Recent research suggests that participation in organized extracurricular activities by children and adolescents can have educational and occupational payoffs. This research also establishes that ...participation is strongly associated with social class. However, debate has ensued—primarily among qualitative researchers—over whether the association between class and activities stems exclusively from inequalities in objective resources and constraints or whether differing cultural orientations have a role. We address this debate using a nationally representative sample of children's time diaries, merged with extensive information on their families, to model participation in, and expenditures on, organized activities. While we cannot directly observe cultural orientations, we account for a substantially wider array of resources and constraints than previous studies. We find that, above and beyond these factors, maternal education has a consistently large effect on the outcomes we study. We discuss the plausibility of a cultural interpretation of this result, as well as alternative interpretations.
Stratification is a central issue in family research, yet relatively few studies highlight its impact on family processes. Drawing on indepth interviews (N = 137) and observational data (N = 12), we ...extend Melvin Kohn's research on childrearing values by examining how parental commitments to self-direction and conformity are enacted in daily life. Consistent with Kohn's findings, middle-class parents emphasized children's self-direction, and working-class and poor parents emphasized children's conformity to external authority. Attempts to realize these values appeared paradoxical, however. Middle-class parents routinely exercised subtle forms of control while attempting to instill self-direction in their children. Conversely, working-class and poor parents tended to grant children considerable autonomy in certain domains of daily life, thereby limiting their emphasis on conformity.
In this article, we assess how the concept of cultural capital has been imported into the English language, focusing on educational research. We argue that a dominant interpretation of cultural ...capital has coalesced with two central premises. First, cultural capital denotes knowledge of or facility with "highbrow" aesthetic culture. Secondly, cultural capital is analytically and causally distinct from other important forms of knowledge or competence (termed "technical skills," "human capital," etc.). We then review Bourdieu's educational writings to demonstrate that neither of these premises is essential to his understanding of cultural capital. In the third section, we discuss a set of English-language studies that draw on the concept of cultural capital, but eschew the dominant interpretation. These serve as the point of departure for an alternative definition. Our definition emphasizes Bourdieu's reference to the capacity of a social class to "impose" advantageous standards of evaluation on the educational institution. We discuss the empirical requirements that adherence to such a definition entails for researchers, and provide a brief illustration of the intersection of institutionalized evaluative standards and the educational practices of families belonging to different social classes. Using ethnographic data from a study of social class differences in family-school relationships, we show how an African-American middle-class family exhibits cultural capital in a way that an African-American family below the poverty level does not.
Focusing on parental networks-a central dimension of social capital-this article uses ethnographic data to examine social-class differences in the relations between families and schools. We detail ...the characteristics of networks across different classes and then explore the ways that networks come into play when parents are confronted by problematic school situations. The middle-class parents in our study tended to react collectively, in contrast to working-class and poor parents. The middle-class parents were also uniquely able to draw on contacts with professionals to mobilize the information, expertise, or authority needed to contest the judgments of school officials. We did not find substantial race differences. We affirm the importance of a resource-centered conception of social capital that grants the issue of inequality a predominant place.
While many school choice studies focus on individual parents' preferences, we simultaneously address the structural context within which families make decisions and the strategies they develop in ...response. Drawing on in-depth interviews with 24 Black middle-class parents of young children, we demonstrate that they sought well-funded, academically rigorous schools populated by racially diverse middle-class students. Using administrative data, we then show that such schools are exceptionally rare, reflecting the structural realities of US society. To manage the ensuing dilemma, the parents implemented one of two school-selection strategies: 'assiduous rationality', which entailed collecting information to make a maximally informed decision, and 'trusting a close tie', which entailed identifying a network member who had been successful, and following their lead. Regardless of their strategy, the parents exhibited significant institutional mistrust and anxiety. Our results point to the constraint exercised by social structures, which can thwart parental goal realization regardless of class resources.
This article considers the understudied phenomenon of children's organized leisure as it relates to the division of labor in the family. Using both quantitative and qualitative data, we first ask ...whether the labor entailed by children's organized leisure is divided evenly between mothers and fathers. Both data sets indicate that this is not the case, with the majority of the work falling to mothers; they also indicate that at least some employed mothers face a tradeoff between time devoted to paid work and time devoted to facilitating their children's leisure. Subsequently, we consider key qualitative aspects of these leisure activities, including deadline sensitivity, authority over scheduling, and degree of predictability. These factors, we find, serve to exacerbate the inequity of the allocation of responsibility between mothers and fathers. We conclude by suggesting that organized leisure has become an important part of the familial landscape and thus warrants further attention. We also suggest that research on the gender division of labor would be enhanced in important ways by greater attention to qualitative dimensions of time use. Researchers should not simply assume that "an hour is an hour."
The City University of New York (CUNY) plays an essential role in educating the burgeoning immigrant population of New York City. During the 1990s, the foreign-born share of CUNY's undergraduate ...population rose from one third to almost one half. Nevertheless, little research has been carried out on this population. Focusing on foreign-born and native minority community college entrants, we compare these groups in terms of the number of credits earned and the likelihood of transferring to a four-year program and of completing an associate degree and a bachelor's degree. We find that nativity, race, and ethnicity are all related to these outcomes. Moreover, whether a foreign-born student attended high school in the United States or abroad is an important determinant of educational outcomes.
This paper affirms the relevance of Bourdieu's arguments concerning schooling and inequality to the sociology of education in the US. In doing so, it eschews abstract debates about “reproduction ...theory” in favor of an empirically grounded treatment. We begin by noting that Bourdieu's theoretical account of the educational system's role in perpetuating inequality was tailored to an institutional arrangement which is highly distinct from that presently found in the US in at least one key respect: whereas for Bourdieu connections between the school and the domestic sphere are “hidden” or “masked,” in the contemporary US they have become the focal point of a vast amount of educational research, discourse, and policy. Indeed, numerous institutional mechanisms exist which are intended to “harmonize” the environments formed by the home and school with respect to educational goals and practices. Our paper subsequently analyzes one of the most widespread such mechanisms: the parent–teacher conference. Using a set of detailed transcriptions of conferences between teachers and parents of middle-class children, on the one hand, and working-class and poor children, on the other, we examine the interaction that occurs in such conferences at the micro-level. It is our contention that, despite the institutional arrangement which prevails in the US, Bourdieu nevertheless provides the conceptual tools necessary to understand this interaction. Thus, within our data, stark differences are apparent in the amount and quality of the information exchanged in conferences as a function of the amount of cultural capital held by the parents. Similarly, parents’ symbolic capital (relative to that of teachers) is associated with differences in the authority situation that characterizes the conference, with middle-class parents exhibiting a pronounced willingness to criticize teachers, advocate on behalf of their children, and demand customized pedagogical assistance for them. On the basis of this data, we conclude that institutional mechanisms such as parent–teacher conferences can function as an indirect avenue through which social class impacts children's school experiences.
This article considers the understudied phenomenon of children’s organized leisure as it relates to the division of labor in the family. Using both quantitative and qualitative data, we first ask ...whether the labor entailed by children’s organized leisure is divided evenly between mothers and fathers. Both data sets indicate that this is not the case, with the majority of the work falling to mothers; they also indicate that at least some employed mothers face a tradeoff between time devoted to paid work and time devoted to facilitating their children’s leisure. Subsequently, we consider key qualitative aspects of these leisure activities, including deadline sensitivity, authority over scheduling, and degree of predictability. These factors, we find, serve to exacerbate the inequity of the allocation of responsibility between mothers and fathers. We conclude by suggesting that organized leisure has become an important part of the familial landscape and thus warrants further attention. We also suggest that research on the gender division of labor would be enhanced in important ways by greater attention to qualitative dimensions of time use. Researchers should not simply assume that “an hour is an hour.”
This article considers the understudied phenomenon of children’s organized leisure as it relates to the division of labor in the family. Using both quantitative and qualitative data, we first ask ...whether the labor entailed by children’s organized leisure is divided evenly between mothers and fathers. Both data sets indicate that this is not the case, with the majority of the work falling to mothers; they also indicate that at least some employed mothers face a tradeoff between time devoted to paid work and time devoted to facilitating their children’s leisure. Subsequently, we consider key qualitative aspects of these leisure activities, including deadline sensitivity, authority over scheduling, and degree of predictability. These factors, we find, serve to exacerbate the inequity of the allocation of responsibility between mothers and fathers. We conclude by suggesting that organized leisure has become an important part of the familial landscape and thus warrants further attention. We also suggest that research on the gender division of labor would be enhanced in important ways by greater attention to qualitative dimensions of time use. Researchers should not simply assume that “an hour is an hour.”
