The popular classes at the school. Contributions and limitations of the concept of symbolic violence.
Conference of Christophe Delay
ENS of LYON, Thursday, march 18, 2010 at 17: 30
Whereas in the 1960s and 1970s, sociologists are interested in understanding of how macro-sociological inequality of opportunity in school as a function of the social origin of the students, the years 1980-2000 were marked by a phenomenon of disinterest growing to the theme of social classes and the realization of qualitative studies on the academic success of students of popular origin, contributing thus to be relegated to “voluntary or unconscious,” the question of social reproduction in the ranks of the old-fashioned concepts of the theory. The presentation, based on ethnographic work in a school of a popular area in geneva (observations, interviews with teachers and families), aims to show the persistence of the unequal academic achievement of students of popular origin, which is part of the encounter ambivalent between the culture of the popular classes and the school culture. We will discuss the contributions and limitations of the concept of symbolic violence that helps to understand some of the attitudes of parents in the face of the school.
Christophe Delay is a researcher SNSF invited to the GRS at the ENS of Lyon. He completed his phd entitled The popular classes in the school. The encounter ambivalent between two cultures to legitimacy uneven (University of Geneva, 2009). He is co-author with Schultheis,
Frauenfelder and Pigot books child Abuse: contribution to a sociology of the intolerable (L’harmattan, 2007) and The popular classes today : portraits of families, executives, sociological (L’harmattan, 2009).
The meeting is hosted by Frédérique Giraud.
For more information
The personal page of Christopher Delay :
http://www.unige.ch/ses/socio/christophedelay.html
Bibliography