Reports on a ethnographic study that investigated how immigrant high school students used Cantonese and English to achieve academic and social success in a Canadian high school where English was the language of instruction. Argues that immigrant students found meaningful ways to acquire the cultural capital of the dominant society. (CAJ)

An ethnographic case study involves a Canadian-born, Chinese Canadian high school student and her art teacher in a Toronto high school receiving many immigrants from Hong Kong. The student's prize-winning art work is analyzed as a pedagogical project that promoted positive development of self-identities, challenged anti-immigrant attitudes, and…