decades, supranational policies on inclusion have been recontextualised and enacted into national and local contexts, often by interacting with other policies.This paper explores, from the perspective of the sociology of knowledge and pedagogic practices, the ways in which dominant discourses on inclusion affect the enactments of language education policies in specific school settings.The study draws on Bernstein’s theory of the pedagogic device.  The research data has been produced through semi-structured interviews, classroom observations and students’ written texts assessed by their teachers, in three lower secondary state schools, situated in disadvantaged areas of the inner city of Athens. The analysis of the research data illuminates that discourses on inclusion constitute a regulative context that shapes specific forms of pedagogic practice through which the Modern Greek Language curricula are enacted, with serious implications for students’ learning.