Reading Interventionist Research in Two Urban Elementary Schools Through a Discursive Lens

In this study, I reframe the debate on minority parents and their children's educators by moving beyond concerns around student academic achievement and toward the quality of relationships among adult stakeholders. Using an interpretive lens based on Foucault's notion of discourse, I examine three research vignettes drawn from an interventionist research project in two urban elementary schools. This examination identifies and responds to interpersonal, inter-institutional, and inter-epistemological dysfunctions. I make a concluding case for the transformative potential in the interplay of discourses: When inequalities and exclusions are redressed in the research, the project realizes a discursive and ethical possibility.