"Troublemakers in search for belonging" : newly arrived pupils in a Oslo school

Abstract

The thesis is about immigrant pupils in Sogn School in Oslo, where my aim was to discover different form of belonging. The school’s role when it comes to integration, varied for the different actors, both in terms of establishing social relations, and in terms of acquiring knowledge. My general finding is that young immigrants establish social relations to other young immigrants. For most of the pupils I got to know well, I was their only native Norwegian friend. Still, the different immigrant pupils generated groups and social relations based on different criteria as language, age, school ambition, gender, interests and nationality. I ended up following two groups of troublemakers in class. The first group, The Serbs, was made up of two boys: Javor (20) from Serbia and Dimitiar (20) from Serbia. The second group was made up of Sifaw (18) from Morocco, Andre (18) from Portugal, Bernard (16) from Poland and Diana (17) from Lithuania. I looked what into what troublemaking meant for group belonging and identity negotiation. The Serbs had established group belonging based on their Serbian identity and language, but also a shared feeling of being marginalized. They felt too old and too qualified to be in the class. The troublemaking behavior was generated in the school context, and has to be understood in terms of their marginalized position. Even though The Serbs seemed to be a strong group that had developed a close relationship, their relationship was not relevant outside school. The Ping-Pongers were the only group in class that was part of a social field that included social arenas outside school. They negotiated shared identities by making sure they would all participate in the same activities. They were part of a social field where they had the opportunities and the places to be together on a daily basis, where meanings were attached to their relationship in an ongoing process. The actors in the group participated in troublemaking with different meanings and motivations. They were perceived of as lacking “social competence”. But Sifaw did not lack social competence; he lacked the required skills to take part in the learning activities. Sifaw participated in the only activity in class were he could make use of his skills and get recognition from his friends. Andre and Diana were not lacking the required skills to take part in the learning activities, but they did not feel they were in a normal school, and did not take it serious. Bernard felt excluded from the Norwegian society and did not want to be in a school were he had to learn Norwegian language and culture.