Role and functions of education: Marxism

Question 1

what is an ideological state apparatus?

Answer 1

• social institution whose main role is to pass on the dominant ideology of the ruling class

Question 2

what is a repressive state apparatus?

Answer 2

• social institution whose role is to enforce the dominant ideology by force or threat of force
• police force

Question 3

what is the correspondence principle?

Answer 3

• the way in which the education system mirrors the world of work
• hierarchical system
• punctuality

Question 4

main marxist believe of the role of education:

Answer 4

• maintain capitalism
• reproduce social inequality

Question 5

Reproduction of social inequality: Althusser

Answer 5

• education deliberately engineers the system for the W/C to fail
• unqualified factory workforce
• it prepares children to be submissive to people in power
• hidden curriculum benefits M/C achievement but not W/C

Question 6

Legitimisation of social inequality: Althusser

Answer 6

• M/C access to more cultural and economic capital= advantage
• education encourages students to blindly accept capitalist values, through hidden curriculum

Question 7

Correspondence principle: Bowles + Gintis

Answer 7

• school like work to prepare for manual labour:
• wages not satisfaction
• lack of control
• obedience
• discipline and status
• boredom

Question 8

Myth of meritocracy: Bowles + Gintis

Answer 8

• education claims to be meritocratic but school discriminate in favour of the middle class
• hidden curriculum lowers working class ambitions

Question 9

Evaluation: Giroux (Neo-Marxism)

Answer 9

• anti school subcultures causes the W/C to reject being compliant workers
• fail to acknowledge gender or ethnicity often combine with class to produce success or failure

Question 10

Evaluation: Saunders (Neo liberals)

Answer 10

• middle class educational success is due to biological differences

Question 11

Evaluation: Chubb and Moe (New right)

Answer 11

• fail to see how education has failed all social groups
• education has failed to equip all students with the skills to be successful in the global market place

Question 12

Evaluation: Postmodernism

Answer 12

• fail to see that education actually reproduces diversity rather than inequality

Question 13

Evaluation: Morrow and Torres (postmodernism)

Answer 13

• students create their own identities rather than being constrained by traditional structures like class
• students are able to make their own decisions about their identity