Education depends crucially on language: knowledge and skills are taught through a process of linguistic exchange. But how much of the language used by teachers and professors is actually understood by students? To what extent does the social background of students affect their capacity to understand the language used in the classroom or the lecture hall? Why do students and teachers overestimate the success of the educational process and underestimate the degree of misunderstanding involved?

In this important work Pierre Bourdieu and his associates explore these and other questions through a careful study of the role of language and linguistic misunderstanding in the teaching contexts of higher education.