Youth experiences of schooling in Paris and Porto Alegre: research reflections in urban peripheries

Abstract

The article seeks to draw contrasts between the schooling experiences of young people from popular classes, taking as delimitation the peripheral situation of interlocutors in the regions of La Courneuve, north of Paris, France, and Cruzeiro, south of Porto Alegre/RS, Brazil. It is inspired by contributions from the sociology of social trials and takes as references Anne Barrère's categorizations of the trials specifically faced at school. In the field, it worked with document analysis, observation and comprehensive interviews, in dialogue with young people in two public educational establishments. The results indicate common experiences of the trials of ‘constructing meanings for scholar knowledge and work’, ‘injunction for autonomy’ and ‘individual performances in scholar assessments’. However, differences can be observed regarding the place of schooling in individual itineraries, in a tense but strategic condition in the French case, and in a relative position alongside the imperative of independence in the Brazilian case.