Situated action, double dialogicality and the sociogenesis of categorizing in institutional practices: Diversity in schooling from vicious children to neuropsychiatric diagnoses

The background of this article is an interest in institutional communication. The context in which this has been studied concerns how diversity (in social background, ethnicity, school success etc.) is, and has been, interpreted in schooling, historically as well as in contemporary society. Through history, a range of categories allegedly accounting for school failure has been suggested, and the categories invoked reflect the position of schooling as a meso-structure in society. The categories adopted in public discourse and politics, and reproduced in media, create identities, and serve as arbiters of opportunity for children. It is argued that the dialogical perspective outlined by Linell, and focusing the contingencies between macro-, meso- and micro-structures in social interaction, represents an important step in defining an empirical strategy for analysing the interrelationships between situated action, situation-transcending practices and the sociogenesis of categorizing practices. •Identifies categories used over the past 150 years to classify children who have difficulties in adapting to schooling.•Categories used reflect cultural assumptions of children's abilities and problems often imported from the vernacular.•The long tradition of converting school problems to problems within the individual child continues, albeit with new categories.•Categorizing is a moral practice. Categories, when enacted have consequences for children's access to learning opportunities.