[joanne]

I can’t speak for anyone apart from myself (hey, who can?) but my working class father was very resistent to the idea of my degree and post-grad. He seemed to have this idea that once I became educated and therefore joined the middle classes I would need to turn my back on my identity and dump my family…seriously! He also assumed that once I was made middle class by gaining a few letters I would also gain all the negative aspects of the bourgoisie… But, working in the voluntary sector and arranging trainign for volunteers I find a lot of them have been discouraged from fulfilling their potential by parents who have internalised the prejudice of the class system — they belive that they are incapable of educational attainment, and they believe their kids are too and tell them not to bother to save the embarrasment of inevitable failure. (My perception only) It’s not only teaching staff that have self-fulfilling prophecies! Your point about hostility is a good one too; an older generation which has been failed by a less egalitarian educational system will not be encouraging to their youngsters and will counsiously or not, pass on messages that school will not help them in their lives. It is sad, and it burns me up when I see lovely, intelligent people who think they are incapable of anything intectual because of their background. And it annoyed the hell out of me to get to university to find these thick thick middle class people coasting on confidence and entitlement.

User Detail :  

Name : joanne, Gender : F, Sexual Orientation : Straight, Race : White/Caucasian, Religion : Atheist, Age : 32, City : Leeds, State : NA, Country : United Kingdom, Occupation : Voluntary Sector, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, Social class : Lower class,