Bourdieus Social Reproductive Theory and Working Class in Education - Research Paper Example

Running Head: BOURDIEU’S SOCIAL REPRODUCTIVE THEORY Bourdieu’s Social Reproductive Theory and Working in Education s Name] [Course Title] [Date of Submission] Bourdieu’s Social Reproductive Theory and Working Class in Education Introduction Upward mobility for the working class is limited by both material and cultural structures in western society. While politicians and pundits alike trumpet the frustrations of the middle class, little attention is paid to working class and poverty class issues. Mahony and Zmroczek (1997: 2-3) in ‘Class Matters’ also found that the public educational system they experienced was dominated by a middle class culture. Working class culture was covertly taught to be valueless. As a result, many contributors found that any attempt to bring up social class in the academy was quickly silenced. While the number of working and poverty class persons who hold a college degree is low, the subset of those that have attained a Ph.D. is undoubtedly far less. Certainly the working class scarcity of representation within academia is part of the reason for so little information about this subject. So few working or poverty class students reach this level, it would seem a prime population to study given the notion of a fair and meritocratic system. A lack of understanding exists, however, in examining the lives of working class students as they attempt to bridge the gap between their material and cultural background and the world of academe, in which the middle class dominate both physically and culturally. Social Reproduction Theory Often referred to as social reproduction theory, Bourdieu and those utilising the Bourdieusian frame offer a valuable theoretical base for understanding the lives of the working class and poverty class. Bourdieus economic metaphors enable us to see how culture is relational to the economic. He developed a political economy that includes cultural practices in an understanding of power. Bourdieu outlines four types of capital: economic, cultural, social, and symbolic. As with all capital, the more you possess, the easier it is to generate more. As Swartz (1996, p. 78) explains, "these [capitals] are not tidy, well-delimited theoretical arguments but orienting themes that overlap and interpenetrate." The base for these capitals is explicitly understood to be material within a Bourdieusian paradigm. One is born into a familial environment that places the individual somewhere on a proverbial starting line in a highly competitive race for resources. However, given that not all persons begin at the same starting line, the competition is rigged from the onset. Family income, wealth, and anticipated inheritance or capital gains form the basis for how a person enters the endurance race for resources. Some with family resources start on the fifty-yard line, while others who are not on the private dole will amass around the crowded starting line. Field Bourdieu uses the heuristic devices of field, habitus, and capitals in order to explore how classes become both materially and culturally dominated. While both neoliberalism and meritocracy adhere to the myth of individualisation and equal chances, Bourdieu explicitly challenges these notions and insists that humans are products of our material history, in that we begin as agents with the accumulations of capitals from our lineage. The class that dominates in each field may vary, but the rules for that field will almost always benefit the dominant. Additionally, conflicts for scarce and valuable positions of authority and prestige between classes are rare, partly because such distinction is obtained by being spatially distant from groups lower on the social hierarchy (Savage et al. 2004: 95). Fields are structured spaces that are therefore often homogeneously occupied by people "endowed with the habitus that implies knowledge and recognition of the imminent laws of the field, the stakes and so on" (Bourdieu 1993:72). Those few who enter the field with different habitus will in all likelihood encounter conflict with the homogeneous inhabitants of that field. Habitus Habitus are the naturalised feelings thoughts, tastes, reactions, and bodily postures as well as mental structures through which agents apprehend and express their place within the social world (Lawler, 2004: 110-111) and which directly impacts ones experiences in the field. Additionally,"…habitus produces practices and representations that are available for classification, which are objectively differentiated: however, they are immediately perceived as such only by those agents who possess the code, the classificatory schemes necessary to understand their social meaning" (Bourdieu 1989: 19). Bourdieu suggests that members of the same social class acquire a similar objective- looking, commonsense way of being (a structure within the larger structures), which coordinates automatic, taken-for-granted practices. Group members share unwritten and unacknowledged codes. This helps to delineate difference and legitimacy. For example, the group with the power to institutionalise their habitus in a particular context (i.e., field) defines which group has the wrong codes. Furthermore, social class informs members about who is and is not a member, and a sense of ones place in the world. For Bourdieu, this sense of ones place is also a product of the internalisation of an agents position within the structural system. Therefore, within a hierarchical structural system, habitus also implies a sense of the place of others. "There exists, within the social world … objective structures independent of the consciousness and the will of agents, which are capable of guiding and constraining their practices or their representations" (Bourdieu 1989: 15). Bourdieu goes on to suggest that unequal material conditions are at the base of social separation, but at the same time, "…social classes, are to be made. They are not given in social reality" (p. 18). The structures, therefore, cannot be maintained without active boundary maintenance of individuals between each class. Since it is logical to assume that most people do not actively seek downward mobility, the boundary maintenance from above holds significant importance. The activity of making social classes, however, is accomplished on an invisible or subconscious level a great deal of the time. Indeed, people do not have to have class-consciousness in order to act on behalf of their class. In fact, mass consciousness of the social construction of class would be a rare and historically specific condition. Cultural Capital Members of the working and poverty class are restricted in both informational attainments regarding the rules of the game and influence within the field in which that game is played. Because cross class ties are exceptions rather than the norm (Lin, 2000: 793), members of lower classes are further restricted in their access to information regarding success in a field. Again, it must be noted that the project of self-making and the accumulation of cultural capital can be misread as an act of rational choice, where individuals freely accumulate as much capital as they can within the natural limits of their innate capacity. This view, however, foists the responsibility and blame for under-education and under-employment onto the individual, allowing the capitalist social structure to remain hidden. As Bourdieu (1977: 177) stresses, academic credentials can be traced back to economic roots even when they give "every appearance of disinterestedness by departing from the logic of interested calculation and playing for stakes that are non-material and not easily quantified" (p. 177). The differences in the initial material capital continue to separate the classes socially. The separations however, tend to be perceived as inherent and legitimate differences in the quality and the nature of the classes natural distinction. Peoples attention is too easily turned away from the material realities of society. To obtain a certificate of cultural competence (i.e. an academic degree), students must typically access family cultural capital. Therefore, "cultural capital is alternatively an informal academic standard, a class attribute, a basis for social selection, and a resource for power which is salient as an indicator/basis of class position" (Lamont and Lareau 1988: 156). Cultural capital can operate on a local level, but within the level of the field, it is also "institutionalised as legitimate and valuable at the societal level" (Mohr and DiMaggio 1995:168). This perceived and recognised legitimacy is the key to social power. Normalising and valuing a particular cultural capital over others is the key to establishing ones middle class self as a legitimate candidate for certification (Skeggs 1997: 124). Without contra-distinction of otherness imposed upon the working and poverty class and a judgment of that otherness as lacking, Lawler explains that the middle class would not be able to draw their normalised, desirable worth (2004: 112). Having the right type of capitals is seen as having worth. Having the wrong kind not only attributes valueless ness to the other, it creates moral grounds for boundary maintenance. As a result, the act of regulating those who slip through the barriers and enter the field, is not itself problemitised, but seen as a needed measure to ensure the integrity of the field. For if large numbers of people could access the field and begin to establish a rival capital in order to secure themselves in a field, struggles for legitimacy could occur. This conflict would most likely lead to a " ... transformation or modification of the field itself..." (Devine and Savage 2004: 13). For now, the working and poverty classes do not enjoy critical mass or strong networks of cross class solidarity. With weak social power on their own, they must try to be accepted into the social networks dominated by the middle class in order to gain knowledge of hidden rules and resources. Social Capital Social capital is the aggregate of the actual or potential resources that are linked to a durable network of more or less institutionalised relationships of mutual acquaintance. Social capital can provide valuable information, offer intellectual and emotional support, and access to networks of influence (Bourdieu 1986: 241). Therefore class distinctions can lead to different types and qualities of network relations. This in turn assists in creating more capital because, "embeddedness in resource rich social networks increases the likelihood of receiving useful information, in the routine exchanges and without actively seeking such information" (Lin 2000:792). However, the advantages of social capital are routinely denied. It is common for people who benefit from social capital to attribute their attainments to their hard work and talent alone. Bourdieu has noted that this denial of social capital is especially important within the field of education where the ideology of meritocracy assists in "preventing apprehension of power relations as power relations" (Bourdieu 1977: 15). Symbolic Capital When the dominant groups economic privilege is converted into cultural capital and social capital, it can be further realised as symbolic capital. Bourdieu explains that symbolic capital"…is known through the categories of perception that it imposes, symbolic relations of power tend to reproduce and to reinforce the power relations that constitute the structure of social space" (1989:21). Symbolic capital establishes the right to be listened to and taken seriously. It also allows for the suppression of voices in which the holder deems unworthy. Single holders of symbolic capital (or holders working in concert) are in the position to deny social distance and are capable of objectifying others and manipulating their images. Therefore symbolic capital is also a power to establish worth. Those deemed of little worth can be subjected to negative sanctioning or denied aid and attention at will by those who possess symbolic capital. Bourdieu names this as "symbolic violence"; it can be more effective than physical violence because the violence it imposes is deemed legitimate and "gives the illusion of consensus" (Bourdieu and Passeron 1977: 5). Just as the state is the holder of legitimate physical violence, the social group that holds a monopoly of the field holds the monopoly over the use of symbolic violence. Conclusion There is a lack of discourse about social class in the academy. This may lead to the assumption that class inequality in therefore not a major problem. Bourdieu reproduction theory can help researchers to situate an understanding of class within education. Bourdieu and other social reproduction theorists allow for an examination of class within a structural context and allow us to examine how the sociocultural environment interacts with material conditions. As Skeggs explains, "So this is not about a shift from economics to culture, but how culture is being deployed as an economic resource in the contemporary and how this shapes our understanding of class" (2004: 47). This theoretical framework focuses on structures that create inequality, as opposed to the culture of poverty paradigm, which assumes working class culture is deviant and in need of change. A Bourdieusian frame is focused on unmasking the misrecognitions of power; the aim is to make visible the often-unrecognised mechanisms that maintain inequality by directing our attention on the important hidden and intrinsic rules of our social world. Work Cited Bourdieu 1989. Social Space and Symbolic Power. Sociological Theory 7(1):14-25. Bourdieu, Pierre and Jean-Claude Passeron. 1977. Reproduction in Education, Society and Culture. Translated by R. Nice. London, UK: Sage Publications. Bourdieu, Pierre. 1977. Outline of a Theory of Practice. Cambridge: Polity Press. Bourdieu, Pierre. 1986. The Forms of Capital. Pp. 241-256 in Handbook of Theory and Research for the Sociology of Education, edited by J. Richardson. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press. Bourdieu, Pierre.1993. Sociology in Question. Translated by R. Nice. London: Sage. Devine, Fiona and Savage, Mike. 2004. The Cultural Turn, Sociology and Class Analysis. Pp. 1-23 in Rethinking Class: Culture, Identities and Lifestyles, edited by F. Devine, M. Savage, J. Scott, and R. Crompton. Houndmills; New York: Palgrave Macmillan. Grimes, Michael D. and Joan M. Morris. 1997. Caught in the Middle: Contradictions in the Lives of Sociologists from Working Class Backgrounds. Westport, CT: Praeger Publishers. Lamont, Michele and Annette Lareau. 1988. Cultural Capital: Allusions, Gaps and Glissandos in Recent Theoretical Developments. Sociological Theory 6(1): 153-168. Lawler, Steph. 2004. Rules of Engagement: Habitus, Power and Resistance. Pp. 110­-128 in Feminism After Bourdieu, edited by L. Adkins and B. Skeggs. Oxford: Lin, Nan. 2000. Inequality in Social Capital. Contemporary Sociology 29(1): 785-795. Mahony, Pat and Christine Zmroczek. 1997. Class Matters: Working-Class Womens Perspectives on Social Class. London: Taylor & Francis Ltd. Mohr, John and Paul DiMaggio. 1995. The Intergenerational Transmission of Cultural Capital. Research in social Stratification and Mobility 14(1):167-200. Savage, Mike, Gaynor Bagnall, and Brian Longhurst. 2004. Local Habitus and Working-Class Culture. Pp. 95-122 in Rethinking Class: Culture, Identities and Lifestyles, edited by F. Devine, M. Savage, J. Scott, and R. Crompton. Houndmills; New York: Palgrave Macmillan. Skeggs, Beverley 2004. The Re-Branding of Class: Propertising Culture. Pp. 46-68 in Rethinking Class: Culture, Identities and Lifestyles, edited by F. Devine, M. Savage, J. Scott, and R. Crompton. Houndmills; New York: Palgrave Macmillan. Skeggs, Beverley. 1997. Classifying Practices: Representations, Capitals and Recognitions. Pp. 123-139 in Class Matters: Working-Class Womens Perspectives on Social Class, edited by P. Mahony and C. Zmroczek. London: Taylor & Francis. Swartz, D. 1996. Bridging the Study of Culture and Religion: Pierre Bourdieus Political Economy of Symbolic Power. Sociology of Religion 57(1):71-86. Read More