CRPP - Conference Papers

This paper analyzes the relationship between ethnic group, language use and social class in Singapore in light of implications for performance in the national school system. Using a Bourdieusian theoretical framework we argue that though Singapore equitably distributes the linguistic capital of English through its bilingual language in education policy, children from low income homes are disadvantaged. For the Chinese and Malay ethnic groups there is a correlation between dominant home language and social class though this is not the case for the Indians. Correspondence analysis shows that SES is correlated to English test scores. Multilevel analysis shows that SES is related to aspects of linguistic capital like language choice in reading, watching TV, choosing types of friends and learning about religion. Data for these claims come from The Sociolinguistic Survey of Singapore 2006 (SSS 2006).