Solitary Reapers: Reading Cultural Interjections in a London School

This essay explores the problematic nature of an enforced monolingual culture promoted by the current Conservative-led UK government. It comments upon the paradoxical nature of the 2014 curriculum that promotes heritage texts and ‘proper’ English, when such poets embraced a Bakhtinian tolerance of languages. It focuses primarily upon the social relationships fostered with a Year 10 class by a new teacher within the English department in North London school. It questions the rejection of the Bullock Report and explores the importance of culture and linguistic interjections in pupils’ negotiation of meaning in and outside the classroom.