ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the social life of mothers and their children and the differences ‘race’, gender and social class make to socializing and social networks across the two schools. It looks at mothers’ social networks, while the second focuses on children's social activities. In the Oak Park transcripts and the relevant field notes it seems as if the process of social networking is coterminous with middle-class mothers’ support of their children's education. Their children's access to the wide range of out-of-school activities is heavily dependent on elaborate mutual arrangements about which mother drops off and which mother collects the small group of children attending the same maths class or English tutor. Both working- and middle-class black women at Milner also had social networks which generated educational profits for their children. Social change meant many of the white working-class women were struggling with a disjuncture between habitus and the social field.
