Learning To Labour By Paul Willis: Summary And Analysis

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In 1977, British cultural theorist Paul Willis published a study titled "Learning to Labour" in which he investigated the connection between social class and education. In his study, he found that a group of working-class school children had developed an antipathy towards the acquisition of knowledge as being outside their class and therefore undesirable, perpetuating their presence in the working class. This mindset is so prominent by seeing their parents and community members only having minimum wage. The omnipresence of Social structure continues its impacts within the vast workforce. The conditions and availability of a person's employment is often dependent of the individuals class. Those within the upper- middle class and middle class had a greater amount of freedoms and opportunities within their occupations. While citizens in lower classes tend to work in hazardous situations which they are subject to injury and even death. In order to provide a more indepth look at this there has to be specific research of such. The Class Pay Gap in Higher Professional and Managerial Occupations by Daniel Laurison, Sam Friedman explores how class origin shapes earnings and managerial employment for people of various …show more content…

According to new research people who psychologically think of themselves as members of a lower social class.The study by University of Michigan professor Ned Smith revealed that when threatened with the loss of a job, people who think of themselves as having a low social status view their social and professional value as smaller and denser than they actually are. The pattern among high-status people was just the opposite, with those facing unemployment imagining their value as being larger and more solid than they actually are in reality. This is the direct result of the mental state that is created growing and evolving within a ever present social

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