Elizabeth Strohminger

Dr. Reiman
English 1101x-031
2.8.2010

Critical Interpretation Qutoes

“Basil Bernstein, Pierre Bourdieu, and Michael W. Apple, focusing on school knowledge,
have argued that knowledge and skills leading to social power and reward (e.g., medical,
legal, managerial) are made available to the advantaged social groups but are withheld
from the working classes, to whom a more ‘practical’ curriculum is offered (e.g., manual
skills, clerical knowledge),” (225).
This is where Anyon gets her motivation for her research. The idea that students are stuck in the
social class into which they are born was already developed by the researchers listed above.
Anyon makes it clear that this idea is touched on by at least three other researchers before her.
However, she points out later on that these researchers focused mostly on “England, France, and
North America” and claims “there has been little to no attempt to investigate these ideas
empirically in elementary or secondary schools and classrooms in [the US],” (226). So while she
uses the ideas from her peers in other countries, she makes it her own by discussing sole the
elementary school systems in the US.
“The second relationship which contributes to one’s social class is the relation one has to
authority and control at work and in society,” (228).
Anyon seems to think that the way one acts towards authority is highly important when
discussing his/her social class. However, this goes back to her lack of interest in any other part of
human development besides the social class. How a person acts towards authority is not just
dependent on the person’s social class; it has to do with how that individual grew up and was
raised. The individual’s mannerisms will always trump empirical data found in a lab because it
will be different from anyone else’s.

“What potential relationships to the system of ownership of symbolic and physical capital,
to authority and control, and to their own productive activity are being developed in
children in each school?” (246).
This quote is the ultimate core of Anyon’s essay; they are the exact questions she attempts to
answer in her work. By addressing each part in turn for each individual social class school, she is
able to develop her argument. Each social class has their own particular way of addressing
symbolic and physical capital, which she deems important to explain initially. Then, using what
we know of the social class’s opinion of capital, she will then define how the people will look to
authority and control. To her, everything is related. Unfortunately, this seems to leave her blind
to other reasons for human behavior. She does hit on one core element, that of the human need
for creativity, but other things like the development of mannerisms are not discussed.
“While such work does not usually satisfy human needs for engagement and self
expression, one’s salary can be exchanged for objects or activities that attempt to meet
these needs,” (248).
Elizabeth Strohminger
Dr. Reiman
English 1101x-031
2.8.2010

Critical Interpretation Qutoes

Obviously one must first address Anyon’s underlying tone of the need to express oneself.
Throughout her essay, she makes it very clear that expression is a basic human need and without
it many are unhappy. Even in this quote, she uses syntax that would suggest a negative
connotation to not being able to do so. However, she also addresses the human need to make
money to support oneself. Because the people in this social class make enough money to do
things like travel and shop, not having the tools to sustain their own “human needs for
engagement and self expression” is not as big of a deal as it could be because they have enough
money to find that in another outlet.
“These differences may not only contribute to the development in the children in each
social class of certain types of economically significant relationships and not others, but
would thereby help to reproduce this system of relations in society,” (249).
This quote touches on Anyon’s theory of a never ending cycle for these children. She believes
that because these schools help reinforce how their social class is defined, that children who
attend these schools will only grow up knowing the skills that were taught to them at a younger
age and are thereby stuck in the social class in which they grew up. She believes that the
majority of students will not break this cycle, and will only continue to enhance it more.