Sociology - Education

• Nature


  Instinctive and biologically determined
• Nurture


  Learned and socially constructed
• socialisation


  the process by which an individual learns or internalises the culture of society
• Primary socialisation


  learning within the family/home, includes basic skills and values
• Secondary socialisation


  learning within educational institutions and includes acquiring knowledge and skills for work
• Agencies of socialisation


  media, religion, peer groups etc.
• norms


  social rules, expectations or standards that govern the behaviour expected in particular situations
• social construction


  things that are constructed by social processes rather than occuring naturally
• values


  principles or goals, ideas about what is good or bad, important or unimportant
• roles


  behaviour expected of a person in a specific position
• status


  The social standing of a person in a society
• Ascribed status


  Characteristics which are fixed and cannot change
• achieved status


  it is a status achieved through efforts
• culture


  a way of life, the sum of everything learned and shared by a society/group and carried on over generations
• subcultures


  different norms and values can form within a society - differ from those of the mainstream culture
• Inequality


  The condition of being unequal and different to others because of your circumstances
• Structural view


  The way society is structured shapes us. we behave according to society's norms and values. We have no free will. Macro approach
• Social action view


  We have free will. Interactionists believe we have the power to shape society through interacting with each other. This is a micro approach becuaue it focuses on small interactions shaping society.
• Modern to Post-modern


  Traditional: rural/agricultural, strong communities, religious

  Modern: urban/industrial, technological developments, belief in science

  Post-modern: the world has become more globalised, increased diversity, losing faith in science
• Consensus theological perspectives


  Functionalism

  The New Right
• conflict theological perspectives


  Marxism

  Feminism
• Functionalist perspective


  1. compares society to the human body (organic analogy)- every part of our society has an important role to play and is needed in order for it to function

  2. People are socialised into appropriate social roles based on their skills and abilities.

  3. structural theory and consensus
• Durkheim


  1.Teaching Social solidarity would encourage the parts of society to work together by sharing society's culture and values

  2.Teaching specialist skills would help people to find the part that they would play Within society and train them to be ready for that role

  3.School acts a society in miniature as it prepares us for life in the wider society
• Parsons


  1. Sees school as the focal socialising agency - a bridge between family and wider society.

  2. family life is different to schools and wider society as the child is judged by particular standards (ascribed status) while in school + wider society the status is largely achieved

  3. meritocracy - everyone is given an equal opportunity and you receive rewards based on your efforts.
• Davis and Moore


  1. Schools help you to identify what your role might be within society once you have left the education system

  2. By assessing students attitudes and abilities, schools help to match them to the job they are best suited to

  The education system sifts and sorts people into their role into the most suitable roles for them. Most important roles are filled by the most talented people.

  Most able= higher qualifications= high reward positions
• Evaluating the functionalist perspective

  S- Vocational education are becoming more popular and they are specific to certain skills that would help them in the future roles in society

  W- The education system doesn't teach specialist skills adequately.High quality apprenticeships are rare. 1/3 of 16-19 yo are on courses that do not lead to higher education or good jobs.

  S- everyone is judged against the same standards. Everyone gets the same exam, those who work hard and put in more effort are rewarded with high grades.

  W- marxist sociologists believe meritocracy is a myth. The main factor affecting whether someone has a high income is family class and background. Meritocracy justifies higher class privileges so it seems as if they gained it through fair competition at school; teaching the working class to accept inequality.
• New Right Perspective


  1. A state cannot meet the peoples needs

  2. We are in state control from the government that is capitalist and inequality is inevitable

  3. neoliberal economic ideas - less government interference in the free market

  4. The education system is failing as long as the government are in charge as it discourages efficiency+competition, imposes uniformity, unresponsive to consumers (students+parents)

  5. marketisation - schools need to attract students and those who fail to do so will have to take measures to increase demand at their school
• Similarities between New Right and Functionalists

  - believe that people are naturally more talented

  - favour meritocracy

  - education should prepare for work and socialise into shared values
• Miriam David (1993)


  Parentocracy - marketised education

  Power shift from the producer to the consumer encouraging diversity. it gives the parents more say and raises standards e.g. publication of league tables so parents can choose the right school
• Chubb and Moe


  consumer choice

  The american state run system failed because it has not created equal opportunity and has failed the needs of disadvantaged groups and is inefficient in producing pupils with the skills needed by the economy. private schools deliver high quality education as they answer to consumers.

  Solution

  a market system that puts consumers in control, allowing them to shape schools to meet their needs. Each family is given a voucher to buy education from a school of their choice forcing schools to become responsive to parents wishes
• Roles New Right want the state to have

  -impose a framework on schools within which they have to compete

  -ensure that schools transmit a shared culture.
• Evaluating the New Right Perspective

  W- Although the New Right believe that education imposes a sense of national culture and shared values, Marxists argue that it instead imposes the culture of a dominant ruling class and devalues the culture pf the working class

  W- Gewirtz and Ball argue that competition between schools only benefits the middle class students because their parents have enough knowledge about the school system to be able to choose

  W- myth of parentocracy - middle class parents are better able t take advantage of the choices available e.g. moving house so the children can attend desirable schools

  W- sociologists have criticised the new right for being contradictory. Chubb and moe ask the government to impose a national curriculum whilst encouraging parents to be able to choose what their children have access to.
• Marxist Perspective


  Our society shape and determines who we become. There is the bourgeoisie who are capitalists and become wealthy through exploiting the proletariat( the working class)
• Althusser


  ISA - maintain the rule or the bourgeoisie by controlling peoples ideas through religion, media and the education system

  RSA- maintain the rule of the bourgeoise by force or threat - police, courts and the army

  The education has two functions: to reproduce inequality by failing each generation of working class pupils and to legitimate inequality through ideas which disguise inequality
• Bowles and Ginitis


  Schools are designed to mirror the work place, which produces a hard-working and disciplined work force. This benefits the rich as they believed they earned their privileges through open and fair competition (meritocracy) and reinforces inequality so they will not attempt to overthrow those in charge.

  The correspondence principle is taught through the hidden curriculum. Examples of the correspondence principle: hierarchy, competition and extrinsic satisfaction
• Willis


  Learning to labour- Also an interactionist approach that focuses on the meanings pupils give to the situation and how these enable them to resist indoctrination. He researched 12 working class boys who were moving from school to work. They were resisting school and creating a counter culture by being scornful at conformists boys who listened to teachers, flout the rules and values (smoking) and reject meritocracy . They see themselves as superior to intellectual work which is effeminate. They identify strongly with manual labour. This actually helps them to slot into the jobs capitalism needs them to perform, they get bored and don't expect satisfaction from work, acts of rebellion guarantee they end up in unskilled jobs ensuring the failure to gain qualifications.
• Evaluating the Marxist Perspective

  W- post modernists argue that the education system produces diversity, we no longer need a manual labour force like the 1950s and there are range of jobs that the education system prepares you for today - saying it teaches the w/c to prepare for their role oversimplifies the role of the education system and not acknowledging the job market of a post modern world

  W- Morrow and Torres criticises marxists for taking a 'class first' approach that sees class as the key inequality. Post modernists societies are more diverse so there are non-class inequalities. Sociologists should explain how education produces all forms of inequality

  W- Functionalists disagree - meritocracy

  W- feminists believe the education system reproduces patriarchal inequality e.g dress codes

  W- B+G - no free will, structural theory , Willis - free will, social action view
• Fordism


  Capitalism requires low skilled workers willing to put up with alienating work on mass production assembly lines
• Post-Fordism


  society is now more diverse and fragmented so there is 'flexible specialisation'. It requires a skilled, adaptable workforce able to use advance technology
• middle-class


  non-manual occupation and professionals 'white-collar