:
"This excellent ethnography...raises issues deserving serious consideration for all interested in the meaning of empowerment and success of minority children."
–MultiCultural Review
"Many of Valdés’s descriptions are rich and compelling, contributing insights as only ethnographic work can do."
–Contemporary Sociology
This book presents a study of ten Mexican immigrant families, describing how such families go about the business of surviving and learning to succeed in a new world. Guadalupe Valdés examines what appears to be a disinterest in education by Mexican parents and shows, through extensive quotations from interview data, that these struggling families are both rich and strong in family values and bring with them clear views of what constitutes success and failure. The study’s conclusion questions the merit of typical family intervention programs designed to promote school success and suggests that these interventions–because they do not genuinely respect the values of diverse families–may have long-term negative consequences for children.
Contents: Introduction: Between Two Worlds • School Failure: Explanations and Interventions • The Setting and the Families • Coming Across • The Ten Women • Surviving in a New World • Raising Children • The School Context • Education and Life Chances
