Contemporary Issue of Whether Social Class Determines Child's Success - Assignment Example

Analysis of a Contemporary Issue: Social Determines Childs Success Social es get formed by people who have same rankings of the three Ps namely “power, privilege, and prestige”. Class system decides the rank of people impacting their lives in different areas including their political thoughts, sexual inclinations, religious associations, eating habits and life expectancy (Newman 136). The topic area is one of the topmost contemporary issues. Selecting this topic for discussion and analysis is perfectly justified because it impacts the social set up and future of a country. Children are the future of a society and country on whose shoulders is the responsibility of leading the country to a better tomorrow. The significance of the issue of social class is very relevant not only for the interest of the child whose success is determined by the social class a child belongs to but for the overall well being of the society and the country. It is very crucial to analyse this topic and find out how this issue is affecting the children during their schooling and later in life (Newman 136). Success in examination is decided by a child’s social class. This fact has been acknowledged by Holley (qtd. in The Independent), the chief executive of the Training and Development Agency, stating, "The performance of a school and a child in it is highly linked to social class”. Holley has rightly pointed towards the negative role played by social class in deciding the performance of a child in school; this interference of the class in the career development of a child has been there even before the Second World War. So one cannot blame the stakeholders of education industry but analysis of this crucial issue can certainly help in taking measures so that the role of class in the success of school going children could be minimised. Education opportunities in a comparatively open society are decided by the social class of the parents. Children of wealthy parents are brought up in better environments than children’s of not-so-wealthy parents. They enjoy all privileges of life like good schools, opportunities to travel and inculcate hobbies as they possess financial capacities to entertain them (Newman137). If parental income is low, there are more chances of a child living with the risk of single parent, unemployed parents, living with more than one disability and leaving the school without in-between. It is not simply a case issue of parents’ affording capacities of providing luxuries of life that impact the society and determine the success of a child from materialistic perspective. Parents’ social class also impacts the values to be inculcated and developed among children as nourished through the social ranking system. Significant factor is the connection between social class and socialisation. Sociologist Melwin L Kohn has found that middle class couples nurture different values in their children than working class couples having at the minimum one child in the fifth grade. Values encouraged and promoted by middle class couples in their children included self-direction, independence and curiosity as found after interviewing 200 middle class couples. Another study has found that middle class parents nourish and promote talent in their children through organised recreational activities and experiences enhancing the power of logical reasoning. This feature has been particularly dominant in middle class mothers (Newman137). On the contrary, working class parents are more prone than middle class parents to inculcate values for adherence to outside authority, a common feature of the blue-collared jobs their children would be doing. Their basic accomplishment is providing a clean environment to their children and adherence to rules. Although there could be other influential factors to social class that parents consider important in the upbringing of their children but commonly but these influences of middle class and working class parents have been predominant throughout irrespective of the sex of the child or the structure of the family, as observed by Kohn (Newman137). Newman (137) has made observation on mixed race women belonging to middle class which meant that they took keen interest in the education of their children than the same section of women from the working class. Although belonging to different cultural backgrounds, social class plays a major role in socialisation of children in European societies like Poland and Germany and Asian societies like Japan and Taiwan. Any changes in the social class of parents affect socialization of their children. In the case of job loss of one of the parents their behaviour becomes irritating with the children; their stress level affects their behaviour by becoming demanding in disciplining their children. They are more prone to react harshly and involve in physical punishment if their children don’t perform well. It affects the performance of such children from working class parents (Newman137). Approach of middle class parents and working class parents depicts difference in social class which determines differently the success rate of their children regarding future aims. Working class parents relate the final business and career success of their children with their abilities to confirm to and adapt to the environment. On the contrary, the middle class parents think that success of their children in career and occupations depends on their leadership traits. Children of middle class parents are less prone to believe in the role of fate. They believe more in their capabilities than on sheer luck or not having luck. They are mentally stronger than the children of working class parents (Newman137). Race and Ethnicity Parents are not the sole deciding factor for the behaviour, interests and capabilities of children belonging to different classes of society. Race and ethnicity also put their influence on the behaviour of children. One such incident when an unarmed West African immigrant was killed by four white police officers, white and non-white children reacted to the incident differently. Their faith in the police was shattered that the policemen are always there to help people. Some of the mixed race students shared the fact that they were guided by the community on how to interact with a white policeman to avoid harassment. Different associations of coloured people have issued such instructions on community platforms regarding taking precautions while interacting with policemen who have become rogues. Such incidents of police brutality on coloured people show the impact of race and ethnicity on socialisation (Newman138). Children belonging to white race are rather less conscious of identifying themselves with their race than managing the privileges that are attached to their race and their behaviour with other members of the white society. The school environment and the religious institutions spread the message to white children by making such remarks, “you can be anything you want as long as you work hard”. The same does not happen with children of ethno- racial societies; their social environment is quite uneasy (qtd. in Hughes & Chen). These children live two different lives at the same time, one with their own community and the other with the “mainstream” society. The socialisation experiences of these children differ as they grow up. They gain knowledge of the traditions of mainstream culture, their own culture and minority ranking in society and the experience based on the history and cultural heritage of their ethno-racial group (Newman138). It is observed that parents stress on a specific kind of orientation. Those who have overcome discrimination and reached at higher social rankings simply impress upon the values cherished by their culture of origin only. There are other social classes of children whose parents provide such feedback and guidance that prepares children for partiality, ethnic hatred and maltreatment to be ignored or not included in discussion on their group platforms. Children belonging to minority classes might get crucial feedback that hard work alone cannot help in advancing forward in society. Such a feedback is given by wealthy parents to their children as well although living in racially integrated societies reaffirming that racial issues whenever emerge prepare the children to adjust and behave likewise as guided. Such guidance is not provided to majority race for the social environment does not require them to adjust (Newman138). Gender Another aspect of social class is gender, which needs to be differentiated from the term ‘sex’. Sex generally specifies a person’s biological maleness and femaleness. Gender specifies behaviour, which could be masculine or feminine thus having a social aspect. This differentiation is must to specify the varied behavioural differences between the sexes (Newman139). The gender based social class starts from the time of the birth of a child as the medical staff announces the gender of the child, launching the child on the career path at once. The colour of the blanket the boy in most hospitals is wrapped in is blue and that of the girl is pink. From hence onwards the career paths for both the sexes take different routes. As the children grow, they get signals from the surrounding environment particularly schools reinforcing gender based aspirations besides impacting the children to form self-concepts (Newman139). Parents generally reply in negative when asked the question whether they differentiate between their male and female children but reality is always different than what is said. Parents of female children below 24 years describe them using certain gender typical adjectives like “soft,” “tiny,” “fine-featured,” and “delicate.” For sons typical adjectives used are “strong,” “alert,” “hardy” and “coordinated”. Change with the times has been noticed in the behaviour of parents but still their behaviour pattern remains affected because of gender related associations (Newman139). Parents, however advanced, still take care that their child looks culturally suitable in appearance. Girl babies not having hair on their bald head are tied pink ribbons on their heads for easy identification that the child is a girl. Such traditions differ from country to country of using a symbol to differentiate a girl child from a boy child (Newman139). Such social class differentiation also determines the success of the child as certain career paths are taken as reserved for boys and some for the girls. Going a step further we find that gender determines social class of female children in the toys they play; there are different toys for male children and female children. Toys play a great socialisation part in tutoring children about the current cultural notions of gender. During the time of the 1950s, technological progress was much appreciated. Therefore, erector-sets and chemistry-sets were popular purchases for boys to become engineers and doctors but for girl children popular choices were dollhouses and baby dolls teaching girls of becoming good home makers when the time approaches (Newman142). The current social environment presents the same scenario. Whenever we take a cursory view of the advertisements on the television, toy shelves and online website show cases, we notice a dividing line of toys based on the gender; girls’ toys depict the theme of domesticity, fashion and motherhood stressing on creativity, upbringing and body appeal. On the other hand, the toys that are manufactured for boys stress on adventure, action, exploration, competition and aggression. Such gender based toys promote social classes where girl children have different social skills and qualities than boys, thus differentiating the designs of social progress and career paths of boys and girls (Newman142). Take the example of video games where female characters are shown in bare minimum clothes to the extent of provoking their male counterparts for arousing sexual feelings through their voluptuous looks. There is a gender message in such videos impacting the behaviour of boys towards girls and women and their notions of suitable male behaviour (Newman143). It is not that efforts have not been made to bridge the dividing line between toys for boys and girls. Toy manufacturers have made half-hearted attempts to delete the difference of gender, certain toy manufacturing companies have attempted to sell action figure girls but have become the victim of traditional stereo-typing. Actually, business interests are predominant in any industry. That’s why no attempt has been made whole-heartedly to blur the dividing line between gender based products. Success of a child whether a baby boy or girl, therefore, rightly depends on the social class a child belongs too. If a child belongs to affluent family and parents, opportunities are not hard nuts to crack. If a child belongs to white parentage, only hard work will pay and if the child is a male his upbringing creates gender bias with the girl child (Newman143). The big social set up decides what we become. Wealthy male white children get special treatment as they belong to a privileged class having power and prestige gained through the social class they belong to. In stead of inculcating values based on a particular social class parents, ethical considerations and cultural roots need to change with the time to create a barrier free society. We are failing in creating such a society because we don’t want to widen the compass of our viewpoints. We are not open to change the society as a whole. Values that need to be followed should be universal in appeal, not divided on the basis of affluence and poverty, colour and gender. Individuality becomes more prominent when it comes to identifying right values. Considerations for our own ethnicity based on our own social class, gender and race carries greater influence on our mind. The role of societal influences should be limited only by just providing information on “how we become what we are,” (Newman 156) and not let them play the role of a social class determining the success of a child. Works Cited Garner, Richard. “Social Class Determines Childs Success.” The Independent. 18 September 2008. Web. 5 November 2010. (http://www.independent.co.uk/news/education/education-news/social-class-determines-childs-success-934240.html). Newman, David M. Chapter 5: Building Identity Socialization. Exploring the Architecture of Everyday Life. Pine Forge Press, 2009. 137-156. 5 November 2010. (http://books.google.co.in). Hughes, D. & Chen, L. When and what parents tell children about race; an examination of race-related socialization among African-American families. Applied Development Science, 1997, 1, 200-214. 9 November 2010. (http://steinhardt.nyu.edu/scmsAdmin/uploads/002/719/When%20and%20what%20parents%20tell%20children%20about%20race.pdf). Read More