 | Verbal Deficit: A Critique Subjects: Behavioral Sciences; Education; Language & Literature; History of Education; Sociology of Education; Psychological Science; Curriculum Studies; Language & Linguistics; Social Psychology; English & Literacy/ Language Arts; Language and Communication; Psycholinguistics; Sociolinguistics; Linguistics; Originally published in 1981. Verbal deficit theories try to account for differential educational attainments in linguistic terms, suggesting that children reach varying levels of success in school as a result of their ability or inability to express themselves, and relate this to social class. This critique considers such theories, especially in the form propounded by Bernstein, primarily from a sociolinguistic viewpoint but with special attention to the historical and educational context behind the theories. It claims that verbal deficit theories are not only unscientific and non-linguistic, but are educationally damaging as well, and proposes instead a linguistic 'difference' theory. |
