Pupil subcultures

Pupil subculture- group of pupils who share similar values and behaviour patterns that often emerge as a response to the way pupils have been labelled and in particular, a reaction to streaming

Lacey (1970)

  • Pro-school subculture

    • Students remain committed to the values of the school

    • Gain and approve this status through academic success

      • Higher stream students, usually M/C

  • Anti-school subculture

    • Low self-esteem due to undermining of self-worth by school by placing them in position of inferior status

      • Low stream students, usually W/C

    • Label of failure pushes them to gain status in other ways

      • Invert school’s value of hard work/obedience/punctuality

        • Cheek teachers/truant/smoke/don't do homework

          • They become S – FP of educational failure

Willis (1974)

  • Lads and earoles

    • Lads: group of w/c boys who rejected the school system and its values, often engaging in anti-school behaviour

      • See selves as ‘real men’ due to background in manual labour

    • Earoles: boys who conformed to school expectations and aimed for academic success, often seen as less rebellious

      • Viewed by lads as effeminate and gay

      • Often faced bullying and exclusion from the more dominant lad culture, creating a clear divide between the two groups

  • Anti-school pupils placed in lower streams

    • Lose sense of self-worth

      • Made to feel inferior by school

  • Internal factors greater affect on students

    • No matter your home background in school treatment impacts your attitude towards school

Archer

Nike identities

  • Symbolic violence leads to alternative ways of creating self-worth/status/value

    • Construction of meaningful class identities by investing in styles

      • E.g. branded clothing like Nike

    • Appearance = symbolic capital (from peers)

      • Not conforming viewed as social suicide

        • Conforming gives safety from bullying

          • Wearing brands seen as way of being true to oneself without feeling inauthentic

            • Identities heavily gendered

              • Girls dress hyper-femininely

  • ‘Street styles’ conflict with m/c habitus

    • Seen as ‘bad taste’ and ‘threatening’

  • W/c pupils see higher education as unrealistic and undesirable

    • Living on a student loan would make them unable to afford street styles, further alienating them from their peers who embrace these aesthetics

Ingram (2009)

  • Two groups of w/c Catholic boys from deprived area of Belfast

    1. Passed 11+ and went to grammar school (m/c habitus)

    2. Failed and went to local secondary modern (low expectations habitus)

  • Found that w/c identity is inseparable from a w/c locality

    • Network of family and friends key part of boy’s habitus, as were street culture and branded sportswear

  • Group 1 had extra pressure to fit in, more emphasis on conformity

    • Tension between school’s m/c habitus and their w/c habitus

    • Callum

      • Ridiculed for wearing a tracksuit on non-uniform day

    • Symbolic violence- w/c students forced to abandon w/c identity if want to succeed

Maguire (1997)

  • W/c CC from childhood counted for nothing when grammar schools came in