Fifteen years ago, Concha Delgado-Gaitan began literacy research in Carpinteria, California. At that time, Mexican immigrants who labored in nurseries, factories, and housekeeping, had almost no voice in how their children were educated. Committed to participative research, Delgado-Gaitan collaborated with the community to connect family, school, and community. Regular community gatherings gave birth to the Comite de Padres Latinos. Refusing the role of the victim, the Comite paticipants organized to reach out to everyone in the community, not just other Latino families. Bound by their...

The ethnographic experience is an indelible venture that continuously redefines one's life. Bringing together important cross-currents in the national debate on education, this book introduces the student or practitioner to the challenges, resources, and skills informing ethnographic research today. From the first chapter describing the cultural foundations of ethnographic research, by George Spindler, the book traces both traditional and new approaches to the study of schools and their communities. Emphasis on discourse, critical pedagogy, and ethnicity are among the many aspects of...

This volume presents the personal accounts of African American, Asian American, and Latino faculty who use 'narratives of struggles' to describe the challenges they faced in order to become bona fide members of the U.S. Academy. These narratives show how survival and success require a sophisticated knowledge of the politics of academia, insider knowledge of the requirements of legitimacy in scholarly efforts, and resourceful approach to facing dilemmas between cultural values, traditional racist practices, and academic resilience. The book also explores the empowerment process of these...

The New Americans describes the life of immigrants and transnationals in the Lower Rio Grande Valley where poverty is the 'training ground' for people's resilience and capacity to adapt to different social and economic settings. At the heart of their ability to survive and succeed is their ability to form a strong personal and ethnic identity that allows them to accommodate new life styles without losing their self-respect. Trueba shows how the resilience and diverse cultural experiences of transnationals and immigrants enable them to succeed in school and in their work and communities....

American society is changing in front of our eyes with the presence of new Americans, immigrants and transnationals, whose experiences have prepared them to play key leadership roles in our country. The paradox of having the poorest of the new Americans rising to important social, economic, and academic roles is explained in these pages.