neo-marxist views on education

Question 1

Agreements with marxism

Answer 1

Willis

agrees with Bowles and Gintis

Education reproduces inequality and serves capitalism

Question 2

Disagreements with Marxism

Answer 2

Disagrees with Bowles and Gintis

They assume education brainwashes children, which suggests working class pupils are passive

Argues children are able to resist

Question 3

How does Willis argue learning to leabour

Answer 3

Group of lads saw the myth of meritocracy as a con and opposed the aims of the school and the conformist pupils

Formed an anti-school subculture with counter school values, such as disrupting lessons, smoking and drinking

Question 4

What did Willis find through correspondence

Answer 4

counter-school subculture and working class culture

sexism, lack of respect for authority, regarding intellectual work as inferior and effeminate

their culture prepares them to be the low-paid, low-skilled workers capitalism needs

• they do not expect job satisfaction and are good at finding ways to cope with the boredom of their work
• their reaction of education and qualifications actually ensured that they end up in unskilled jobs so this provides that meritocracy is a myth

Question 5

Positive evaluations of Willis

Answer 5

Combination of Marxist and Interactionist approaches so is able to explain resistance even if that still leads to working class jobs

Has been the catalyst for further research into education and inequality in recent decades

Question 6

Negative evaluations of WIllis

Answer 6

Willis’ research was a small-scale case study which cannot be representative and so difficult to generalise even to the rest of the school, never mind other schools

Willis romanticises the lads as working class heroes, failing to challenge their anti-social behaviour and sexist attitudes