Social Class on Campus: Theories and Manifestations

by Barratt, Will

• ISBN13: 9781579225728
• ISBN10: 1579225721
• eBook ISBN(s): 9781000977899
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2011-05-31
• Publisher: Stylus Pub Llc

Summary

This is at once a playful text with a serious purpose: to provide the reader with the theoretical lenses to analyze the dynamics of social class. It will appeal to students, and indeed anyone interested in how class mediates relationships in higher education, both because of its engaging tone, and because it uses the college campus as a microcosm for observing and analyzing the concept of class “ and does so in a way that will prompt the reader to reflect on her or his location in the continuum of class, and understand how every member of the campus community helps co-construct social class. Will Barratt starts from the premise that there is more than one way to study any idea; and that the more tools we use to examine a concept, the more fully we understand it in all its complexity and ambiguity. To illustrate salient features of class on campus, he introduces five fictional European-American women “ Whitney Page, Louise, Misty, Ursula, and Eleanor “ and also includes the real stories of students who represent a diversity of backgrounds. Social class is often neglected or ignored as an important issue in the lives of students. The book provides the reader with a language for analyzing class, with theories of class that go beyond standard economic and sociological models, and examples of the manifestation of class “ all toward the end of helping the reader have more agency in working with this difficult and challenging concept. This book is suitable for students going to college for the first time, for courses exploring multicultural issues in contemporary society, and for anyone professionally involved with students. Each chapter includes a suggested experience and reflection questions to prompt readers to explore their thinking and feeling about class, as well as class discussion questions.

Author Biography

The Authors: Will Barratt has taught in the Departments of Counseling and Educational Leadership at Indiana State University over the past 20 years. He was the Holmstedt Distinguished Professor in the Bayh College of Education in 2006-2006 and was given the Caleb Mills Distinguished Teaching Award in 2008.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	p. xi
About the Author	p. xiii
Understanding Social Class
A Starting Point	p. 3
Class is more than money	p. 3
Class is personal	p. 3
Class is an intercultural experience	p. 4
Class is individual perception	p. 5
Class as a tool	p. 5
A word about precision	p. 6
Class as identity	p. 7
Class as income and wealth	p. 7
Class as capital	p. 8
Class as education	p. 9
Class as prestige	p. 9
Class as occupation	p. 11
Class as culture	p. 11
Class as a system	p. 11
Class as privilege and oppression	p. 12
Class as role	p. 12
Social class on campus	p. 12
Campus majority social class	p. 13
Class is more than money	p. 13
Class bubbles	p. 14
A tale of five students: Whitney Page, Louise, Eleanor	p. 14
What will likely happen to these women?	p. 20
Money, culture, and social class of origin	p. 23
Social class contrast and fit on campus	p. 23
Experience	p. 25
Reflection questions	p. 25
Discussion questions	p. 25
Your Experience and Social Class	p. 27
The Privilege Meme	p. 28
Where you stare matters	p. 28
Starting with boundaries	p. 29
Starting somewhere	p. 30
Historical views of class	p. 31
Class and anticlass	p. 34
Key words and secret language	p. 35
Summary	p. 37
Experience	p. 38
Reflection questions	p. 39
Discussion questions	p. 39
Class Myths	p. 41
ôClass doesn't exist in the USA.ö	p. 41
ôWe are all middle class anyway.ö	p. 42
ôThe working class is disappearing.ö	p. 43
ôOnce you get a degree you arc no longer working class.ö	p. 44
ôEducation is the key to upward mobility.ö	p. 44
ôCollege is open to anyone who wants to work hard.ö	p. 46
ôYou can't separate class from ethnicity.ö	p. 47
ôAll White people are the same.ö	p. 48
ôPeople talk about class because they don't want to confront ethnicity and gender.ö	p. 50
ôEveryone knows about class.ö	p. 51
ôThe world is a meritocracy.ö	p. 51
Myth and reality	p. 52
Experience	p. 52
Reflection question	p. 53
Discussion questions	p. 53
The Social Class Identity	p. 55
Social class identity: Development	p. 56
Social class identity: Maturity	p. 57
Social class identity: Transition	p. 58
Our three social class identies	p. 59
Social class contrast	p. 62
social class transition	p. 63
Managing multiple social class identites	p. 64
Support for social class transition	p. 66
Class passing	p. 67
Class as role	p. 68
Summary	p. 69
Experience	p. 69
Reflection question	p. 70
Discusssion question	p. 70
The Majority Class Student Experience of Class of Campus	p. 73
Choosing how we name classes	p. 73
Misty goes to college	p. 74
So what?	p. 78
Ursula goes to college	p. 79
Eleanor's story	p. 82
Marking class on campus	p. 87
The reproduction of class	p. 89
College as a confirmation experience: The world of accommodation	p. 90
Campus class markets: Fashion	p. 92
Campus class markets: Language	p. 92
Campus class markets: Social interaction	p. 93
Campus class markets: Organizational structure	p. 94
Campus class markets: Leadership	p. 95
Campus class markets: The physical campus	p. 97
Class passing	p. 98
The monoculture campus	p. 98
The danger of being the majority	p. 99
Experience	p. 99
Reflection questions	p. 100
Discussion questions	p. 100
The Minority Class Student Experience of Class on Campus	p. 101
The lower-class experience on campus	p. 101
College as a conversion experience: The world of assimilation	p. 102
Whitney Page's story	p. 102
So what?	p. 107
Louise's story	p. 108
So what?	p. 114
Deficit model of class: Raising up the underclass	p. 115
Summary	p. 116
Experience	p. 116
Reflection questions	p. 117
Discussion questions	p. 117
The Campus Ecology of Class	p. 119
The campus social class human aggregate	p. 120
The campus social class physical environment	p. 122
The campus social class organizational environment	p. 123
The campus social class constructed environment	p. 124
Summary	p. 126
Experience	p. 126
Reflection questions	p. 126
Discussion questions	p. 126
Manifestations of Social Class
Class as Income and Wealth
A case study	p. 131
Multiple views of class groups based on income	p. 132
Income as more than income	p. 133
So what?	p. 134
Class as wealth	p. 135
So what?	p. 136
Experience	p. 137
Reflection question	p. 137
Discussion questions	p. 137
Class as Capital	p. 139
Bourdieu on capital	p. 139
Bourdieu on social capital	p. 142
Other kinds of capital	p. 143
So what? Implications for campus	p. 145
Summary	p. 146
Experience	p. 147
Reflection questions	p. 147
Discussion questions	p. 147
Class as Education	p. 149
Social class and the campus	p. 149
The individual effects of education	p. 151
Summary	p. 154
Experience	p. 154
Reflection questions	p. 154
Discussion questions	p. 154
Class as Prestige	p. 157
A prestige experience	p. 157
Cost and prestige	p. 160
Ranking and prestige	p. 161
Keeping up with the others Prestige and class	p. 163
Prestige and college	p. 163
Competition	p. 164
Prestige in perspective	p. 165
Experience	p. 165
Reflection questions	p. 165
Discussion questions	p. 165
Class as Occupation	p. 167
Occupational prestige and social dominance	p. 169
Occupations and class summary	p. 170
Experience	p. 170
Reflection question	p. 171
Discussion questions	p. 171
Class as Culture	p. 173
Subcultures and education	p. 174
Cultures in competition	p. 177
Student cultures, student typologies	p. 178
Faculty cultures, faculty typologies	p. 179
The reproduction of culture	p. 180
Class, culture, privilege, and oppression	p. 181
Summary	p. 181
Experience	p. 182
Reflection question	p. 182
Discussion questions	p. 182
Class, Ethnicity, and Gender	p. 185
More Complexity
Class and gender	p. 185
Class and ethnicity	p. 186
Class, gender, and ethnicity	p. 186
Experience	p. 187
Reflection questions	p. 187
Discussion question	p. 187
Stories	p. 189
Zach's story	p. 189
Khou's story	p. 195
Christina's story	p. 201
Ken's story	p. 205
Abe's story	p. 210
Reflection question	p. 214
Discussion questions	p. 214
What Can Anyone Do?	p. 215
Things you can do about class	p. 216
Things you can encourage others on your campus to do about class	p. 216
References	p. 221
Index	p. 229
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