Joan DeJaeghere, "Constructing the Limits and Possibilities of Equality: Analyzing discourse and practices of gendered relations, ethnic traditions, and poverty among non-majority ethnic girls in Vietnam"

Dr. DeJaeghere is Assistant Professor of Comparative and International Development Education at the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities. Her paper examines discourses and practices at individual, community and institutional levels that construct meanings and experiences of poverty, ethnic tradition and gender relations of non-majority Vietnamese ethnic girls and their access to and participation in secondary school. This critical ethnographic study utilizes Sen's framework of capabilities to critically analyze differences in discourse and practice of poverty, and gendered relations and ethnic traditions as they affect girls' choices and well-being in and through education. Dr. DeJaeghere particularly draws on girls' and their parents' constructions of these issues as they negotiate them. She argues for strategies that address poverty and gender must also consider the inequalities and lack of capabilities that exist for non-majority ethnic groups in societies, and move beyond the discourse that ethnic traditions and gendered relations are primary barriers to girls' education. Dr. DeJaeghere's visit has been arranged by Dr. Christine Min Wotipka, Assistant Professor of Education and (by courtesy) Sociology, Stanford, and is sponsored by Social Sciences, Policy, and Educational Practice Area, Stanford School of Education, the Program in Feminist Studies, and the East Asian Studies Theme House.