Moments of Inclusion and Exclusion: pupils negotiating classroom contexts

This paper uses evidence from a small-scale study of two English primary school classrooms to examine school inclusion in its political contexts. We argue that 'inclusion' and 'exclusion' are complex processes, enacted moment-by-moment by pupils and teachers. Our focus is on the...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:British journal of sociology of education 2003-11, Vol.24 (5), p.547-558
Main Authors: BENJAMIN, SHEREEN, Nind, Melanie, HALL, KATHY, COLLINS, JANET, SHEEHY, KIERON
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Academic Ability
Academic Achievement
Attractiveness
Black people
Children
Classroom Environment
Education
Educational Research
Elementary School Students
Employment
England
Equal Education
Feminism
Gender identity
Masculinity
Negotiation
Open universities
Personal relationships
Popular culture
Primary education
Primary schools
Race
Sex
Social Class
Social Closure
Social exclusion
Social Integration
Social research
Sociology
Sociology of education. Educational systems. Lifelong education
Students
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Summary:This paper uses evidence from a small-scale study of two English primary school classrooms to examine school inclusion in its political contexts. We argue that 'inclusion' and 'exclusion' are complex processes, enacted moment-by-moment by pupils and teachers. Our focus is on the pupils' negotiation of these moments, and we examine how their negotiations are contingent on (although not determined by) a web of intersecting indices of 'difference', including differences of social class, ethnicity, gender/sexuality, perceived academic ability and physical appearance. We take a post-structuralist approach, well-known in feminist educational research but less often used in research and thinking about 'inclusive' schooling, to foreground children's active role in making sense of social conditions that are not of their own making or choice. We conclude that a politically literate understanding of the processes of inclusion and exclusion is necessary both to highlight the continuing reproduction of educational inequality, and to produce the necessary conditions for egalitarian change.
ISSN:0142-5692
1465-3346
DOI:10.1080/0142569032000127125