Elina Lahelma

Bio: Elina Lahelma is an academic researcher from University of Helsinki. The author has contributed to research in topics: Vocational education & Agency (sociology). The author has an hindex of 27, co-authored 86 publications receiving 2217 citations. Previous affiliations of Elina Lahelma include Academy of Finland & University of Lapland.

Making spaces : citizenship and difference in schools

Abstract: Acknowledgements Introduction: Do You Wanna Dance Individual Citizens Space and Place for Markets: New Right and the Restructuring of Education Curricula for Nations Invitation to the Dance: Exploring Everyday Life in Schools One Two Three, One Two Three: The Official School Stepping Here, Stepping There: The Informal School 'Strictly Ballroom': The Physical School and Space 'Twist and Shout': Bodies in the Physical School Who Are The Wallflowers? Appendix: Methods in Use Notes Bibliography Index

Lack of male teachers: a problem for students or teachers?

Abstract: This article explores young people's perspectives on males and females as teachers, contrasting these with teachers' perceptions. It builds on 90 interviews of school students aged 13-14 and 60 follow-up interviews 4 years later. The first interviews were conducted in ethnographic context in two secondary schools in the mid-1990s in Helsinki, Finland. Whilst lack of male teachers is a recurrent theme in educational discussion, widely agreed among teachers, gender did not appear to be relevant when young persons talked about teachers. They appreciate teachers, irrespective of gender, who can teach and are friendly and relaxed, but who nevertheless keep order and make sure that students work. Male teachers who teach popular, non-academic subjects were often favoured by boys, but so were female teachers of academic subjects and increasingly as time went on. The interviews suggest that students do not need male teachers to act as ‘male models’. They also suggest that male teachers should be sensitive...

School is for Meeting Friends: Secondary school as lived and remembered

Abstract: The present article discusses young people's manifold and ambivalent feelings towards school as an institution, and towards their own school in particular. The questions are explored using different kinds of data: associations and metaphors that students provided on 'school', their reflections on an ideal school and their own school, as well as memories of secondary school a few years later. It draws on an ethnographic research in secondary schools and on a longitudinal life-history study in which the transitions of the same young people to post-16 education are traced. The empirical conclusions concerning students' perceptions on school are presented with four interlikned themes: students' lack of autonomy, the importance of informal relations, the importance of space and time in school, and the complexities of gender patterns. The article also raises a methodological question on nostalgia in memories - especially in ethnographers' memories.

Gendered Conflicts in Secondary School: Fun or enactment of power?

Abstract: This article discusses relationships and conflicts between girls and boys during the secondary school years, trying to reflect on the fine line between playing which is 'just fun' and behaviour that is experienced as harassing. The method used is to examine the parallel patterns of different kinds of data: classroom observations in secondary schools, ethnographic interviews of students at the age of 13-14, and school memories of the same young people at the age of 17-19. These varied data reveal diverse interpretations to gendered interactions. The article suggests that sex-based harassment acts as a form of social control that constitutes a way of maintaining and policing gender boundaries and hierarchies. 'Whole school policy' is needed to counteract it. The article draws from an ethnographic research study in two secondary schools and its follow-up, conducted together with Tuula Gordon.

The Production of Space

Abstract: ‘The Production of Space’, in: Frans Jacobi, Imagine, Space Poetry, Copenhagen, 1996, unpaginated.

Business Research Methods

Abstract: written last as this must include a flavour of results, don’t repeat phrases from the main text. If we don’t get the reader’s interest in the short abstract, they are unlikely to read the rest of the report. Introduction, must immediately grab the reader’s attention, often by a dramatic statement of the problem or situation to be researched. Background, usually starts with a broad picture and gradually refines it to the narrow focus of the research (a filter) Literature review, see the earlier chapter on this subject Research objective and method justification, most of this book has been about this section, but it must not appear as a stand-alone section. Every section including this one should follow logically from the previous one and lead naturally to the next. So, for example, the literature review section should end with a direction for the primary research, which is then picked up in the research method section. Findings, try to offer the findings of your research in as pure a form as possible. This doesn’t mean giving raw data, it means finding a way to present that data so the characteristics of the data are clear to the reader, without interpreting the data, so that the reader is dependent on your view and cannot see the data for themselves. Visual methods such as charts and tables can summarise and present data effectively, but not pages and pages of them which soon cause overload. Discussion and analysis, this is the real test of your ability to synthesise what you found in the literature review and in your primary research and to pull out from that synthesis what seem to you to be the most important points. It is not a place to put any description. Writing should be clear but intense – all sentences must add value. Presenting research reports