Paulle

Anxiety and Intimidation in the Bronx and the Bijlmer; An Ethnographic Comparison of two schools

What is it actually like to spend a good deal of one's waking hours in schools of the truly disadvantaged in Amsterdam and New York? What are the mechanisms and meanings that govern the practices of people in the bowels of urban education systems on opposite sides of the Atlantic? Between 1996 and 2002 Bowen Paulle had the unique opportunity to work as a teacher in and as an ethnographer in and around, two deeply troubled schools in the Bronx and the Bijlmer. This ethnographic account provides new material for fresh ways of thinking about 'inner-city' schools in the U.S. and 'black' schools in the Netherlands. Paulle concludes that, by transforming the ritual practices and hidden curricula presently remolding the second natures of adolescents such as those examinded in t his book, we can save money of our most vulnerable youth.