Intercultural discourses and assimilationist practices: some contradictions in the spanish educational system

This article analyzes the degree of coherence amongst the legal, theoretical and formal speech about diversity management and the reality of the pedagogical practices in formal educational institutions. To that end is addressed a theoretical review of the different educational laws, the speeches of the teaching staff and educational practices from previous researches. The main result points to the existence of some contradictions: the concept of cultural assimilation at the same time that it is despised, both in educational legislation and in explicit and conscious teaching staff speech, ends up being the one adopted in most of the educational practices. This finding leads to some conclusions regarding the need to rethink and redefine the concept of cultural assimilation from the perspective of equality and a critical conception of ethnicity and identity.