Delpit

Delpit disagrees with Gee; Gee claims it is difficult if not impossible for someone born into a non dominant discourse to transfer into a dominant one. I agree with Delpit, that this mind set causes predetermination. If you think your students will fail and treat them as so then it isn't possible for them to succeed. I believe that Gee was incorrect. It isn't as difficult to transfer between discourses as he portrays.
Delpit gives plenty of example of how minorities have over come and transferred into a dominant discourse. Rodriquez is another example of someone who has transferred into a dominant discourse. I believe that for some it is difficult but it is not impossible to transfer from one discourse to another.
I believe in a way I have too. I was not born into a upper-middle class white suburban family. I may be white, but my family definitely struggled. As a young kid, my dad was a factory worker and part time druggie/drug dealer. My mother was constantly in out of different factory jobs. My dad quit doing drugs when I was between 5 and 8. My parents never went to college and barely made more than minimum wage. When my parents got divorced is when financial troubles really hit. I moved in with my dad. We struggled for years before he decided to just sell the house. My senior year of high school we moved in with his boyfriend. By the time they moved to Florida this past year, my dad was barely making a dollar more than I do at Walmart.
My mother on the other hand is on SSI and housing and food stamps. She lives in the "ghetto" and struggles month to month.
So I don't come from a dominant discourse. I come from a lower-middle class boarder line poor family. My parents never went to college, didn't even consider it for themselves. I have aunts and uncles who have transferred into dominant discourses but my parents did not. I come from a divorced family and gay parent, not exactly a suburban white kid. Now I am in between transferring to a dominant discourse. I work and go to school so I do not repeat the cycle of poverty in my family. I know I am smart, and I am lucky I did not go to a school where my teachers held me back from my potential. They didn't just see a poor little white girl.