Bourdieu on the Inequality of Education and Cultural Capital and Habitus - Literature review Example

Bourdieu on the inequality of education and cultural capital and habitus

Introduction

The notion that schools are modes of reproduction was Pierre Bourdieu's significant "discovery". Education was viewed by Bourdieu as a central ideological and cultural site of socialization; via a misrecognized form of social reproduction operating within the modern education system.

There are the research suggests that black and low socioeconomic status students obtain lower educational returns by compared the gap of educational achievement between black and white students (Roscigno and Ainsworth-Darnell, 1999). Besides, He proposed two concepts" habitus" and "cultural capital", they provide a perspective which is unique for education analyzation. "Habitus" was conceived by Bourdieu as a set of cultural and social practices, disposition and value that are transmitted to the individual within their sociocultural context via pedagogic action (Bourdieu, 1986) in particular by the Formal family education are essential because it can be viewed as the academic market for cultural capital distribution. For example, a child's parent is a musician, and he or she receives more and intact art edification compare with those parents are an ordinary technician. It means parental occupation and socioeconomic gaps, to a large extent, influence children, including but not just limited education performance. For instance, a child who lives in a medical family, and that child is more tends to be a doctor or study medical-related subjects. It possibly is the inter-generational transmission of privilege and cultural capital of Bourdieu. This essay will explore how Bourdieu used the concept of cultural capital to explain and analyze the function between education and culture, and to lead the inequality of social reproduction. Besides, Bourdieu interested in the connection of 'culture', and education, especially educational qualifications in the concept of social reproduction. In addition, Bourdieu's 'culture' and 'habitus’ can honestly explain educational inequality in achievement? Since Bourdieu more tends to structural account—cultural capital and habitus—to account for sociological issues.

Cultural capital and cultural reproduction

For Bourdieu, cultural capital “represents the immanent structure of the social world,” determining at a given moment what is possible for an individual to achieve.

Pierre Bourdieu developed the cultural deprivation theory. It implies a show of how inequality in the education system can influence the way people establish their social and cultural values (Bourdieu, 1973). The theory states that people in the upper-class are better than people in the working class of a social group. People in the upper class feel superior and therefore tend to think that people in the working-class have to blame themselves when their children do not have success in the school education system (Bourdieu, 1973). Since the success in academic capital and cultural capital is mostly determined by the stability of other capitals, including economic and social capital. However, he states that the assumptions should not be taken into account because exams test the people in the working class in the education system which does not necessarily bring out their full potential into light; hence they are disadvantaged than those in the class. Therefore it is not their fault but the cause of the education curriculum which does not equal aspect for all. Thus, education reform and cultural reproduction seem to be concentration.

Cultural reproduction is one of the primary purposes of the education system to create better people with dreams and ambitions. Being reproduction means that it reproduces people according to their already present states. If someone from a dominant culture, his/her will be reproduced to fit a dominant culture and the same happens for the middle- and working-class. People from the dominant culture have the powers to have a meaning imposed on something and aver the purpose be regarded as legitimate. They also define their culture as being worthy and view it as the basis of knowledge for many and to the education system. It is just a perception because there is no method to prove that the dominant class are best compared to other subcultures (Bourdieu, 1977).

Nevertheless, the cultural trajectory in Bourdieu’s subculture may is different from that of the dominant class. Since Nash (1990) believes that Bourdieu’s theory inherently is exclusion theory, which means people who succeed dominant culture preserve literary heritage they realized with various means, and then to exclude those people who do not have 'right' to achieve. It is seen as that reproduction weaken the realization and 'right' of the lower class to study in higher education to some extent.

Additionally, Bourdieu explains that having a dominant class in someone is like having a cultural capital. It is because, with the education system in place, this capital can be made to make the individuals wealthy and have power. The school has responded to rebuild cultural and realized value and to teach students understanding the essence of the material world and society, but various factors restrict the actual performance. One is the dominant class has prestige monopoly in the educational institution, so that their culture is also hidden in schooling curriculum and academic mechanism. As the investment of the dominant class on education is for their benefits, including guarantee their children to succeed in education and society to maintain their dominant status. Subsequently, such a dominant system, which guaranteed academic meritocracy, legitimized economic inequality (Bowles and Gintis, 1976).

Moreover, the different language in classes also leads to different educational achievement despite it looks like an indirect influence. The middle-class parents tend to interfere with children's language, including comprehensive conversations, negotiation, rich vocabulary, and the use of long sentences, unlike working-class parents who rarely talk with their children, and uses command language (Bodovski, 2010), such as 'must-do', 'should not do' and 'it is a fault' without explanation or reasons. It probably leads to inferiority complex for those working-class children in daily life and learning. Still, middle-class children, on the other hand, are more confident and comfortable with their words. Besides, Lareau and Weininger (2003) show that middle-class parents are about to cultivate their children's words, deeds and cultural norms in preschool, it is not the kind of cultural skills that working-class children lack. Additionally, Gillies (2005) shows that middle-class parents emphasize children's ability, talent and character, but working-class parents are concentrated on the ability to stay out of trouble and work hard. These the difference between language and parental upbringing among different classes makes different educational outcomes. Also, the class with a higher level of cultural capital can guarantee that their children coordinate with the education system.

Bourdieu (1977) also expounds the most affluent class or group of cultural capital is more tends to invest in education and cultural practice for their children rather than the investment of economic benefits. Besides, he gives teachers’ children have a relatively high proportion of educational investment and previous academic success in arts and science in higher education. However, besides cultural capital, the realization of this point requires the support of other capitals, such as the lawyer and doctor have both ‘material’ and ‘culture’ that can be used as ‘support’ in their children’ positions in society than some rural teachers’ family or declining scholarly family. Since Coleman et al. (1988) report that students with higher socioeconomic status performed better academically, and it presents the fact that education is stratified, or called educational hierarchy.

Furthermore, cultural capital includes adaptive culture and human capacities, such as the familiarity with expectation and related operations, the ability to interpret abstract ideas and grasp vocabulary and texts. Moreover, those abilities assist works to enhance parental skills to, directly and indirectly, influence their children on upbringing in the family, and then to contact with schools (Edgerton and Roberts, 2014). At here, social ability and recognized ability (or academic achievement) have to combine to assess one of them.

Meanwhile, cultural capital is not evenly distributed since it brings about class differences in the dominant group in education attainment. People in the dominant class have an advantage to other people since they trained and instilled to be in the dominant culture, Bourdieu also success in life depends on the success of the earlier points in life (Bourdieu, 1984). He also suggests that students with higher class can gain more high-class culture, and students with higher cultural capital probably obtain the teachers’ favour and high marks, which are conducive to educational achievement. Gauging students in the manner translates to those from working-class groups having no much space for success in their lives. Bourdieu gives a very vague reply to the establishment of skills and knowledge needed to establish educational success. Bourdieu measures educational success by how the students present themselves but not by the content that is in their work. In the educational system teachers reward grades by expressions such as manners and styles which are more familiar to children from the dominant class (Bourdieu, 1986). Children from the working-class have a disadvantage since style departs from them, and grammar, tone, delivery of work is not entirely embedded in their social class. The teachers use bourgeois parlance instead of common parlance. This show that working-class students have a barrier already present in the education system for them to succeed (Bourdieu, 1990).

Moreover, the earlier points in life in dominant cultures are characterized by success since they are usually grown in a culture that is fond of winning. This boots their culture, and therefore, the values of winning and success are instilled in them. That all translate to that education success in social groups is directly proportional to cultural capital possessed by the dominant group (Bourdieu, 1977). By contrast, the theory of rational choice emphasizes the gap between educational achievement and social class as the restrain of economic factors (Sullivan, 2000). Nevertheless, Bourdieu also contrasts the pure model of rational action and believes that rational actors can master the knowledge of the presupposition of rational behaviour and the ability to understand it only in extraordinary circumstances. Besides, the ability to understand is also influenced by feelings, solidified thinking and the tendency to act (Edgerton and Roberts, 2014).

The concept of habitus in educational practice

Habitus refers to the lifestyle, the values, the dispositions and the expectation of particular social groups. A specific habitus is developed via experience. People tend to learn things from what they see every day in their life and how to expect life. The habitus of each group will be different because people from a diverse social group have different experiences and chances in life. The people can control values, but they are not the captive of habitus completely. They can act and choose what to do freely, but this will direct them to make some choices in life, such as behaviour. The main Bourdieu point is that an individual has to react in certain events, which most of them are novel. Still, instead they do it in terms of character they have experience in life, like behaviours, reasonable and common sense. In short, it means that habitus is an infinitive capacity for generating product. This actions, thoughts, perception and expression which conditions such as historically and socially situation sets its limits. Bourdieu uses the survey of Education, Taste and Class for his study; where he said that state is related to upbringing and education. Different taste is associated with the different classes, and the factions of the class have different prestige level legitimate taste has a higher prestige and includes serious classical music and fine art (Bourdieu, 1986).

Moreover, according to Nash, habitus is an internal structure, as class behaviours, insights and dispositions and rules potentially influence children, and to transfer into habits, which make them adapt their class. Nash (1990) classifies habitus to three types, and they are characteristic habitus, collective habitus, and dominant habitus. Meanwhile, Nash takes habitus as a mediation between cultural structure and social structure, and to explain social practice from the social perspective of structure. Moreover, his view is also different from Bourdieu, and he thinks separate practice and behaviour instead of a unit. To some extent, Bourdieu's thought is that 'habitus' is the specific material of the structure, but not "everything happens as if". Looking at working-class, middle-class and upper-class students, and they live in different families with different potential habits since they were born. Habitus to a large extent affect their inside, including thinking, recognition and realization, and consist up a kind of ‘talent’ or ‘excellence’. Still, it is constrained by positions of social status and impacted by the family environment. As Edgerton and Roberts (2014) state that the disposition of someone in a particular field is from his/her habitus interacted with the capital, he/she can mobilize in that field. They also expound that people’s behaviours are the joint result of their habitus interact with their cultural capital.

Additionally, a student’s success in a particular field, primarily in the education of school, and it is determined by some adjustment and adaptation of the internal structure of their habitus. It likes 'fish in water', which is that if the external objective conditions are in harmony with or consistent with their configuration, there is more room for adaptation and development (i.e., upward momentum). For instance, upper- and middle-class students show consistent dispositions and expectations of schools in their learning, and it is more likely that to help them have a broader prospect in their educational process. However, for most of the working-class students, the dispositions and expectations they usually show are hard to achieve schools expectation. Because it is hard for them to adjust inherent internal recognition to adapt and match with the educational system, or school expected so that they have a small likelihood on education achievement to beyond higher-class. For those working students who captured success in education once, they start to concentrate on the education of school and to treat schooling education as a capital accumulation for upward social mobility and the overcoming of status-related barriers. Moreover, this type of success in education and the accumulation of capital hidden in their social and cultural practice and behaviours, and to influence family education and academic performance in generations.

Furthermore, the success in academics needs a precondition that habitus suit for the world. For example, a child can quickly adopt a new educational stage including to innovate a fresh consideration on learning model, or follow diverse teaching methods and utilize the knowledge in practice. In contrast, this capacity is not innate, but rather the interaction between ‘habitus’ and the distribution of cultural capital. Nevertheless, this process usually is misrecognized by publics. Bourdieu calls that misrecognition as "symbolic violence" or as symbolic capital, which is that fail people or those with cultural capital who are at a disadvantage regarding this quick adaptation and acquisition as 'gifted' and natural talent.

The development of the concept of habitus

Reay (2004) argues that ‘habitus’ is criticized for their potentially deterministic tendencies, which means habitus will become to live in a particular 'field'. There are different practices and stances are generated by different states of the field in the same habitus. Thus, she expounds that habitus has four forms, the first one is 'habitus' as embodiment, which is a specific perception of the world's internal structure and particular industries, and be expressed by a series of enduring activities, such as speaking, or gesture. The second one is habitus as an agency, as habitus can potentially generate various behaviours, and to be restrained and transformed through individuals; then habitus as a gathering of the trajectory of individual and collective, and it shows Bourdieu's duality. Besides, the final one is habitus as a complex interaction of past and present. Also, it is approved that habitus can penetrate the environment around people, but do not always change according to the level of individual expectation, and then to change their living conditions. Sometimes, their expectation in habitus also constrained by other requirements such as class, race and gender. For instance, a working-class child expects to gain success in a classical music competition with higher class children, but his/her parents have less 'fortune' to support his/her material, language, psychology and mental. Then this child will have to change his/her expectation and to adapt this state with initial habitus and innovated new one. It seems to show an internalized frame constrains habitus, and Bourdieu's the concept of 'field' boost this possibility in the frame.

Moreover, she states that habitus can be used to analyze the sense of superiority and inferiority expressed through advantage and disadvantage groups in their daily interactions. Although Reay clams that 'habitus' goes beyond habitus the used of habitus, it also does not away from the determinism since she does not deny that habitus exists in the culture. Still, she offers a near-reasonable explanation of habitus is that Bourdieu's habitus is not only reflected in individual behaviour and attitudes, but also body posture as a whole, and it can be used to reveal gender, race and class (Reay, 1997).

Additionally, the individual’s adaptation to the outside world is thought to be unconscious (Breuda Farnell, 2000, in Reay, 2004). There is a little controversy with Bourdieu's duality of individual and collective, even though the individual's habitus developed well. It likes that a top middle-class child with strong ability of calculation gain an excellent score in a mathematic examination, but familiarity with calculation problems and methods cannot be called unconscious adaptive behaviour. It is because such unconscious adaptation may come from the cultivation of family and school habits and the transmission of cultural capital from inter-generations.

Conclusion

Bourdieu’s view that “(habitus*capital) + field = practice” (Bourdieu, 1984: 101), which may mean satisfactory educational achievement requires the cultivation and development of habitus and cultural capital consistent with the educational system in a particular field to be maintained. As mentioned above, due to the differences in language, behaviour, attitude, environment and disposition between different classes, the cultivation of children's habitus and the input of cultural values are also different. Furthermore, when these factors are put in a particular cultural field, the temporal consequences are also various, that is, the gap of educational achievement that we see. Therefore, only by paying attention to both the permanent state and the productive state beyond the habitual disposition of use can we be closely connected with cultural capital to achieve the best result. It is like Bourdieu (1993) views that only when one is immersed in a particular city of empirical reality can one grasp the most profound logic of the world. In conclusion, inequality in education is a way to have social reproduction from the current states where children from prominent families remain dominant, and those from working-class families remain there. It brings about social elimination in the education system to maintain the dominant class.

Cultural reproduction is one of the primary purposes of the education system to create better people with dreams and ambitions. Being reproduction means that it reproduces people according to their already present states. If someone from a dominant culture, his/her will be reproduced to fit a dominant culture and the same happens for the middle- and working-class. People from the dominant culture have the powers to have a meaning imposed on something and aver the purpose be regarded as legitimate. They also define their culture as being worthy and view it as the basis of knowledge for many and to the education system. It is just a perception because there is no method to prove that the dominant class are best compared to other subcultures (Bourdieu, 1977).

Nevertheless, the cultural trajectory in Bourdieu’s subculture may is different from that of the dominant class. Since Nash (1990) believes that Bourdieu’s theory inherently is exclusion theory, which means people who succeed dominant culture preserve literary heritage they realized with various means, and then to exclude those people who do not have 'right' to achieve. It is seen as that reproduction weaken the realization and 'right' of the lower class to study in higher education to some extent.

Additionally, Bourdieu explains that having a dominant class in someone is like having a cultural capital. It is because, with the education system in place, this capital can be made to make the individuals wealthy and have power. The school has responded to rebuild cultural and realized value and to teach students understanding the essence of the material world and society, but various factors restrict the actual performance. One is the dominant class has prestige monopoly in the educational institution, so that their culture is also hidden in schooling curriculum and academic mechanism. As the investment of the dominant class on education is for their benefits, including guarantee their children to succeed in education and society to maintain their dominant status. Subsequently, such a dominant system, which guaranteed academic meritocracy, legitimized economic inequality (Bowles and Gintis, 1976).

Moreover, the different language in classes also leads to different educational achievement despite it looks like an indirect influence. The middle-class parents tend to interfere with children's language, including comprehensive conversations, negotiation, rich vocabulary, and the use of long sentences, unlike working-class parents who rarely talk with their children, and uses command language (Bodovski, 2010), such as 'must-do', 'should not do' and 'it is a fault' without explanation or reasons. It probably leads to inferiority complex for those working-class children in daily life and learning. Still, middle-class children, on the other hand, are more confident and comfortable with their words. Besides, Lareau and Weininger (2003) show that middle-class parents are about to cultivate their children's words, deeds and cultural norms in preschool, it is not the kind of cultural skills that working-class children lack. Additionally, Gillies (2005) shows that middle-class parents emphasize children's ability, talent and character, but working-class parents are concentrated on the ability to stay out of trouble and work hard. Read More