From “their culture is very strong” to “He/she doesn’t adapt to the school”: pupils from immigrant origin, academic evaluation and Pygmalion effect at Primary School

Abstract

This article focuses on the links between teacher’s cultural(ist) discourses and imaginaries of children of foreign immigration and their academic results at a primary school in Catalonia, Spain. The ethnographic case study shows some connection points between dominant culturalist images and the school marks of pupils in a State School located in Barcelona province’s coast where immigrant children of very diverse origins came together, principally Moroccan, Latin-American and West European. A special stress is put on the discussion of the academic results most vulnerable to culturalist prejudices and stereotypes: those regarding to “Personal and evolutionary aspects” as used by teachers in the report of academic marks. Through this case study we can observe the moulding of minority status and stigmatization of children with poor immigrant background in the educational context between the force of prejudice and the Pygmalion effect.