This thesis is concerned with the constitution of pupil identities within the school context. My central goal is to offer an enhanced understanding of the processes through which inequities within the context of secondary education come to pivot around biographical, cultural and learner identities. The thesis examines existing school ethnography concerned with pupil identities and maps key theoretical movements within the social sciences and humanities concerned with the subject and identity. I suggest that school ethnography has only recently begun to explore fully the interactions of multiple identity categories and the implications of these interactions. I also suggest that the utility of recent theorisations of power and the subject for understanding school-level practices remains under-developed. My analyses of empirical data generated through an ethnography in one London Secondary School offers a response to these limitations. Drawing on the theoretical contributions of Michel Foucault, Pierre Bourdieu, Judith Butler, Jacques Derrida and Robert Connell, my analyses show how the citationallinguistic, bodily, and textual practices of pupils and teachers contribute to the performative constitution of intelligible selves and others. I suggest that while performatively constituted subjects have discursive agency, the intelligibility of performative constitutions is constrained by the historicity of discourse. I demonstrate the significance of the discursive intersections and interactions of identity categories and suggest that identities can best be understood as and in constellations. These constellations open up and close down the possibilities for identities to both become traps and be reinscribed again differently. These analyses add depth to existing understandings of the ways in which identities are constituted, the significance of constellations of identity categories, and the processes whereby educational inequities are sustained.

This PhD thesis investigates the role of social capital in the educational outcomes and school experiences of teenage students. Social capital is mapped in relation to the context of the school, the family and the community, as it is experienced and reported by Year 12 students. The main focus of the study is on the contribution of social capital to educational outcomes, such as students' exam attainment, their decision to go to university or not and the process followed to choose and apply to universities. In addition, students' experiences within the school are discussed with particular reference to friendship formation. A primary concern of this study is to understand the role of social capital within contextualised frameworks by taking into consideration factors such as the social class, the ethnic background and the gender of the participants as well as the overall ethnic composition of the participating schools. This research employed mixed methods of collecting and analysing data. A survey questionnaire was administered to approximately 250 students and in-depth, semi-structured interviews were carried out with 60 students. The data was collected from four ethnically diverse London secondary schools. The findings of this thesis suggest that social capital influences students' education and school experiences to a certain extent, however, it does not work in the same way for all social groups. Conversely, the nature and influence of social capital, as a multi-faceted and multi-dimensional concept, are strongly mediated by social class, ethnicity and gender and in some cases by the ethnic composition of the school. For instance, social class and ethnicity exercise a central role in the way students form their friendships within the schools and the way parents mobilise social capital in order to enhance their children's educational outcomes. The thesis concludes that these contextual characteristics, namely social class, ethnicity and gender, significantly shape the character of social capital and its influence on students' education and school experiences.

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This study explores the roles that parents and teachers ascribe to themselves and each other regarding the education and all-round development of children. Previous research has focused predominantly on the factors behind parents' decisions to become involved in their child's education. This study seeks to illuminate and compare the thoughts and beliefs which underlie the role constructions of both parents and teachers and may impact directly upon the extent and nature of their working relationship. Findings derived from an interpretative phenomenological analysis of in-depth semi-structured interviews suggest that both groups are hugely dedicated and committed to their roles and to improving outcomes for children. They also suggest a number of areas where the perceptions of parents and teachers diverge, leading to different emphases on the expectations each has of the other. These differences include perceptions of self-efficacy, parental voice, the vulnerability of children, the most effective balance between support and challenge for children, and the extent of the parents' role in academic education. The implications of the findings are considered in terms of the working relationship between parents and teachers, outcomes for children and the practice of professional Educational Psychology.

The increase in intra-urban polarisation in Britain has seen the inter-linking of multiple problems amongst certain sections of society (Hills et al., 2010; Aldridge et al., 2012). Within the context of these processes, schools have frequently been positioned as a local regeneration delivery mechanism (Lupton, 2006) with the expectation that they can mobilise a response. However when compared to the totality of other social and economic factors at work, their capacity to do so is weak (Bernstein, 1970). Schools thus occupy a difficult position; rather than driving social change, they struggle to mitigate the relationship between deprivation, poor educational outcomes and poor life chances in general (Fabian Commission on Life Chances and Child Poverty, 2006; Cassen & Kingdon, 2007; Wilkinson and Pickett, 2009; Dyson, 2012).The community-oriented school approach has been adopted across a number of countries in an effort to tackle these issues (Dryfoos & Maguire, 2002; Dyson & Raffo, 2007). This thesis addresses the relationship between schools and their communities using the distinctive example of a school which took a community-oriented approach in an effort to tackle issues which beset the deprived community.Weston Academy opened in 2008 and was sponsored by the main social housing provider in the area, Weston Housing Trust. The school sought to not only improve standards of education but also provide services and support through a joined up approach. This study forms part of a three-year development and research partnership between Weston Academy and the University of Manchester. As a member of the research team, I conducted a longitudinal case study to explore the development of the school and used family case studies to track the impact of their efforts on community members’ lives. The research reveals that despite their promising approach, Weston Academy had limited impact. I recognise that although Weston Academy sought to improve standards, this over-shadowed their more community-focused efforts, meaning that they developed on two separate tracks. However, this study shows the effects of these actions were increasingly intertwined. I thus argue that the standardised nature of how schools operate ultimately restricts the extent they are able to tackle issues which beset deprived communities. I close with a consideration for what kinds of differences community-oriented schools might be expected to make in the future.

The study is divided into three parts. Part One consists of two chapters in which I situate the study theoretically and reflect on the personal consequences of the subsequent methodological undertaking. Chapter 1 introduces the conceptual and contextual frameworks utilised throughout this research. In it I chart the history of ethnographic educational research, from the Chicago School to the emergence of critical ethnography through the seminal work of the Birmingham-based CCCS, before rounding off by highlighting contemporary approaches offering new insights on the cultural landscape of social class inequalities. The current state of educational research in Ireland will also be touched upon, as I introduce the national setting for the comparative element of this study, which forms the location of the school in which I conducted further fieldwork. I also discuss the contemporary relevance of the concept of 'inclusive education' and contextualise its relevance in relation to a study of this nature. Chapter 2 presents a reflexive account of how the research conducted for this study was actually carried out, concentrating on my early forays into the field as a fledgling school ethnographer in the English setting of Bridgepoint High school. The chapter focuses on this initial stage of the enquiry because this is when the pitfalls and dilemmas associated with researching people in real world settings confront one for the first time, leading to a strategy of reflexive engagement that subsequently shaped and informed the comparative fieldwork in Ireland. Part Two contains two chapters that form the comparative case study element of this research. Chapter 3 offers a detailed description of life at Bridgepoint High, a large state-run secondary school situated on the Bridgepoint estate in the northeastern city of Crownport. In addition to describing the social and economic conditions that prevail on the estate, the chapter looks at the way that constant testing and surveillance combines with the pressures of the contemporary education market to privilege a meritocratic IQ-ism that results in a deficit-based attitude towards its pupils. A culture of interactional hostility and disillusionment with formal education is found to be a pervasive feature of Bridgepoint school experience, with largely negative consequences for everyone concerned. Chapter 4 presents a case study of secondary education in the Republic of Ireland, represented by St. Oliver's Community College in the coastal city of Cove. Again, the chapter details the local surroundings and points to similarities not just in the two cities themselves but also on the estates where the schools are located. However, in sharp contrast to Bridgepoint High, St. Oliver's was discovered to be a radically different kind of establishment, appearing on the surface to operate a more strict discipline code, but actually offering a calm, conducive and welcoming atmosphere characterised by surprisingly cordial social relations. The pressures of credentialism appear equally strong here too, but the willingness of staff to find alternate ways to celebrate pupil achievement, allied to shared investments in a positively ascribed local identity, are found to be at the heart of the outstanding sense of community witnessed at the school. Part Three consists of three chapters, forming the 'analysis' section of the study. Chapter 5 attempts to explain what I see as the reasons why Bridgepoint High school is not 'successful', both in the official terms proscribed by current government education policy, and in terms of the quality of school experience that it provides for its teachers and young people. Here, I point to the reinvigorated culture of 'machismo' exhibited by staff and pupils, partly as a rearticulated and insecure response to the diminished status of traditional forms of working-class, masculinity, and as a consequence of the 're-masculinizing' tendencies inherent in emerging forms of teacher subjectivities under the managerial regime of 'continuous improvement'. A school culture of strident homophobia, racism and compulsory heterosexuality is shown to present insurmountable barriers to improving school-based relations, without which the young people of the Bridgepoint estate will continue to prematurely disengage from education. Chapter 6 presents a comparative analysis of how the two schools differed in their approach towards educating the young people in their charge, paying particular attention to the many similarities in structural constraint both schools faced, and yet pointing to the varied responses within the schools to the challenges posed by these constraints. Chapter 7 offers a complimentary analytical perspective to that in Chapter 5, this time presenting a thorough explanation of the reason why St. Oliver's Community College was found by all of those involved, including staff, pupils and the local community of which it is very much an integral part, to be in every respect a 'successful' school, despite its relatively lowly status. While highlighting the substantial contribution that a 'Catholic' outlook on schooling undoubtedly plays in generating congenial working relationships between teachers and pupils, I also highlight the strategy of affirming value in locality as a major reason why the school has developed such strong links with the surrounding community. Ultimately, celebrating one's sense of belonging in a particular place is argued to have a huge impact on the self-confidence and esteem of pupils who responded by sharing ownership of St. Oliver's in a shining example of the potential offered by inclusive education. Finally, a brief Conclusion summarises the findings of the research and offers some tentative suggestions on how English schools, despite the policy constraints they face, need to apply a more community-centred model of schooling attuned to ensuring that people's concerns and realities are put at the centre of the educational agenda. Only then would members of those communities perceive themselves as active citizens, with their different ways of knowing valued as a resource in the shared enterprise of learning.

The research plan of this thesis was primarily designed to test the widely-accepted hypothesis that the home backgrounds of children affect their educational progress at the secondary schools and can be held responsible for many of the misplacements that occur in these schools. "The influence of the home" [so writes the Essex Education Committee] is the phrase which throughout our discussions we have most often heard and ourselves quoted. Children who are not essentially unsuitable [for grammar schools] can be made unsuitable by bad home conditions. Even when the conditions cannot be called bad, the lack of any cultural background or of any understanding of the meaning of an educated outlook insidiously cramps the mind of the pupil and retards his progress. 1 .Generally speaking, it has been the influence of an unfavourable environment that has received most attention, but Sir Cyril Burt suggests that the effects of a good environment should also be considered: When one studies the failures among those who were selected [for grammar and central schools] and the oversights among those who were not selected, not a few mistakes, it is seen, might have been avoided had the child's social environment been taken into account. 2. Both in this country and on the other side of the Atlantic, it has become fashionable nowadays for psychologists, sociologists and educationists to make pronouncements upon the importance of the social and cultural background in determining school progress- However, objective demonstration of this importance is lacking, and it was for this reason that the inquiry was taken up. Groups of the "failures" and "oversights" to whom Burt refers will be studied in detail and compared with control groups in an attempt to test: (1) the hypothesis that certain aspects of the home background affect the educational progress of children at the secondary school level; and (2) the further hypothesis that the introduction of a home background assessment into the allocation procedures would reduce the number of children placed in educational courses for which they later appear to be unsuited. If both of these hypotheses are substantiated, the question of whether or not home backgrounds should be considered when allocating children to secondary schools then arises. However, this is a separate problem that concerns the politician and the social philosopher as well as the educational-psychologist, and, as this thesis is intended to report only a scientific inquiry concerned with one of the administrative problems that arise when children are being selected for secondary schools, it has been thought desirable to express no opinion on such broader educational issues.

This research focuses on the use of guanxi (Chinese personal connections) in everyday urban life: in particular, how and why people develop their bonding, bridging and linking social capital in their guanxi networks. While much existing research focuses on the roles of bonding, bridging and linking social capital in different contexts, little is known about the process of developing and using these three types of social capitals in Chinese society. Although Kwang Kwo Hwang, Yunxiang Yan, and Xianqun Chang have distinguished different types of guanxi related to closeness, how these are related to social capital remains unknown. The study presented here aims to fill this gap in the research. Data of this research was drawn from two ethnographic studies of school place allocation in two Chinese cities during 2012-2013. The research finds that ritual is vital in guanxi practice, and it has more significant impact in moderate guanxi than close and distant guanxi. When la guanxi, people tend to apply Confucian li to show more Confucian ren in order to gain the same level of ren treatment in return from others. Thus, guanxi capital is mostly gained by ritual investment due to the influence of Confucianism. Based on this finding, the research proposes a new concept, described as “ritual capital”, which refers to a part of an individual’s cultural capital, fostered and maintained through practice of proper ritual.

Educational attainment has been a central debate in the field of educational research for a long time. Moreover, regarding inequality in educational attainment, social research has been dominated by questioning the association between educational attainment and gender, ethnic and social class inequalities. When considering social class inequality, one universal conclusion can be drawn: the higher family social status, the better academic attainment. This is also true in Taiwan, as is the case elsewhere. However, I want to ask: does social status influence other educational outcomes in addition to academic attainment, and if so, how? With respect to this question, I argue that beside educational attainment, students’ school experiences can be considered as an important educational outcome; furthermore, it may be influenced by social status and gender. The aim of this research is to investigate the experiences of year 8 students in Taiwan: what are their perceptions of school experiences?, and more specifically, what extent family social status and gender are associated with different students’ perception of parents’ educative capital and their own educational habitus, which in turn influences pupils’ school experience. Indeed, this study intends to expand the relationship between social status/gender and education; moreover, to examine a dynamic structure between family social status/gender influence and personal perception. After the process of data analysis, many meaningful findings are examined. Family socioeconomic status did not make direct impact on students’ relationship with peers and teachers; and parents’ educative capital did not affect educational attainment directly either. In addition, surprisingly, gender difference made no difference on all measured aspects. By holding such information, it will be possible examine the phenomenon of youth development and secondary education in Taiwan.