The complexities of reading capital in two Puerto Rican families

Compton-Lilly, Catherine. (2007). The complexities of reading capital in two Puerto Rican families. Reading Research Quarterly, 42(1),72-97.

Here we have three stories: two case studies of Puerto Rican-American women and the kindergarten children under their care as they strove to complete GED/certified nursing assistant programs while living in a low-income community in the urban northeast U.S., and the story of a white, middle-class former elementary teacher-turned researcher who had an unusually difficult childhood and who seems to have a deep commitment to working in the community where the two case studies are situated.

The stories related here are engaging, and often heartrending. The central construct, that of “capital” in all its many forms, is key here. Compton-Lilly maintains that the kinds of capital valued in official contexts (e.g., “economic capital”) often differ from the kinds of local capital valued by “non-mainstream” families (in these case studies, “social capital”). Thus, the strengths of these families are undervalued in official contexts such as school or the workplace. Compton-Lilly presents two contrasting cases that underscore how seeming possession of officially valued characteristics can trump actual skills and strengths in literacy.