Social Class Differences in Family-School Relationships: the Importance of Cultural Capital Author(S): Annette Lareau Source: Sociology of Education, Vol
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Social Class Differences in Family-School Relationships: The Importance of Cultural Capital Author(s): Annette Lareau Source: Sociology of Education, Vol. 60, No. 2 (Apr., 1987), pp. 73-85 Published by: American Sociological Association Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2112583 Accessed: 26/01/2010 16:17 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use, available at http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp. JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in part, that unless you have obtained prior permission, you may not download an entire issue of a journal or multiple copies of articles, and you may use content in the JSTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use. Please contact the publisher regarding any further use of this work. Publisher contact information may be obtained at http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=asa. 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American Sociological Association is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Sociology of Education. http://www.jstor.org SOCIAL CLASS DIFFERENCESIN FAMILY-SCHOOLRELATIONSHIPS: THE IMPORTANCEOF CULTURAL CAPITAL ANNETTE LAREAU SouthernIllinois University Sociology of Education 1987, Vol. 60 (April):73-85 This paper summarizesa qualitative study of family-school relationships in white working-class and middle-class communities.The results indicate that schools have standardizedviews of the proper role of parents in schooling. Moreover, social class provides parents with unequal resources to comply with teachers' requestsfor parental participation. Characteristicsoffamily life (e.g., social networks)also interveneand mediatefamily-school relationships. The social and cultural elements of family life that facilitate compliance with teachers' requests can be viewed as a form of cultural capital. The study suggests that the concept of cultural capital can be usedfruitfully to understandsocial class differences in children's school experiences. The influence of family background on Whitty 1985; Anyon 1981; Apple 1979; Erick- children's educational experiences has a curious son and Mohatt 1982; Gearing and Epstein place within the field of sociology of education. 1982; Gaskell 1985; Taylor 1984; Valli 1985; On the one hand, the issue has dominated the Wilcox 1977, 1982). field. Wielding increasingly sophisticated meth- Surprisingly, relatively little of this research odological tools, social scientists have worked has focused on parental involvement in school- to document, elaborate, and replicate the ing. Yet, quantitative studies suggest that influence of family background on educational parental behavior can be a crucial determinantof life chances (Jencks et al. 1972; Marjoribanks educational performance (Epstein 1984; Marjo- 1979). On the other hand, until recently, ribanks 1979). In addition, increasing parental research on this issue focused primarily on participation in education has become a priority educational outcomes; very little attention was for educators, who believe it promotes educa- given to the processes through which these tional achievement (Berger 1983; Seeley 1984; educational patterns are created and reproduced. National Education Association 1985; Robinson Over the past fifteen years, important strides 1985; Trelease 1982; Leichter 1979). have been made in our understanding of social Those studies that have examined parental processes inside the school. Ethnographic re- involvement in education generally take one of search has shown that classroom learning is three major conceptual approachesto understand- reflexive and interactive and that language in the ing variations in levels of parental participation. classroom draws unevenly from the sociolinguis- Some researchers subscribe to the culture-of- tic experiences -of children at home (Bernstein poverty thesis, which states that lower-class 1975, 1982; Cook-Gumperez 1973; Heath 1982, culture has distinct values and forms of social 1983; Labov 1972; Diaz, Moll, and Mehan organization. Although their interpretationsvary, 1986; Mehan and Griffin 1980). Studies of the most of these researchers suggest that lower- curriculum, the hidden curriculum, the social class and working-class families do not value organization of the classroom, and the authority education as highly as middle-class families relationships between teachers and students have (Deutsch 1967). Other analysts trace unequal also suggested ways in which school processes levels of parental involvement in schooling back contribute to social reproduction (Aggleton and to the educational institutions themselves. Some accuse schools of institutional discrimination, claiming that they make middle-class families Versions of this paper were presented at the annual feel more welcome than working-class and meetings of the American EducationalResearch Associ- ation, April 1985, and the American Sociological lower-class families (Lightfoot 1978; Ogbu Association, August 1985. 1 am indebted to Nicole 1974). In an Australian study of home-school Biggart, Pierre Bourdieu, Aaron V. Cicourel, Troy relationships, for example, Connell et al. (1982) Duster, Samuel W. Kaplan, Hugh Mehan, and M. argue that working-class parents are "frozen Katherine Mooney for criticisms of this paper. In out" of schools. Others maintain that institu- addition, the paper greatly benefited from the comments tional differentiation, particularly the role of of Mary Metz and the anonymousreviewers of Sociology of Education. Address correspondenceto the author at teacher leadership, is a critical determinant of the Departmentof Sociology, Southern Illinois Univer- parental involvement in schooling (Epstein and sitv. Carbondale,IL 62901. Becker 1982; Becker and Epstein 1982). 73 74 LAREAU A third perspective for understanding varying variations in home-school relationships and levels of parental involvement in schooling review the implications for future research. draws on the work of Bourdieu and the concept of cultural capital. Bourdieu (1977a, 1977b; HISTORICAL VARIATIONS IN Bourdieu and Passeron 1977) argues that FAMILY-SCHOOL RELATIONSHIPS schools draw unevenly on the social and cultural resources of members of the society. For Families and schools are dynamic institutions; example, schools utilize particular linguistic both have changed markedly in the last two structures, authority patterns, and types of centuries. Not surprisingly, family-school inter- curricula; children from higher social locations actions have shifted as well. Over time, there enter schools already familiar with these social has been a steady increase in the level of arrangements. Bourdieu maintains that the parental involvement in schooling. At least three cultural experiences in the home facilitate major stages of family-school interaction can children's adjustment to school and academic be identified. In the first period, parents in rural achievement, thereby transforming cultural re- areas provided food and shelter for the teacher. sources into what he calls cultural capital Children's education and family life were (Bourdieu 1977a, 1977b). intertwined, although parents evidently were not This perspective points to the structure of involved in the formal aspects of their children's schooling and to family life and the dispositions cognitive development (Overstreet and Over- of individuals (what Bourdieu calls habitus street 1949). In the second period, marked by [1977b, 1981]) to understand different levels of the rise of mass schooling, parents provided parental participation in schooling. The stan- political and economic support for the selection dards of schools are not neutral; their requests and maintenance of school sites. Parents were for parental involvement may be laden with the involved in school activities and classroom social and cultural experiences of intellectual activities, but again, they were not fundamen- and economic elites. Bourdieu does not examine tally involved in their children's cognitive the question of parental participation in school- development (Butterworth 1928; Hymes 1953; ing, but his analysis points to the importance of National Congress of Parents and Teachers class and class cultures in facilitating or 1944). In the third and current period, parents impeding children's (or parents') negotiation of have increased their efforts to reinforce the the process of schooling (also see Baker and curriculum and promote cognitive development Stevenson 1986; Connell et al. 1982; Joffee at home. In addition, parents have played a 1977; Ogbu 1974; Rist 1978; McPherson 1972; growing role in monitoring their children's Gracey 1972; Wilcox 1977, 1982). educational development, particularly in special In this paper I argue that class-related cultural education programs, and have moved into the factors shape parents' compliance with teachers' classroom as volunteers (Berger 1983; Levy, requests for parental participation in schooling. I Meltsner, and Wildavsky 1974; Mehan, Hert- pose two major questions. First, what