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Learning Intentions • Explain different sociological theories of purposes of education, and strengths and weaknesses of each theory. • Explain how education can contribute to inequality in the UK • Explain how educational achievement can be affected by ethnicity, class and gender • Link to case studies • Give balance and informed evaluation Discuss and write down answers to the following • What do you think are the purposes of the following features of school life: • Uniform • Classroom Code • Group work • Exams • Detention What is a school for? This is what most sociologists can agree on… • Schools are agents of secondary socialisation – they play a role in teaching society’s members how to behave. • Schools are places where children absorb the norms and values of society • Schools are places where children can interact with others and become aware of themselves as individuals – the process through which they can acquire a personal and a social identity George Mead – Latent and Manifest functions • Do you remember what this means? • What do you think are the latent and manifest functions of the things mentioned at the beginning of the powerpoint? History of compulsory education • The Education system takes children from a very young age and places them within a structure with rules, passing on knowledge, values and skills. • Compulsory education has only existed since the 1870 Education Act – which made it compulsory up to the age of 10. • In 1918 the Fisher Education Act led to state provision of secondary education. • There was a need to create a skilled workforce in order to compete with other industrialised nations. Different views on education… • Political viewpoints at the time: • Worried that it would teach the lower classes to see their lives as unsatisfying – encouraging revolution • Others felt it would have a civilising role and could serve the powerful as a means of ideological control • Some saw education as a possible route out of poverty – a basic human right. Functionalism • Functionalism was the most prominent sociological theory on education until the 1960’s. • It asks questions like – what is the function of education? What is the relationship between education and other aspects of the social system? Remember that functionalists see society as a big organic structure. • Sees education as promoting consensus by transmitting the norms and values of society. • Functionalism sees education as having 3 core purposes 3 Purposes of Education • 1) Socialisation Helps to maintain society by socialising young people into key cultural values such as such as achievement, competition, equality of opportunity, social solidarity, democracy and religious morality. Durkheim was concerned that education should emphasise the moral responsibilities that members of society have to each other – remember he was worried about individualism leading to anomie. So this links to things like PSE; Happy, Health, High Achieving; GIRFEC; CfE • Talcott Parsons said education forms a bridge between parents and the wider world. At home kids are loved regardless of their awful personalities. Their social status comes from being part of the family – it is particular. • In school, social status is achieved through merit – which is more like the actual world (at least that’s what functionalists think) – so these are universalistic standards, judged against the same criteria as everyone else 2) Skills Provision • Education teaches the skills required by modern industrial society – maybe general skills that everyone needs like literacy and numeracy; or specific skills for particular occupations. • Longer periods in education become necessary as labour becomes more complex. 3) Role Allocation • Education allocates people to the most appropriate job for their talents – using exams and qualifications. • The most talented are allocated to the most important occupations – seen to be fair because of equality of opportunity. Questions • So what do you think might be the strengths and weaknesses of the functionalist view of education? • How would functionalists view each of the features at the beginning of the powerpoint? Strengths of Functionalism • Functionalism links education with wider society • Explains how schools help select people and allocate them into adult society • Explains how pupils are assessed and given roles Weaknesses of Functionalism • Too simplistic – sees only one set of norms and values – there may be more in competition • Assumes education is a meritocracy – ignores class, gender and ethnic inequalities • Assumes that the education system fits the needs o the world of work – when actually the stuff we’re teaching you is utterly irrelevant to any work you will ever have to do. Marxism • For Marxists education is seen as an important part of the superstructure – which means it works alongside family, religion, the media to serve the needs of the economic base ( the capitalist system of production for profit) • Remember in Marxism the base shapes the superstructure – while the superstructure maintains and justifies the base Education has 2 main functions • 1) It reproduces the inequalities and social relations of production of capitalist societies • It serves to justify inequalities in the system through the myth of meritocracy – so people grow up unquestioning of the system Education has replaced religion • Marxists also believe that the universal education system is a way of reaching and manipulating the hearts and minds of the working classes in a way that religion used to before its decline in the West. • Getting people to believe they have a place in society, and blinding them to their true conditions, offering false hope. Louis Althusser • French Neo-Marxist • Disagreed with the functionalist view that the main function of education is the transmission of common values – instead he argues that education is an “Ideological State Apparatus” (ISA) this means a tool of the state to pass on its dominant ideology. • Its main function is to legitimate, maintain and continue to produce throughout the generations class inequalities in wealth and power by transmitting ruling class values disguised as common values • Education reproduces the conditions needed for capitalism to flourish without having to use force. So it gets people to quietly consent to inequality, and know their place as workers – when in the past systems such as slavery would have required force. • Using force would reveal the system to be oppressive, and so people would eventually fight against it. • Education teaches that capitalism is just and reasonable. • Ideology gets better results than force by exerting influence subconsciously (think about Lukes’ ideas of thought control) • This is carried out through the hidden curriculum the way schools are organised and the way that knowledge is taught means that working class people are encouraged to conform to the capitalist system, and accept failure and inequality uncritically Pierre Bordieu • Called the means by which the working classes are effectively duped into accepting their failure and limited social mobility as justified “symbolic violence”. Their cultural attributes are rejected because the system is defined by, and for, the middle classes, who succeed by default because they have cultural capital which is considered more valuable. • Marxists would also draw similarities between the social relationships in a classroom between teachers and pupils, and between pupils from different backgrounds as a training ground for the workplace – children learn to “know their place” Strengths of Marxism • Strong in analysing the inequality in the system – which can help to explain inequality in later life – and the cycle of poverty Weaknesses of Marxism • Again, takes away from the individual’s ability to affect own destiny – pupils seen as creatures of the system with no control. • Not all teachers are agents of the state • Pupils do have power to exercise control over own environment – there are examples of classes where pupils call the shots