Synopses & Reviews
Decades of neo-liberal reforms have established a market in secondary schooling, where 'choice' and 'diversity' are expected to drive up standards and maximize individual responsibility. This is known to favor middle class people. But what of those middle classes deliberately choosing ordinary and even 'low performing' secondary schools for their children? What are their motives, and how do they experience the choice? What is it like for the young people themselves? Where do they end up? And what does all this show us about contemporary white middle class identity and its formation?
This groundbreaking study, now in paperback and with a new Preface, offers some answers to these questions. Based on detailed fieldwork with parents and children, it examines 'against-the-grain' school choices, looking in particular at family history, locality, the nature of 'choice' itself and associated anxieties, relationships to other ethnic groups and to whiteness, and the implications for democracy. The book highlights an inescapable acquisitiveness but also more hopeful dimensions of contemporary white middle class identity.
Review
Society for Education Studies Book Prize 2012 Winner - Runner-up
'This magnificent book...will command widespread interest.' - Mike Savage, British Journal of Sociology of Education 'The production of this beautifully crafted and important book adds to what we know of education policy in practice - and brings complex and fresh evidence to the setting of school choice, class and lived social identity. This work will be a major reference point for sociological theory and policy in practice for some time to come.' - Meg Maguire, Journal of Education Policy
'This book focuses on the perspectives of white middle-class parents who make 'against'-the-grain school choices for their children in urban England. It provides key insights into the dynamics of class practising that are played out in these choices and the multiple narratives and contexts that influence them.' - Dympna Devine, British Journal of Sociology of Education
'This book will be of interest to education and social policy researchers, sociologists, education professionals and indeed left-leaning white middle class parents.' - Nicola Ingram, British Journal of Sociology of Education
'A thoughtful and very interesting analysis by a talented group of researchers.' - Professor Annette Lareau, University of Pennsylvania, USA
'A very important book...This is a 'must read' for anyone interested in contemporary class formation.' - Professor Lois Weis, Graduate School of Education, University at Buffalo, USA
Synopsis
This book examines experiences and implications of 'against-the-grain' school choices, where white middle class families choose ordinary and 'low performing' secondary schools for their children. It offers a unique view of identity formation, taking in matters like family history, locality and whiteness.
About the Author
DIANE REAY Professor of Education at the University of Cambridge, UK. She is executive editor of the
British Journal of Sociology of Education and on the editorial boards of
Gender and Education, The Journal of Education Policy and
Sociology. Her most recent publications include
Activating Participation: Parents and Teachers Working Towards Partnership (co-edited with Gill Crozier).
GILL CROZIER Professor of Education and Assistant Dean Research, School of Education, Roehampton University, UK and UK director of the Comenius project on Teacher In-service Training for Roma Inclusion. Her previous publications include Parents and Schools: Partners or Protagonists? and Activating Participation: Parents and Teachers Working Towards Partnership (co-edited with Diane Reay).
DAVID JAMES Professor of Education at the University of the West of England, Bristol, UK and co-director of the Bristol Centre for Research in Lifelong Learning and Education (BRILLE). His previous publications include the co-authored books Bourdieu and Education, The Creative Professional and Improving Learning Cultures in Further Education.
Table of Contents
Acknowledgements
1. Introduction: The White Middle Classes in the Twenty-First Century – Identities Under Siege?
2. White Middle Class Identity Formation: Theory and Practice
3. Family History, Class Practices and Habitus
4. Habitus as a Sense of Place
5. Against-the-Grain School Choice in Neoliberal Times
6. A Darker Shade of Pale: Whiteness as Integral to Middle Class Identity
7. The Psychosocial: Ambivalences and Anxieties of Privilege
8. Young People and the Urban Comprehensive: Remaking Cosmopolitan Citizens or Reproducing Hegemonic White Middle Class 9. 9. Values? Reinvigorating Democracy: Middle Class Moralities in Neoliberal Times
Conclusion:
Appendix 1: Methods and Methodology
Appendix 2: Parental Occupations and Sector
Appendix 3: The Sample Families in Terms of ACORN Categories
References