A aquisição de capital cultural e linguístico: quatro casos particulares do (im)provável

Abstract

Four (im)probable cases of acquisition of linguistic capital and cultural capital are analysed in this master dissertation. The informants were chosen with two characteristics: they were from families with low cultural capital and they revealed evidence of a confident relation with the language. For Bourdieu, social origin represents the main factor in the production of linguistic ability: through a precocious familiarization, the members of the privileged levels are capable of adjusting perfectly and naturally to the most diverse linguistic situations. Other authors, however, while they emphasize the importance of social origin, add other factors, equally basic, beyond inheritec cultural capital, for the acquisition of the cultural capital. To understand the factors around which the informants carry through the acquisition of a linguistic capital, their statements, and those of their families, their teachers and of other people in their proximity, the processes and those of their families were analyzed. The processes were initially considered individually; later a more inclusive analysis was attempted, by matching the four familiar patterns. The conclusion was reached that one cannot attribute the acquisition of linguistic capital to a single factor. One seeks, then, an understanding of the interdependence of factors that combine with each of the investigated cases to compose a single pattern. Amongst the factors that, while interdependent in form, intervene in the process of acquisition of linguistic capital are: mobilization and family ethics, mobilization of the pupil, the achievement of successful schooling and the desire for distinction.