Glenn, Charles L. with Ester J. de Jong. (1996) Educating Immigrant Children: Schools and Language Minorities in Twelve Nations. Reviewed by Leslie J. Limage

Glenn, Charles L. with Ester J. de Jong. (1996) Educating Immigrant Children: Schools and Language Minorities in Twelve Nations. New York : Garland Publishing, Inc. 741 + xii pp. ISBN 0-8153-1469-8 Reviewed by Leslie J. Limage Paris , France June 10, 1998 This volume on the education of immigrant children in Western Europe, the United States, Canada and Australia has taken up the challenge of providing as many viewpoints as possible in country and cultural context on the thorniest of educational issues. The term "immigrant children" in the title is in some ways misleading. The authors of this volume in no way reduce their subject matter to simplistic etiquettes or transnational definitions without context-based meaning. Indeed, the authors resolutely provide an historical, political, sociological and, then, educational context for the discussion of how the countries in question have responded to linguistic and cultural diversity in their midst. Educating Immigrant Children: Schools and Language Minorities in Twelve Nations is certainly the most comprehensive review of its topic available in English at this time. The volume is comprehensive in ways most of the vast literature on immigrants and their educational experience in Europe, North America or Australia has not attempted. The literature of international organizations (including OECD, UNESCO, Council of Europe cited often by the authors) has inevitably met with the self-imposed censorship of intergovernmental bodies. They do not conduct independent research as they are under the scrutiny of their member countries/governments. Scholarly and activist literature generally take rather firm positions and leave the multiple perspectives on issues of respect for diversity aside. This is to be expected and inherent in the genre. Also, much of the literature is composed of "country" or "immigrant group" case studies. Comparison on thematic issues while maintaining the complexity of internal differences of view within countries is extremely rare. According to the authors, the study "employs a comparative perspective, showing how similarities and differences among the policies of different countries and among the experiences of different language minority groups illuminate the policy choices "...with respect to education provision. But the study does more than that. It examines on a thematic basis the controversies surrounding the presence of culturally and linguistically diverse populations of different generations in highly-advanced industrial democracies and dwells on those controversies to show that there are no simple answers to be transposed without caution across national boundaries. The book is divided into sections: the policy context; minority groups and their languages; program models and conclusions. The reader is provided with a comprehensive and extremely timely review of internal debate on what is meant by participation in society at different times in the same country and common themes for reflection for the future. The authors are particularly adept at presenting alternate and conflicting views on the nature of participation in the societies studied and demands for different sorts of recognition of diversity, integration, assimilation. As a reviewer, I am particularly impressed with the handling of Western European migrant/minority issues and France especially. The authors have successfully placed the discussion of first, second and third generation immigrants in the complex current context of rising unemployment, increased xenophobia, racism and anti-semitism, and fear of outright violence (be it through terrorist attacks by so-called fundamentalist islamic groups growing out of the conflict in Algeria and other Arab or Muslim countries or through the rise of extremist groups of youths from disadvantaged minority suburbs and inner cities). While delving into changing attitudes of "countries of origin" and "host countries" towards immigrant populations, the authors have focused on the great difficulty education systems in Europe have had in providing any meaningful response to the larger problems of contemporary society. At the French end of the spectrum, two important concepts frame the equality of opportunity debate: "laicité" or secularism and the historic separation of religion from schooling. Equality means the same education for all. While the German continuous overt hostility to the integration of immigrant workers and their families , the euphemistically-called "guest workers" or Gastarbeiter results in the same inability to acknowledge diversity within the educational system albeit not in the name of "equality of opportunity." The discussion inevitably focuses on debates around languages of instruction and the role of bilingual and multilingual education. Once again, the authors successfully present a full range of perspectives on these issues in each of the countries studied. There is no attempt to gloss over internal conflict to provide a "national" position on unresolved and ongoing issues. And for that tension to be maintained in a volume over 700 pages in length requires skill, sensitivity and the best of comparative scholarly efforts. The book is strongly recommended for courses on immigration and education, social foundations of education, bilingual and multicultural education and comparative education. It is also a valuable contribution to a very large international literature on education and minority/migrant issues for its consistent presentation of complex issues in all their complexity. About the Reviewer Dr. Leslie J. Limage has research interests in literacy and basic education policies and practices, immigrant and minority education, labor market prospects; gender issues in education. Professional background as staff member of Education Sector of UNESCO, consultant to OECD-CERI on immigrant and minority education and labor market issues; teacher in the United Kingdom, France and the United States. An American graduate of the University of California, Santa Barbara, University of Paris, University of London Institute of Education in Comparative Education, Sociology of Education. Economics of Education. Resides for the past twenty years Dr. Limage in France.