Marxism: education
- Created by: sarah_mocha
- Created on: 26-03-16 16:17
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- Marxism: role + function of education
- education serves the ruling class. it justifies the vast inequalities that develop under capitalism
- Key sociologists: Bowles and Gintis
- correspondence theory: education mirrors the workplace
- education system produces a subservient workforce
- there is a hidden curriculum alongside the formal curriculum
- Key concept: hidden curriculum
- teaches a respect for hierarchy and authority. this mirrors the world of work where workers have to defer to the authority of the employer
- teaches workers to accept motivation through external reward. students study not for the joy of learning but for exam certificates
- helps students develop a passive and dependent personality
- teaches students that they should accept that they are only responsible for a small part of the production process. fragmentation is accepted
- this is the education for the working class. ruling class are trained for leadership and control; they're groomed for the positions of power they will later occupy
- the most important factor in determining educational success is parental background
- the class system is reborn generation after generation and meritocracy is a myth
- justifies inequalities by creating the illusion that everyone has an equal chance, the same opportunity
- everyone appears to have the same teachers and textbooks, and take the same exams
- this means that poor people who fail believe their failure is their own fault and that the rich deserve their wealth
- everyone appears to have the same teachers and textbooks, and take the same exams
- Key sociologist: Bordieu
- education helps maintain wealth of the ruling class
- ruling class possess cultural capital (the values, knowledge and skills of the ruling class)
- education is based on cultural capital as it tests the values and knowledge of the ruling class
- teachers use language that is familiar to the ruling class
- working class culture is devalued by the education system
- Evaluation
- narrow focus that only look as class inequalities; what about gender and ethnic inequalities?
- sees students as passively waiting to be filled by capitalist ideology, however some do reject it
- if education is controlled by the capitalist system it wouldn't make sense to teach sociology or show that capitalism has negative effects
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