Ways with Words: Language, Life and Work in Communities and Classrooms

Shirley Brice Heath's Ways with Words is an ethnographic study of two greatly differing groups, both racially and economically, in the South-Eastern United States during the 1970s, and the difficulties created for teachers, due to language and learning differences, when they come together in the school system. These are, respectively, the black textile-working community of `Trackton', and the white business-owning townspeople of `Roadville'. The language usage of the Trackton children often causes problems later on in the townspeople's schools. Aside from the difficulty they have with such concepts as time-space scheduling and the function of certain toys for certain purposes, due to their different learning strategies at home, class assignments can become a hindered task. First of all, language barriers exist between the teachers of Roadville and the black students from Trackton. Often times their word usage does not parallel and misunderstandings become regularity, such as the Trackton usage of the word "ain't" for "didn't" and the teacher's misunderstanding of it as "doesn't". This explains the instance of confusion in a conversation between a teacher and young Lem: "A teacher asked one day: `where is Susan? Isn't she here today?' Lem answered: "She ain't ride de bus.' The teacher responded: `She doesn't ride the bus, Lem.' Lem answered: `She do be ridin' de bus.' The teacher frowned at Lem and turned away" (Heath 276). Such miscommunications were commonplace between these two groups. Trackton children would also have trouble following what to the teacher were simple directions. For example, Trackton children made a distinction between putting toys "away" and putting them "where they belonged" (Heath 280). Teachers would become frustrated when they asked the prior and found toys scattered in places where they "didn't belong," however, if the latter was asked, the task was completed properly. Also, Trackton's differing notion of truth played a large role in the frustrations. When it was time for story telling, the Trackton children excelled at fanciful tales. However, when asked to give a truthful account, they still embellished with lies, for "inside the classroom, their language play, incorporation of commercial characters, and many of their themes" that are actually valued in their culture "are unacceptable. The close personal network which gives Trackton stories their context and their meaning at home has no counterpart in the school" (Heath 297). Unfortunately, the teachers initially misjudged these differences between the townspeople, including the teachers, and the Trackton children. But soon many teachers began to find an effective means of teaching the children and advancing their skills by using the terms and rules of the Trackton children themselves. They began to realize that the Trackton children were interpreting things such as workbook activities not in the wrong way, necessarily, but in a different way cont

Shirley Brice Heath's Ways with Words is an immersing ethnography of communication, detailing the language socialization practices of two working-class Piedmont South Carolina communities, Roadville and Trackton, and the effects of these practices on their children's success in school. The peculiar characteristics of these two communities lend themselves particularly well to Heath's presentation of them as gestalts: both are small, geographically limited and centralized, and community members spend most of their non-working time there. Heath's thorough ethnographic description allows her to critique the oversimplifications of other studies of education; in doing so, however, she overcompensates by neglecting issues of class. The greatest contribution that Ways with Words makes to the larger field of linguistic anthropology is its tacit focus on iconicity, which strongly suggests that the emphasis on indexicality to the exclusion of iconicity in contemporary linguistic anthropology is seriously counterproductive. Language Socialization in Roadville and Trackton The white working-class families of Roadville have had connections to local textile mills for four generations, their relatives having come from the Appalachian Mountains to work (28) . The black working-class families of Trackton, on the other hand, have only been working in the mills for the two decades since the advent of desegregation (29). Desegregation has had an effect on more than just work: in the 1970s, black and white children started attending the same schools with both black and white teachers, leading to major difficulties for educators Roadville and Trackton are alike in many ways: both are somewhat isolated working-class communities, neither of which occupy more than a single block, within a larger town. Life of community members, excepting work, school, and church, centers on their respective communities. Although not everybody of working age works in the local textile mills, all families have some members who do. Moreover, both communities are positively oriented toward school, believing it critical for future success beyond the mills. Despite these similarities, children in the two communities are socialized into language quite differently. In Roadville, babies are spoken to as potential conversational partners from the moment of birth (118). Their actions are assumed to be intentional and meaning-laden, and their utterances taken to be referential (120-2). As they grow older, children are told the labels for things, and adults expect to hear this appropriate label recited upon request (127). Roadville adults value this kind of `right' knowledge that can be memorized and routinely repeated precisely as told. Trackton stands in sharp contrast; here, babies are not seen as potential interactional partners. They are spoken about rather than to (74-5). They are nevertheless surrounded at all times by multiple ongoing communications, as community life is centered on an op

As a graduate student in English, I am not one who wanted to take any courses on rhetoric and composition. I signed up for one class this semester that focused on literacy and race. This book was a required reading. I was actually one of the only students who liked this book. Heath immerses herself in the communities of Trackton and Roadville. As an instructor of some of the local teachers, she decided to look into the literacy learning of these two communities. Trackton, an all black community, consists of people reading to learn. In Roadville, the all-white community is struggling with desegregation and parents wanting their children to learn the "right" things. The study of the Piedmont Carolinas--the area where the two communities are located--is important because it specifies that culture has everything to do with the way language and literacy is learned. I give it four stars because in the course of a ten year study, it did not seem as if she gathered a lot of research. She seemed to focus only on their lifestyles.

Language is power. Heath, a reflective practitioner of both human nature and schooling, provides an in-depth view of communities which epitomize the struggle for such power. In her ethnographic study of Trackton and Roadville, Heath lays bare the socializing process of children through words. The discontinuity between home and school is disturbing; a realization that students who do not fit the traditional way of schooling are left behind. Clearly illustrated is the need for teachers and students to bridge the gap which exists in relation to both language and culture, for without this effort some students will never acquire the power needed to take control of their education or pursue opportunities from which they have previously been excluded. This is must reading for student ethnographers, doctoral students, and those dedicated to school reform, particularly those in the areas of diversity in public schools, and language. This extraordinary book compares favorably to "Growing Up Literate: Learning From Inner-City Families" by Denny Taylor & Catherine Dorsey-Gaines.