ABSTRACT
In the Marxist sociology of education, theories of direct reproduction have been superseded by conceptions of education which stress the importance of 'resistance' within education to the process of the reproduction of capitalism. The idea of the relative autonomy of education has also been given serious attention; and both concepts have been combined with an analysis which is more voluntarist in nature. In Education and Power and Cultural and Economic Reproduction in Education, Michael Apple offers a modified conception of the educational process. Henry Giroux also stresses the voluntaristic nature of resistance theory, as well as the basis which it offers for challenging the more repressive features of schooling. Paul Willis says that the existence of anti-school cultures in schools with a working-class catchment area has been the focus of much attention. The counter-school culture is strikingly similar to shop-floor culture and both are aspects of the larger culture of the working class.
