DISCUSSION, DEBATE, AND FRIENDSHIP PROCESSES - PEER DISCOURSE IN UNITED-STATES AND ITALIAN NURSERY SCHOOLS

This article examines children's everyday discourse processes in three early education settings (an Italian scuola materna, a Head Start Pro gram, and a private nursery school in the United States) to document h ow friendship relations are produced in the everyday discursive practi ces within the children's peer cultures and how these productions refl ect discourse processes in the more general school cultures and the lo cal communities in which the schools are located. Overall, the analysi s demonstrates the importance of viewing friendship as a collective an d cultural process. In this view, culture is not simply a force or var iable that affects how children come to be or have friends. Rather, fr iendship processes are seen as being deeply embedded in children's col lective, interpretive reproduction of their culture.