ABSTRACT
There has been substantial criticism of the absence of consideration of social class differences within the policy debates on underachievement and gender (especially boys’) that have taken place in the past (Epstein et al., 1998; Plummer, 2000; Francis and Skelton, 2005). The significance of social class for educational opportunities and successes was (re)emerging for government attention and action at the time of writing (see DCSF, 2008, A Gender Agenda). In contrast, a reading of educational feminists’ texts from Eileen Byrne (1978) and Rosemary Deem (1978) onwards shows that differences and inequalities created through social class positioning have always occupied a central platform in British educational feminist research and writing. Key feminist thinkers were concerned about the ways inwhich schools reproduced the sexual division of labour (Macdonald, 1980) and the different experiences of middle-and working-class girls (Anyon, 1983). Feminists have also linked schools with wider issues about social and economic positionings: topics covered have included parent-school relationships (David, 1980; Reay, 1998; Walkerdine et al., 2001); parental expectations (Reay and Lucey, 2003); and institutional selection and education policy (Lucey and Reay, 2002). This chapter begins by looking at how social class has been, and is, treated in educational policy. The relationship between social class and teaching will be used as an illustration of feminists’ engagement with gender/class variables. Although there is a chapter in this book that specifically addresses gender and teaching, we chose to focus on the experiences and writing of working-class feminist teachers as an element in work on social class and education. The chapter then goes on to consider the two core themes that we return to throughout this book andwhich have remained central to feminist concerns – ‘achievement’ and ‘gendered experiences of school’ – in relation to what feminists have said about social class.
