Capital And Habitus: Study On The Student Stratification In Classroom Field

Since the social stratification and mobility are the dominant theme in modern society, the relationship between education and social stratification and mobility has been paid close attention to in educational sociology. The stratification between different schools has been studied very well, whereas the one inside school, especially between the students in classroom, was undervalued with lack of systematic theoretical frame and sufficient discussion on the impact factors.On the base of Pierre Bourdieu's theories, this study aimed to analyze the stratification between students in classroom field and to discuss the impact factors in schooling and family background.950 students from a senior middle school and a junior middle school were picked up to be the respondents in the survey and the samples in the observation. The software of SPSS 12.0 was the main instrument of quantitative date statistics.As to the theoretical frame, organizational capital was added to the four basic forms of capital given by Bourdieu. As a result, using the framework of economic, cultural, social, organizational and symbolic capital,and taking the ownership of capital and habitus as the point of penetration, this study analyzed the stratification in classroom.As to the impact factors, the teachers'language interaction with students in class and after school,students'experience of being class leader, socioeconomic status and educational level of parents, amount of books the family has and the frequency of parental direction were discussed in this study.The main findings are as follows. After removing the economic capital and adding the organizational capital, Bourdieu's theories are appropriate to explain the stratification in the classroom field. The habitus, psychological attitude and way of act, differs from student to student according to the capital they have. There is significant correlation between the allocation of educational resources in classroom and the capital students have, that is to say, students in the same classroom get the unequal educational resources.The background of family has effect on the acquisition of habitus, and duplicates itself by affecting the capital students have in the classroom indirectly.. To sum up, students growing up in different family background have different habitus with each other, which will result in the stratification in classroom. What the school education did is to pick up the students of high rank and allocate more and better educational resources for them.Therefore, instead of providing students with opportunities of free social mobility, the school education duplicates the existing social structure unconsciously.