DOI•
Learning to Labour: How Working Class Kids Get Working Class Jobs
01 Dec 2011-Iss: 32, pp 5-8
About: The article was published on 2011-12-01 and is currently open access. It has received 1252 citations till now. The article focuses on the topics: Working class.
Citations
More filters
Dissertation•
01 Sep 2012
TL;DR: In this paper, a two-stage, mixed methods approach was undertaken, with males ranging from ages 16-64 participating, and the final sample included 361 males, spanning various demographics.
Abstract: Background: Gendered inequalities have historically been legitimated through the discursive enforcement of ‘natural’ sexual difference. One particular fallacy that has denied females a political voice, is that white, Western, males are more ‘naturally’ equipped for rational thought or strive for emotional suppression. In starting from the premise that this is always the case however, critical approaches to masculinities underestimate how adherence to the discursive ideal of rationality is mediated through emotional experience.
Purpose: Using concepts of ‘habitus’ and ‘affect’ this thesis challenges the assumption that the perceived rejection of emotions, is firstly how masculinities are constructed. Secondly, because ‘individual’ emotions are a prerequisite to social action, it foregrounds the importance of a nuanced understanding of male emotional narratives explicitly through music. Culturally, music consumption is overtly concerned with ‘individual’ emotional experience and group interaction. Therefore male domination of music production and consumption, stands at odds with discourses of ‘rationality’, offering a means of understanding socially patterned, male emotional experience
Methods: A two-stage, mixed methods approach was undertaken, with males ranging from ages 16-64 participating. The first stage was an online survey and the final sample included 361 males, spanning various demographics. The second stage was a series of six, life-history case studies with participants selected from those who had completed the survey, based on the richness of data they provided and stratified by age.
Conclusions: Both survey and life-history accounts demonstrated a wealth of emotional experience. Whilst music was primarily used as a tool for emotional expression, it was also perceived to manage ‘undesirable’ emotions. Respondents’ emotional engagement with music differed over the course of their lives, in line with socially patterned expectations. This has implications for the notion of ‘learning to be affected’ through the construction of masculinities, indicating new ways of theorising about masculinities as social embodiment.
14 citations
Cites background from "Learning to Labour: How Working Cla..."
...The importance of homosociality for young males has been documented implicitly and explicitly in relation to both gender (Willis 1977; Thomson 1999; Medovoi 2005) and music (Cohen 1972b; Medovoi 1992; Straw 1997; Laughey 2006; Donze 2010)....
[...]
...Whether actively defending a notion of ‘maleness’ as intertwined with ‘masculinity’ (Bly 1990; Farrell 1993; Thomas 1993) or attempting to expose and therefore challenge the socially constructed nature of masculine privilege (Pleck 1981; Brittan 1989; Connell 1995; Petersen 1998; Hearn 2004), discussion in the area has largely been driven by questions arising from gender studies (Halberstam 1998; Butler 1998b; Edwards 2006) and a combination of educational (Willis 1977; Mac an Gháill 1994) and Marxist theory (Connell 1987; Hearn 1987)....
[...]
...Similarly as Straw (1997) argues specifically about record collecting, men frequently construct identities through such consumption practices, though other studies have also noted the importance of homosocial validation in terms of subcultural capital (Willis 1977; Hebdige 1979; Jefferson and Hall 1993; Thornton 1995)....
[...]
...Against the backdrop of economic recession, Willis’ (1977) work Learning to Labour emphasised that working class male cultures prioritised certain versions of masculinities, which are not conducive to educational participation....
[...]
...An almost direct causal link between symbolic violence (Bourdieu 1977; 1989; 2001) and physical violence is commonly assumed, however referring to men neglects the role of age in learning gendered practices from peer groups and direct experience of gender-reproducing institutions such as education (Willis 1977)....
[...]
Dissertation•
10 Aug 2016
TL;DR: In this article, a case study explores academics' beliefs about the purpose and shape of an ideal undergraduate higher education, and proposes a way forward to acknowledge trade-offs made, and to consider more deeply the impact of presage and process elements on academics, students and the undergraduate education aimed for.
Abstract: Exploring the proposition that in our consumer society, undergraduate students are now denied the opportunity to transform into critical thinking scholars, this case study explores academics’ beliefs about the purpose and shape of an ideal undergraduate higher education. Located in one English research-intensive university, research focuses on their perceptions of transformation as a concept, and how it is enabled or denied. Adopting a critical realist approach, the study responds to an absence of work on the effects of marketisation on curricula and pedagogy, and academics’ shifting identities in national policy and local practice.
Academics’ views link to tensions in a changing higher education system, where managerialisation and marketisation have been compounded by the emergence of a global knowledge economy, massification, a new digital age, and more recently, the global financial crisis and a conservative government. Within this, and setting the context for fourteen in-depth interviews, increasingly influential ‘students as consumers’ and ‘student experience’ discourses are explored through critical examination of national and institutional policy documents.
Using a presage-process-product (3P) model, the thesis links academics’ aspirations for an ideal undergraduate education which develops knowledge and intellectual approaches grounded within a discipline (product), to elements that ‘enable’ or ‘deny’ in curricula and pedagogy (process), and the wider institutional environment, such as academics’ roles, student numbers and quality processes (presage). Academics describe the ways in which they negotiate, subvert or overcome these elements. The study uses a suite of concepts including quality discourses, university psychosis, unregulated play, and models of knowledge, curriculum and pedagogy, to visualise tensions surfaced and disentangle the concept of transformation. In proposing a way forward, conclusions note the need for the university to overtly acknowledge trade-offs made, and to consider more deeply the impact of presage and process elements on academics, students, and the undergraduate education aimed for.
14 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors examined the learning outcomes of Physical Recreation (PR), motivation of students selecting PR, and the implications of training in this vocationally-oriented subject in terms of their learning and post-school options.
Abstract: Background: Vocational education in Australia and elsewhere has a history of being gendered and classed, thereby limiting the post-school options of students undertaking this form of study. Drawing on Foucauldian theory, the authors used Gore's eight techniques of power to examine the micro-functioning of power relations at two case sites. Purpose: The purpose of this study was to examine learning outcomes of Physical Recreation (PR), motivation of students selecting PR, and the implications of training in this vocationally-oriented subject in terms of their learning and post-school options. More specifically, we explored the following research questions: what motivated students to select PR; what were the learning outcomes for PR students and what did PR students perceive as their post-school options. Participants, setting and research design: Two schools (Seinfeld and Bedrock), each with different socio-economic and PR strand composition, were purposefully selected for the study. The PR Year 11 and 12 s...
14 citations
TL;DR: The authors argued that strong evaluation offers a new perspective within qualitative inquiry and emancipatory practice which may support agency and recovery in those affected by mental health issues, at the same time offering the potential for positive self-transformation to all those involved in research or practice.
Abstract: The right to ‘voice’ has been identified as central in enabling agency and in ensuring human dignity. This paper discusses an understanding of ‘voice’ which has been derived from Charles Taylor’s concept of ‘strong evaluation’. Voice, from this perspective, is found within an ongoing process of identity development which is based on a quest for an authentic sense of self embedded in a moral journey. It is argued here that strong evaluation offers a new perspective within qualitative inquiry and emancipatory practice which may support agency and recovery in those affected by mental health issues. At the same time, strong evaluation offers the potential for positive self-transformation to all those involved in research or practice – either as service users or as service providers/researchers. The paper addresses how strong evaluation may be enhanced and extended by sociological understandings. This is discussed in relation to a study on the changing discursive landscape in the field of mental health. Despite its primary focus on mental health, this paper is relevant to researchers working within a range of marginalized communities whose members lack epistemological authority.
14 citations
Cites methods from "Learning to Labour: How Working Cla..."
...This was illustrated, for example, in Willis’s (1977) seminal work, Learning to Labour, in which he demonstrates how in the 1970s working-class boys restricted their employment aspirations to unskilled manual work....
[...]
01 Jan 2013
TL;DR: The authors applied the lens of Critical Race Theory (CRT) as a means for understanding how Japanese as second language learners are racialized in Japanese public schools and the degree to which Japanese public middle school teachers support or interrupt these processes.
Abstract: The purpose of this study has been to apply the lens of Critical Race Theory (CRT) as a means for understanding how Japanese as second language (JSL) learners are racialized in Japanese public schools and the degree to which Japanese public middle school teachers support or interrupt these processes. The approach taken in this study was qualitative; data was collected between December 2008 and September 2009. The data includes an initial survey to middle school teachers, two semi-structured interviews with 16 middle schools teachers, participantobservations in JSL and other subject area classes at four schools— a total of twenty eight 50-minute classes, an observation notebook and reflective journal, and document analysis of official documents from schools, the central and local governments, and the Japanese Ministry of Education, and Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT). It was found that the JSL policies and curricula of the four schools observed varied: JSL students in two schools with similar JSL populations received strikingly different
14 citations
Cites background from "Learning to Labour: How Working Cla..."
...Some of the early studies pointed to resistance by students as well as collusion with teachers and administrators, but often ignored issues of gender (Willis, 1977; MacLeod, 1995)....
[...]
...administrators, but often ignored issues of gender (Willis, 1977; MacLeod, 1995)....
[...]
References
More filters
01 Jan 2010
TL;DR: The concept of community of practice was not born in the systems theory tradition as discussed by the authors, but it has its roots in attempts to develop accounts of the social nature of human learning inspired by anthropology and social theory.
Abstract: The concept of community of practice was not born in the systems theory tradition. It has its roots in attempts to develop accounts of the social nature of human learning inspired by anthropology and social theory (Lave, 1988; Bourdieu, 1977; Giddens, 1984; Foucault, 1980; Vygotsky, 1978). But the concept of community of practice is well aligned with the perspective of systems traditions. A community of practice itself can be viewed as a simple social system. And a complex social system can be viewed as constituted by interrelated communities of practice. In this essay I first explore the systemic nature of the concept at these two levels. Then I use this foundation to look at the applications of the concept, some of its main critiques, and its potential for developing a social discipline of learning.
1,082 citations
Book•
27 Jun 2011
TL;DR: In this article, the Flatlands of Oakland and the Youth Control Complex are discussed. But the focus is on the role of black youth in the criminal justice system and community institutions.
Abstract: Preface Acknowledgments Part I Hypercriminalization 1 Dreams Deferred: The Patterns of Punishment in Oakland 2 The Flatlands of Oakland and the Youth Control Complex 3 The Labeling Hype: Coming of Age in the Era of Mass Incarceration 4 The Coupling of Criminal Justice and Community Institutions Part II Consequences 5 "Dummy Smart": Misrecognition, Acting Out, and "Going Dumb" 6 Proving Manhood: Masculinity as a Rehabilitative Tool 7 Guilty by Association: Acting White or Acting Lawful? Conclusion: Toward a Youth Support Complex Appendix: Beyond Jungle-Book Tropes Notes References Index About the Author
909 citations
TL;DR: The authors examines the transition to adulthood among 1.5-generation undocumented Latino young adults and finds that for them, the transition from K to adulthood involves exiting the legally protected status of K to...
Abstract: This article examines the transition to adulthood among 1.5-generation undocumented Latino young adults. For them, the transition to adulthood involves exiting the legally protected status of K to ...
663 citations
TL;DR: In this article, student engagement research, policy, and practice must become more nuanced and less formulaic, and the ensuing review is structured accordingly, guided in part by social-ecological analysis and social-cultural theory.
Abstract: Student engagement research, policy, and practice are even more important in today’s race-to-the top policy environment. With a priority goal of postsecondary completion with advanced competence, today’s students must be engaged longer and more deeply. This need is especially salient for students attending schools located in segregated, high-poverty neighborhoods and isolated rural communities. Here, engagement research, policy, and practice must become more nuanced and less formulaic, and the ensuing review is structured accordingly. Guided in part by social-ecological analysis and social-cultural theory, engagement is conceptualized as a dynamic system of social and psychological constructs as well as a synergistic process. This conceptualization invites researchers, policymakers, and school-community leaders to develop improvement models that provide a more expansive, engagement-focused reach into students’ family, peer, and neighborhood ecologies.
528 citations
TL;DR: The Longitudinal Immigrant Student Adaptation Study (LISA) as discussed by the authors used a mixed-methods approach, combining longitudinal, interdisciplinary, qualitative, and quantitative approaches to document adaptation patterns of 407 recently arrived immigrant youth from Central America, China, the Dominican Republic, Haiti, and Mexico over the course of five years.
Abstract: Background/Context: Newcomer immigrant students are entering schools in the United States in unprecedented numbers. As they enter new school contexts, they face a number of challenges in their adjustment. Previous literature suggested that relationships in school play a particularly crucial role in promoting socially competent behavior in the classroom and in fostering academic engagement and school performance. Purpose: The aim of this study was to examine the role of school-based relationships in engagement and achievement in a population of newcomer immigrant students. Research Design: The Longitudinal Immigrant Student Adaptation Study (LISA) used a mixed-methods approach, combining longitudinal, interdisciplinary, qualitative, and quantitative approaches to document adaptation patterns of 407 recently arrived immigrant youth from Central America, China, the Dominican Republic, Haiti, and Mexico over the course of five years. Based on data from the last year of the study, we examine how the role of relationships mediates newcomers’ challenges with academic engagement and performance. We identify factors that account for patterns of academic engagement and achievement, including country of origin, gender, maternal education, English language proficiency, and school-based relationships. Findings: Multiple regression analyses suggest that supportive school-based relationships strongly contribute to both the academic engagement and the school performance of the par
356 citations