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Schooling choice in South Africa: The limits of qualifications and the politics of race, class and symbolic power

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  • Hunter, Mark

Abstract

From the 1980s many school authorities across Europe and North America made efforts to enhance ‘parental choice’ over schooling. In South Africa, by contrast, it was racial desegregation in the early 1990s that unleashed the movement of thousands of children to attend non-local schools. While it was predictable that ‘black’ children would travel to attend better-resourced schools from which they were previously barred few anticipated that ‘white’ children would travel so much to attend different public schools. The paper centers on explaining a related paradox: primary school children move more than secondary schooling children from a formerly ‘black’ part of the city; while from a formerly ‘white’ part of the city, secondary school children move more than primary school children. Drawing on archival sources, life histories of guardians and pupils, and interviews with schoolteachers, the paper develops this finding to argue that the large expansion of schooling has devalued qualifications such that some schools play a greater role in providing symbolic and social capital—for example a prestigious English language accent and old boys’ networks. In an era of mass education, one that in the global South coincided with decolonization, new forms of differentiation beyond qualifications are becoming critical sites of class formation.

Suggested Citation

  • Hunter, Mark, 2015. "Schooling choice in South Africa: The limits of qualifications and the politics of race, class and symbolic power," International Journal of Educational Development, Elsevier, vol. 43(C), pages 41-50.
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:injoed:v:43:y:2015:i:c:p:41-50
    DOI: 10.1016/j.ijedudev.2015.04.004
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Daniel Schensul & Patrick Heller, 2011. "Legacies, Change and Transformation in the Post‐Apartheid City: Towards an Urban Sociological Cartography," International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 35(1), pages 78-109, January.
    2. Tim Butler & Chris Hamnett, 2007. "The Geography of Education: Introduction," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 44(7), pages 1161-1174, June.
    3. Mary Gilmartin, 2004. "Language, Education And The New South Africa," Tijdschrift voor Economische en Sociale Geografie, Royal Dutch Geographical Society KNAG, vol. 95(4), pages 405-418.
    4. Nicholas Spaull, 2012. "Poverty & Privilege: Primary School Inequality in South Africa," Working Papers 13/2012, Stellenbosch University, Department of Economics.
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    Cited by:

    1. Gabrielle Wills, 2017. "What do you mean by ‘good’? The search for exceptional primary schools in South Africa’s no-fee school system," Working Papers 16/2017, Stellenbosch University, Department of Economics.
    2. Asmus Zoch, 2017. "The effect of neighbourhoods and school quality on education and labour market outcomes in South Africa," Working Papers 08/2017, Stellenbosch University, Department of Economics.

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