Table of Contents

1. Introduction; Part I. Urban Classroom Discourse: 2. Talk in class at Central High; 3. Popular culture in the classroom; Part II. Performances of Deutsch: 4. Deutsch in improvised performance; 5. Ritual in the instruction and inversion of German; Part III. The Stylization of Social Class: 6. Language and class I: theoretical orientations; 7. Language and class II: empirical preliminaries; 8. Schooling, class and stylization; 9. Classed subjectives in interaction; Part IV. Methodological Reflections: 10. Reflections on generalization, theory and knowledge construction.

Promotional Information

Provides a sociolinguistic account of classroom interaction, based on research in an inner-city high school.

About the Author

Ben Rampton is Professor of Applied and Sociolinguistics at Kings College London.

Reviews

From the hardback review: 'It is difficult to do justice to this book in one review. It is complex, lucidly written ... a major contribution to the field and deserves to be cited as a key text by researchers in cultural studies, sociology, linguistics and education for many years to come.' British Journal of Sociology of Education From the hardback review: '...a beautifully realised work of mature scholarship and highly readable ... One could hand the book to a student and say, without much exaggeration, 'Read this, and then follow up the sources, and you will be a fully formed sociolinguist' ... It is a spectacular book.' The Journal of Sociolinguistics From the hardback review: '... leads to extremely important insights into leaky boundaries between schools and the wider socio-cultural world, capable of challenging many established assumptions about language in education ...' Language Learning Journal From the hardback review: 'Rampton pays critical homage to both Dell Hymes and John Gumperz ... Combining interactional analysis with capacious theoretical argument, Language in Late Modernity exemplifies the best of their tradition of ethnography sociolinguistics ...' Journal of Anthropological Research From the hardback review: 'In light of the fact that Rampton is fully successful in maintaining this delicate balancing act between the Scylla of constructivism and the Charybdis of essentialism, this is a book that should be required reading for all sociolinguists of whatever ilk.' Belgian Journal of English Language and Literature