Narrative and self

Marine and Taahira&s;s narratives demonstrated a solid understanding of the place of Otherness in their respective schools and the ways in which norms and expectations varied across school spaces. Whilst Taahira and Marine&s;s narratives demonstrated a nuanced understanding of different norms and expectations around Otherness, the narratives of two other girls Clara, in the French school, and Saalima, in the English school, revealed ambivalence and uncertainty around Otherness in school. As such, their narratives alternated between attachment and distancing, whether it was a rejection of the country they lived in or of the country their family came from. The narratives of Kenny and Anna presented similarities with each other in the ways they negotiated Otherness and tended to distance themselves from the dominant culture of each country. Kenny and Anna&s;s narrative, through their logic of distancing, allowed them to reinvent forms of belonging to an elsewhere, which allowed them to overcome their more peripheral position in the classroom.