by Charis Boutieri (Author)
Learning in Morocco offers a rare look inside public education in the Middle East. While policymakers see a crisis in education based on demographics and financing, Moroccan high school students point to the effects of a highly politicized Arabization policy that has never been implemented coherently. In recent years, national policies to promote the use of Arabic have come into conflict with the demands of a neoliberal job market in which competence in French is still a prerequisite for advancement. Based on long-term research inside and outside classrooms, Charis Boutieri describes how students and teachers work within, or try to circumvent, the system, whose contradictory demands ultimately lead to disengagement and, on occasion, to students taking to the streets in protest.
Format: Illustrated
Pages: 292
Edition: Illustrated
Publisher: Indiana University Press
Published: 25 Apr 2016
ISBN 10: 0253020492
ISBN 13: 9780253020499
This sophisticated book provides an elegant and useful analysis of the situation of teaching and learning in Moroccan schools. The book explores the numerous strategies used by students to surmount difficulties and to increase their chances of success. It reveals the remarkable influence of linguistic conflicts and the role they play in students' integration, participation, and achievement.
* American Anthropologist *Charis Boutieri is Lecturer in the Social Anthropology of the Middle East at King's College London.