In the interview quoted above, Rodas, a 10-year-old girl whose family came from Turkey to seek refuge in the UK, talked to the researcher about the durability of her friendship with another Turkish girl. They have been friends for four years now and this friendship is marked by reciprocity in helping each other to cope in a new culture. Rodas expresses her and her mother's wariness about the possible clash of values in this new culture (‘just in case of trouble’) and indicates that she and her friend have experienced difficulties in school associated with cultural norms. These themes of durability, reciprocity, norms and values are the subject of the case study discussed in this chapter.

Introduction

Throughout this chapter we are using the term ‘refugee’ to apply to those children who have arrived in Britain, with or without their families, seeking refuge under the terms of the 1951 United Nations Convention on Refugees. This does not differentiate between those whose families have been granted refugee status and those who are still awaiting a Home Office decision regarding their case. Stead et al (1999) also adopted this terminology in their investigation of the education of refugee pupils in Scotland, and for simplicity, we adopt the same strategy.