Marxism is a conflict theory, between two social classes the bourgeoisie and the proletariat. They believe in exploiting the proletariats through inequality and labour. Marxism theory is based on capitalism and is a macro theory because it looks at the whole of society. According to Louis Althusser the education system has replaced the role of the church; he argues that the role of the church had a strong influence on individual’s ideologies. Now people’s ideologies are influenced by the education system, which is now the main agency of control within society.
So society is said to be meritocratic, as everybody can achieve if they want to. Durkheim (2002) Believes that there are fixed rules for all and by transmitting the norms and values across society, it is then fair and meritocratic. Marxists on the other hand believe that meritocracy is a myth and that it hides the truth of the inequality in society. Sociologists argue that the processes in school such as the hidden curriculum helps to keep society unequal. The hidden curriculum has a big influence on pupils, its one thing to teach the child educationally but if the child is treated unjustly (no voice) by the school system then a much more negative message is given to those pupils about the nature of society.
According to material in item A, sociologists such as Becker claim that teachers label different groups of pupils and treat them unequally. Labelling in education means attaching a meaning to a student i.e. calling them hard working or mischievious. Researchers want to know whether labelling actually happens and how much it affects people's self-esteem and achievement. There are various types of experiments that are used to research this, however comparitive experiments should not be used as we are only studying a group of people in education, not the whole population.
This leads them to the working life where you work under capitalists and accept orders from superior employers. Therefore they prepare for your working life which benefits the capitalists, however Functionalists view is that the family teaches us the shared norms and values of the society, but not just the norms and values of the ruling class. Although Marxists further argue the family does this through punishments and rewards and being role models. Also Feminists believe that Marxists do not give more attention to the exploitation of women within the family for example, the family produces labour at low cost to the capitalist system as
Marxism is a structuarlist ideology which means that they paying attention to social institutions and structures over individuals, and it was Karl Marxs (1945) who came up with it. The belief that society is divided into the bourgeoisie, who own the "means of production", and the proletariat, who do the work, also known as upper class and working class. The bourgeoisie or capitalist class exploit the workers, and arrange society to keep the workers down. Most of the profit from the work that the working class do is kept by the bourgeoisie. Now, when we know the definitions, we can look at the Marxism view of education.
It also looks at the conflict between the classes. Marxists believe there to be inequality in the education system They argue that it is based on social class and it is not a meritocratic system. It is a capitalist system whereby the rich (the bourgeoisie) stay rich and the poor (the proletariat) stay poor. Marxists believe that the whole of the education system is designed to benefit and help the bourgeoisie. Student’s values, personality and attitudes are shaped to make them useful for capitalism and to make money for society.
Which is not true. He explains that the kids today do not want to learn anything because they do the same things all the time and are just bored, making the teachers bored as well. Gatto starts his essay by making himself an authority on the subject of weakness of the modern schools. The author then shares how he was a teacher in the public school system for over thirty years and how he was screwed over by them. By showing to the readers that he was once a public school teacher it helps them see him as an expert giving his own expert opinion.
Anyon does think that more research needs to be done to clearly show how economic status has a direct connection to the role in children’s education. What I think one of the key aspects of Anyon’s essay is the examples that were given for each school and how the social class affected the teaching. Examples were given by what the teacher said and how he/she taught, I was able to put myself in the classroom and see how I would have handled learning. Starting with the working-class schools, Anyon observed how teachers didn’t explain the work, how it would relate to other lessons, or the point of learning. I feel if you don’t understand the point of something, what is the point of learning?
In capitalist societies, workers are employed to produce goods which are sold by their employers at a profit. Only a bit of the profit ends up in the workers wage, most of its kept by the employer. Marx said that if workers were allowed to notice the unfairness of this, they’d revolt. So, to avoid revolution the capitalist system shapes the superstructure to make sure that the workers accept their lot in life. Institutions like the family, education and religion lead individuals into accepting the inequalities or capitalism.
Here are many reasons I should not talk in class. All of them affect my friends, the teacher, or me negatively. Some of these reasons include, taking time from the lecture, lowered quality of learning, and disrespect of the teacher and the other students. Talking during class distracts other students and disrespects the teacher. This messes up the learning process.