ABSTRACT
This chapter summarises the findings presented in Chapters 3–6 and explains how these findings answer the questions raised in Chapter 1. Bringing together themes explored and developed in Chapters 4 and 5 it tells the stories of children’s life as part of families and communities. Similarly, building on Chapters 5 and 6, it relates children’s experiences in the classroom and how these are shaped and inscribed by their life beyond school. Pulling together aspects of gender, class and caste relations as experienced by urban poor children, the chapter shows how the theoretical framework developed and demonstrated in the book offers a more nuanced and rich analysis of the links between poverty, caste patriarchy and informal work on the one hand, and children’s social and educational experience on the other. In the process, it also problematises dominant development discourses around poverty, poor children’s schooling and the ‘girl effect’ and outlines some of the changes in education and social policy that would help address educational and socioeconomic inequality in contemporary India.
