“Good schooling” in a race, gender, and class perspective: The reproduction of inequality at a former Model C school in South Africa

2020 ◽  
Vol 2020 (264) ◽  
pp. 25-47
Author(s):  
Amy Hiss ◽  
Amiena Peck
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Middle Class ◽  
Cultural Capital ◽  
Social Reproduction ◽  
Code Of Conduct ◽  
Black Female ◽  
White Female ◽  
White Middle Class ◽  
Model C ◽  
Reproduction Of Inequality

AbstractAfter the first democratic elections in 1994 in South Africa, many Model C schools were opened for Black, Coloured and Indian learners. Model C schools that used to cater solely for White female learners had now entered the democratic period, and while the Cape Town Model C school in our study swiftly became populated with Black middle-class female learners, little was known of other transformations on the ground. In 2016, a protest by Black female learners quickly found favour on Twitter. They claimed that differentiated racialised treatment was directed at them and enshrined in the school’s Code of Conduct (COC). In order to investigate these claims, we employ an intersectional discourse analysis to investigate the 2015 COC prior to the protest, as well as the post-protest 2017 COC. Drawing on theories of social reproduction, cultural capital, symbolic violence and habitus, we endeavour to show how Black learners’ embodied capital and lack of cultural capital ensured their inability to be accommodated at the school. We investigate the outcomes of the COC in terms of empowerment, as measured by equitable school access, and the reproduction of inequality, indicated by the implementation of “school rules” directed at Black female learners whilst maintaining the status of the dominant (White) group of middle-class students. We conclude that analysis of the COC reveals an attempt at cultivating a particular White middle-class womanhood through the guise of “good schooling”.

scholarly journals A Phenomenological Study of White Female First-, Second-, and Third-Year Teachers in Title I Schools

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Ashley Tiedemann
Keyword(s):  
Middle Class ◽  
Cultural Capital ◽  
Title I ◽  
Title I Schools ◽  
White Female ◽  
First Year ◽  
Female Teachers ◽  
White Middle Class ◽  
Second Year ◽  
White Female Teachers

The purpose of this study was to examine first-year experiences by interviewing second and third-year White female teachers at the beginning of their second or third year teaching, who work in Title I, K-5 schools. The overarching goal in this study was to: (a) identify similarities and differences in first and second-year teacher experiences; and, (b) identify the struggles teachers face inside and outside of the classroom. To achieve the goal of this study, the researcher used a qualitative phenomenological method. Data from this study was viewed with critical race theory, intersectionality, and cultural capital lenses. These lenses were used to identify cultural gaps, and socioeconomic differences between White, middle-class, female teachers and their students in Title I schools. Participants were white, female teachers in their second and third year of teaching at Title I, K-5 schools. Each participant was interviewed between December and March of their second or third year of teaching; therefore, each participant had worked through their entire first year of teaching at a Title I school. Each participant shared their experiences of their first and second year. White middle-class teachers were selected due to the possible differences in cultural capital and socioeconomic level between teachers and students. Additionally, White females represent 80% of teachers in the United States (Tale & Goldring, 2017). Participants at Title I schools are in more need of supports from their peers, mentors, and administration; however, most participants did not receive these supports. Due to the elevated needs of students at low-income schools, new teachers struggled to meet their needs and understand their cultural capital along with their own White privilege.

Decently transgressing: expressions of female heterosexuality and the discourses of (hetero)sexual pleasure in South Africa

Sexualities ◽  
2021 ◽  
pp. 136346072110374
Author(s):  
Letitia Smuts
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Middle Class ◽  
South African ◽  
Sexual Pleasure ◽  
Sexual Agency ◽  
South African Context ◽  
The South ◽  
Heterosexual Women ◽  
White Middle Class ◽  
African Context

This article explores sexual agency and pleasure among heterosexual women in South Africa. By focussing on Tupperware-style sex-toy parties, this article offers a glimpse into a ‘hidden’ world of white, middle-class women living in Johannesburg. What is revealed in this ethnographic account is that these gatherings promise women new ways of enjoying sex, while remaining within the boundaries of heteronormative notions of (hetero)sex. I use the term ‘decently transgressing’ to capture the ways in which the women in this study make sense of their (hetero)sexual selves and how they negotiate their (hetero)sexual agencies, particularly in relation to past and present heteronormative discourses within the South African context. The findings show that there are tensions between women wanting to embrace their own sexual agency and desires, yet at the same time being limited by certain heteronormative norms.

“I Need Help!” Social Class and Children’s Help-Seeking in Elementary School

2011 ◽  
Vol 76 (6) ◽  
pp. 862-882 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jessica McCrory Calarco
Keyword(s):  
Elementary School ◽  
Social Class ◽  
Middle Class ◽  
Working Class ◽  
Cultural Capital ◽  
Social Reproduction ◽  
Help Seeking ◽  
Ethnographic Study ◽  
Unequal Opportunities ◽  
Do So

What role do children play in education and stratification? Are they merely passive recipients of unequal opportunities that schools and parents create for them? Or do they actively shape their own opportunities? Through a longitudinal, ethnographic study of one socioeconomically diverse, public elementary school, I show that children’s social-class backgrounds affect when and how they seek help in the classroom. Compared to their working-class peers, middle-class children request more help from teachers and do so using different strategies. Rather than wait for assistance, they call out or approach teachers directly, even interrupting to make requests. In doing so, middle-class children receive more help from teachers, spend less time waiting, and are better able to complete assignments. By demonstrating these skills and strategies, middle-class children create their own advantages and contribute to inequalities in the classroom. These findings have implications for theories of cultural capital, stratification, and social reproduction.

1 “The circle in which you move”

2021 ◽  
pp. 19-34
Author(s):  
Candace Bailey
Keyword(s):  
Social Class ◽  
Middle Class ◽  
Cultural Capital ◽  
Women Of Color ◽  
Wide Spectrum ◽  
Social Diversity ◽  
Enslaved Women ◽  
White Middle Class ◽  
Musical Practices

The use of music as a sign of prestige extended across a wide spectrum, from enslaved women of color to the white daughters of affluent planters, and Part 1 reveals this social diversity by demonstrating how women employed binder’s volumes, etiquette guides, and other signs of cultural capital in the parlor to position themselves within a particular social class. Although it includes the historical actors who confirm currently-held views about social class and music in this period (the white middle-class), it juxtaposes these with examples across race and occupationally-defined status (barbers, farmers, mechanics, and planters) to bring to the fore a fuller view of women’s musical practices.

scholarly journals More Private Schools for Nonnative Students? Migrant Performance in Private Schools of Differing National Contexts

2011 ◽  
Vol 2011 ◽  
pp. 1-19 ◽  
Author(s):  
Monika Jungbauer-Gans ◽  
Christiane Gross
Keyword(s):  
Public Schools ◽  
Cultural Capital ◽  
Private Schools ◽  
Social Reproduction ◽  
Independent Schools ◽  
Migrant Children ◽  
Migrant Students ◽  
Private Government ◽  
Pisa 2006 ◽  
Reproduction Of Inequality

Migrant children from most countries are disadvantaged in school. We investigate which characteristics of both school and societal contexts influence the achievements of migrant students. We argue that living conditions and inequality in a society as a whole may affect the chances of minority members and the function that private schools perform in the process of social reproduction of inequality. We investigate in particular the question of whether migrant students attending private schools show a better performance than those attending public schools. The analyses of the paper are based on the data collected in the PISA 2006 survey. Our main results are that the lower mathematics and reading competencies of migrant students can partly be explained by the socioeconomic status and cultural capital of the family and—to a marginal degree—by school characteristics. Initially, students in private independent schools have some advantages that disappear after controlling for country attributes. In both fields of knowledge, migrants obtain better results in private government-dependent schools (interaction effect); this, however, can be traced back to their families' socioeconomic origin and cultural capital. We detect that students in private independent schools reach lower competency levels in wealthier societies (GNP).

Reading ‘Race’ in Bourdieu? Examining Black Cultural Capital Among Black Caribbean Youth in South London

Sociology ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 51 (5) ◽  
pp. 907-923 ◽  
Author(s):  
Derron Wallace
Keyword(s):  
Young People ◽  
Middle Class ◽  
Cultural Capital ◽  
Race And Ethnicity ◽  
Black Middle Class ◽  
Working Classes ◽  
White Middle Class ◽  
Black Caribbean ◽  
Class Privilege ◽  
Depth Interviews

This article extends Bourdieu’s notion of cultural capital in relation to ‘race’ and ethnicity by exploring the significance of black cultural capital among middle class black Caribbean young people in a large state school in south London. Black cultural capital is here defined as the appropriation of middle class values by black ethnics. Based on a 14-month-long ethnography, with specific attention to three focus group and 13 in-depth interviews with middle class black Caribbean young people, this piece outlines the benefits of and backlash to black cultural capital that students encounter from white middle class teachers for deploying black middle class tastes and styles in the classroom. The findings suggest that while black middle class pupils draw on black cultural capital to access advantages in formal school settings, they are also invested in challenging the terms of class privilege that marginalise the black working classes.

The Hidden Curriculum of College Athletic Recruitment

2018 ◽  
Vol 88 (3) ◽  
pp. 355-377 ◽  
Author(s):  
KIRSTEN HEXTRUM
Keyword(s):  
Middle Class ◽  
Social Reproduction ◽  
Data Center ◽  
National Collegiate Athletic Association ◽  
Hidden Curriculum ◽  
Athletic Participation ◽  
Division I ◽  
White Middle Class ◽  
Division I Athletes ◽  
Athletic Recruiting

In this article, Kirsten Hextrum considers institutional avenues that limit upward mobility opportunities by revealing a hidden curriculum of athletic recruiting that favors students from privileged backgrounds. The study's data center on forty-seven life history interviews with National Collegiate Athletic Association Division I athletes from an athletically and academically prestigious university. Hextrum's findings reveal three phases of a hidden curriculum—socialization, covert selection, and overt selection—that secure greater access to elite colleges for White middle-class communities via athletic participation. In this case, social reproduction required active effort by both representatives of higher education and representatives of White middle-class communities to protect existing class and race relations.

Planning ‘Suburban Bliss’ in Joe Slovo Park, Cape Town

Africa ◽  
2002 ◽  
Vol 72 (4) ◽  
pp. 511-548 ◽  
Author(s):  
Steven Robins
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Middle Class ◽  
Working Class ◽  
Low Income ◽  
Social Economic ◽  
Cape Town ◽  
Housing Development ◽  
Policy Makers ◽  
White Middle Class ◽  
The Everyday

AbstractJoe Slovo Park, a housing development in a white middle-class suburb of Cape Town, was designed to replace the shack settlement of Marconi Beam with an orderly working-class suburb. This article focuses on the vicissitudes of post-apartheid housing development schemes, and raises troubling questions about the failure of planners, policy makers and developers to take into account the complexities of the everyday lives they sought to transform. Had they done so they might have anticipated the ‘re-informalisation’ of the newly formalised suburb. The article explores the disjunctures between the planners' model of ‘suburban bliss’ and the reality. The messy, improvised character of low-income housing development in South Africa is contrasted with their Utopian and technocratic vision. This is not to deny that dreams embodied in blueprints may often be shared by the intended ‘beneficiaries’, only that for a variety of social, economic and cultural reasons poor communities are generally unable to realise such ideal visions of modern urban living.

UKRAINIAN UNIVERSITY STUDENTS IN CANADA: CULTURAL CAPITAL AND EDUCATIONAL EXPERIENCES

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Max Antony-Newman
Keyword(s):  
Qualitative Research ◽  
University Students ◽  
Cultural Capital ◽  
Social Inequality ◽  
Extracurricular Activities ◽  
Social Reproduction ◽  
Educational Experiences ◽  
Pierre Bourdieu ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Print Access

This qualitative research involving semi-structured interviews with Ukrainian university students in Canada helps to understand their educational experience using the concept of cultural capital put forward by Pierre Bourdieu. It was found that Ukrainian students possess high levels of cultural capital, which provides them with advantage in Canada. Specific patterns of social inequality and state-sponsored obstacles to social reproduction lead to particular ways of acquiring cultural capital in Ukraine represented by a more equitable approach to the availability of print, access to extracurricular activities, and popularity of enriched curriculum. Further research on cultural capital in post-socialist countries is also discussed.

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