Cultural Capital refers to the skills and knowledge middle class parents have that they can use to give their children an advantage in the education system.
A closely related concept is Social Capital – which is the support and information provided by contacts and social networks which can be converted into educational success and material rewards.
Three ways in which middle class parents use their cultural capital
- Middle class parents are better educated and are more able to help their children with homework
- Middle class parents are more skilled in researching schools
- Middle class parents teach their children the value of deferred gratification
Two ways in which middle class parents use their social capital
- They speak to parents of children who already attend the best schools
- They are more likely to know professionals who work in the best schools
Supporting evidence for the importance of Cultural Capital in education
Diane Reay (1988) – Mothers make cultural capital work for their children. Her research is based on the mothers of 33 children at two London primary schools. The mothers of working-class children worked just as hard as the middle-class mothers. But the cultural capital of the MC mothers gave their children an advantage.
Middle Class Mothers had more educational qualifications and more information about how the educational system operated. They used this cultural capital to help their children with homework, bolstering their confidence and sorting out their problems with teachers.
Stephen Ball argues that government policies of choice and competition place the middle class at an advantage. Ball refers to middle class parents as ‘skilled choosers’. Compared to working class parents (disconnected choosers) they are more comfortable with dealing with public institutions like schools, they are more used to extracting and assessing information. They use social networks to talk to parents whose children are attending the schools on offer and they are more used to dealing with and negotiating with administrators and teachers. As a result, if entry to a school is limited, they are more likely to gain a place for their child.
The school/ parent alliance: Middle class parents want middle class schools and schools want middle class pupils. In general, the schools with more middle-class students have better results. Schools see middle class students as easy to teach and likely to perform well. They will maintain the schools position in the league tables and its status in the education market.
Analysis point
For the sociologists in this section, the cause of lower-class failure is the very existence of inequality itself in society and differences in power held by the working and middle classes.
Positive evaluations of the Cultural Capital theory
- Cultural capital seems more relevant now with neoliberal education policies – marketisation (and free schools) gave parents and schools more freedom – middle class parents and schools use this freedom to exclude the working classes.
- Social capital theory is useful in explaining the punishingly depressing fact that privately educated children often use their social networks to get internships to get them into the ‘professions’.
- Unlike cultural deprivation theory Bourdieu etc. do not see working class culture as inferior or blame the working classes for the failure of their children.
- The theory links inside and outside school factors – middle class families and middle-class schools work together to exclude working class children (especially see Ball’s idea about the school-parent alliance).
- The theory may be more relevant now with the establishment of Free Schools – Only middle-class parents really have the cultural capital necessary to set up Free Schools.
Negative evaluations of the Cultural Capital theory
- Most statistical research suggests material deprivation and economic capital are more significant factors than cultural capital in explaining class differences in educational achievement.
- It may be unfair to blame schools for being biased against working class children – many schools put extra resources into helping working class children.
- From a research methods point of view, it is more difficult to research and test out some aspects of cultural capital theory – how do you measure the effect of piano lessons on educational achievement for example?
- If cultural deprivation theory is true – there are no practical solutions to reducing class inequalities in education within the existing system – more radical (revolutionary?) changes are necessary.