A Comparision of the Work of Paul Willis with Respect to Bowles and Gintis

A Comparision of the Work of Paul Willis with Respect to Bowles and Gintis

During the 1800s it was a starting point for a sociological

perspective based on the ideas of Karl Marx (1813-83). They were ideas

of conflict and inequality in education, families and household.

In 1976 followers of the Marxist approach Bowles and Gintis conducted

a survey of the education system, which provided them with similar

information to that of Karl Marx. Then in 1977 Paul Willis provided a

critical analysis of that of Bowles and Gintis and conducted his own

survey as a Neo-Marxist of the education system (Learning to Labour).

Although both views were based on the sociological perspective of Karl

Marx there was a considerable difference.

Paul Willis research was carried out between 1972 and 1975 it took

three years. He travelled round following 12 working class boys deemed

“the ladz”. They represented everything that school didn’t they were

completely the opposite. They didn’t want individual promotion, no

qualifications, and no job that required training or job satisfaction.

The students who did everything that was expected of them were

labelled “ the earoles”.

Compared to Bowles and Gintis, Willies investigation was carried out

very differently. His study was a small-scale view; it was micro and

therefore was an interpretivist’s view of society rather than that of

Bowles and Gintis, which was a structuralist’s view of society. It was

macro. For example when studying the education system Bowles and

Gintis would look at education as a whole and study things like social

class and origin of background from this they would draw up a

conclusion t...

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Gintis didn’t even step foot into a school. Whereas Willies did he

used an ethnographic approach to study students. He actually went into

the school and interacted with the students using an eclectic

approach, he used Marxist perspective to explain it all. Bowles and

Gintis also said that the students were passive and could be shaped by

the education system and could not shape their own reality. Willis

views is far more realistic and accurate, saying that they do have the

power to do there own thing and that Bowles and Gintis are far too

deterministic. Bowles and Gintis in general are claiming that all

cultural activity is geared up to class interest, they is why they are

structuralists. Whereas Willis didn’t look into social structure that

much so he didn’t neglect religious, patriarchal and ethnic interests.