Peace, violence & social distance: Ethnography of an elite school in India

Abstract

The article attempts to understand the concept of peace through the prism of social realities. The central argument deconstructs violence and peace as a variable of social distance. Consequently, social interactions become the mechanism of inequalities to underscore how asymmetries of power restructure the social distance. However, interactions are not always actualization of the pre-existing vertical social structures (shaped by power) but how agentic dispositions can counter the course of these interactions and the resultant social distance. The recalibration or maintenance of this distance through the agency is then understood in light of peace or violence framework. The course of analysis builds upon “structural violence” and “Convivencia” as a measure of social distance in relationships. Highlighting the Foucauldian notion of “governmentality”, the article concludes social distance enabled “informal” pedagogy as a more intrusive and more insidious form of pedagogy than the disciplinary one because it attends to the affective aspects of learning. The analysis is based upon ethnographic fieldwork conducted at an elite international residential school in India. As this builds an evaluative space of “peace thinking”, it provides for complexities of peace research.

Keywords:

• Ethnography
• structural violence
• peace education
• school convivencia
• social distance

1. Introduction

Peace thinking relates only to some parts of social reality directly, but indirectly all kinds of assumptions about social reality seem to be relevant. It is difficult to rule out any field of social theory as irrelevant, because all aspects of social reality seem to some extent to be coupled to each other so that insight may be taken from almost any corner to shed light on auxiliary hypotheses needed for the construction of a peace theory. (Galtung, 1967, p. 19)

Building upon the foregoing account, the article attempts to explicate peace and violence intelligible from social distance perspective. By attempting to understand how peace is a functional and violence as a dysfunctional variable of social distance, the article builds upon Galtung’s prescription of “peaceful social order not as a point but social orders from which violence is absent” (Galtung, 1969, p. 168) (in this case social interactions). It offers avenues through which the concept of social distance can enrich peace theorizing and research.

The article by deconstructing the tacit dimension of social interactions denudes the obscured violence which is ingrained in the normative social practices and structures. This helps us understand how structural violence penetrates into aspects of social interactions and is reflected in social distance. The attempt is to understand conditions underlying social interactions through which violence is penetrated which helps maintain social distance. One such mechanism is interaction between relations of super- and sub-ordination. Understanding this mechanism helps engage with the complexities of an actor as the “normative inheritor” of the social structure and how s/he negotiates roles and guidelines of the behavior of hierarchy and hegemony reflected through social distance. The agency (if) fostered to negotiate social structures is then understood in terms of a peace framework.

Structure is “a set of rules and resources that constitute the properties of social systems” (Giddens, 1984, p. 25). Giddens says that individuals are constrained to exercise agency due to the presence of social structures. Durkheim, on the other hand, sees the same structures as functional as he views social structures working in the interest of the society to meet societal needs and help evade possibilities of war and conflict (Pope, 1975). For this article, structures are reflected in normative ways of being guiding the actions of the “social actors” at the school. Karakayali (2009) calls this as normative social distance which is “collectively recognized norms about membership status in a group and it is these norms which specify what kind of relations with what kind of people are acceptable and marks distinction between us vs them” (p. 541).

Contrary to the arguments on the predominance of structure over individuals, the concept of agency emphasizes the centrality of human actors. Agency means actions of humans in intentionally constructing their social world. (Giddens, 1984) Therefore, humans have the agency to challenge, contradict and thereby, overthrow hegemonic structures. For this article, agency is reflected in, the ability of various “social actors” of the school to influence and shape the established social structures. This can be paralleled to Karakayali’s (2009) affective social distance as degree of affection and sympathy towards others by means of reducing normative social distance.

The central analysis of this article is based on six months of ethnographic fieldwork conducted between April and December 2018 at an elite international residential school in India. The work seeks to deconstruct schooling with respect to the ideals of Peace Education. The effort is to examine institutional practices of the school in light of Peace Education theory to render school “intelligible” from a peace perspective. The work is contextualized in the classical debate of how schooling interferes with education. Harber and Noriko (2009) empirical work raises serious questions on the compatibility of Peace Education and formal schooling as it exists today. The research explores these tensions by deconstructing relationalities of Peace and Peace Education through the concept of social distance in this school setting. It is in this context that the present research addresses the call for a more grounded approach in Peace Education research seeking “investigation of schools and communities globally” (Bajaj, 2008, p. 138) in order to understand how Peace Education is realized in practice. Hantzopoulos (2011) confirms the absence of research on how schools institutionally enact peace education. This study seeks to bridge this lacuna in peace education research.¹

2. Setting the context

“Most human and humanizing activity that people engage in is talking to each other.” Herbert Blumer

The definition of peace is interminable because peace “as a word is like a basket word in which anything can be thrown into. It is a kind of word which does not have any kind of sharpness. For a lack of better expression, those of us who are fond of it or are trying to develop are using it in order to create a space for critiquing and for finding alternatives of how education needs to be redefined” says Krishna Kumar² It is essential to attend to this definitional problem of peace to articulate not only a particular philosophy of Peace Education but for the purpose of the central argument of this article.

To provide a definitional base, we clarify what we mean by peace and violence in social interaction as a measure of social distance. These expressions would help serve as a useful metric for measuring social distance as either peaceful or violent. Social distance is “an absence of fellow feeling and understanding which exists inspite of physical distance having been eliminated” (Bogardus, 1926, p. 40). On the other hand, an enabling social distance in Bogardus’ definition is “the degree of intimacy and understanding that exists between individuals or social group” (Wark & John, 2007, p. 398). In other words, it is a situation where all other distances based on social fault lines disappear and what remains is the distance which binds individuals on the human-to-human spectrum. Interactions featuring such social proximity would be inclusive, would result in effervescent and enhancing relationships and in the cultivation of capacious emotions and cherished values, as there exist a linear relationship between social distance and affectivity. When there is “little sympathetic understanding, social farness exists, and when sympathetic understanding is great, nearness exists” (Bogardus, 1941, p. 106).

The most proximate expression of conditions which shorten this distance for an educational ecology would be the term “school convivencia”. It addresses “ways of living together and living with others that happens in school, focusing on the quality of interpersonal relationships amongst the school actors” (Franco, 2018, p. 888) and “it is the quotidian interactions between the social actors of the school that shape this tacit form of convivencia” (ibid, p. 890). Padilla (2013) acknowledges its role in countering violence and providing for a culture of peace and hence resonates with Galtung’s conception of negative and positive peace (as cited in Franco, 2018). Demente Forero-Pineda et al. (2006) also reaffirm the role of convivencia for “peaceful social interaction amongst children” and for “the conditions associated with non-violent human relations” (p. 275).

Therefore, the construction of social fabric of the school remains central to fostering convivencia. It is the social climate of the school which is significant to how a learner experiences school and is intrinsically linked to quality of education. Hence, framing school climate, convivencia becomes an institutional culture, a melting pot of behavior, attitudes and values. A healthy social order marked by quality inter-personal relationships constitutes convivencia and addresses the call for peace education praxis “to begin in the context of interpersonal relationships” (Harber & Noriko, 2009, p. 175)

As it intrinsically enables social proximity, it not only strengthens human bonds but by also dilutes differences both in vertical and horizontal relationships. Hence, it is naturally expected to reduce social distance. Through this article, the attempt is to study reduced social distance as peaceful by highlighting the importance of optimizing interaction-based Convivencia,

Theories of peace suggest that peace proposals must be developed in relation to sources of violence. Hence, for the purpose relevant to this understanding, fostering peaceful social interactions requires us to first understand what threatens it. In its absence manifestation, it means peace which “dismantles power hierarchies which are subversive of the cherished value of equal respect of human dignity because peace itself is antithetical to vertical social relations and hierarchies in any form” (Galtung, 2008, p. 3). Therefore, one could define non-peace as “structural violence” because “stratification is indispensable towards the understanding of structural violence” (Galtung, 1969, p. 175).

Structural violence is defined as “social, economic, political and environmental arrangements which privilege few than the others” (Galtung, 1969). Hiding in structures (in this case social interactions), structural violence is dull, quiet and normal because it gets normalized and becomes part of the social structure. At an individual level, it sinks so deeply that it will be difficult to tell the difference between an actor’s depression and oppression, anxiety and a pathological society, violence and norms. Hence, structural violence often gets experienced as psychological violence because “structural violence affects bodily and psychological integrity, basic material needs (sleep, nutrition, movement, health, love), classical human rights (freedom of expression, need for mobilization, need for work, etc.), and non-material needs (like solidarity, friendship, happiness, self-actualization and so on)” (Galtung, 1988, pp. 271–272). Structural violence exists not because of war but because of the norm- “normative” social behavior.

Structural violence in social interactions is understood as inequality consolidated by the distribution of power in relationships. This can be paralleled to the concept of power distance which is based on differences in capital (both form and volume) possessed by people (Balibar & Wallerstein, 1991; Bourdieu, 1989). Since the “significance of social distance is in connection with the maintenance of status or with a person’s standing” (Bogardus, 1926, p. 40), it is naturally expected to exacerbate the social distance. It would naturally reify interactions which are inhumane, reflects solipsistic behavior, personify an individual not in its own worth as a human and in interactions in which reciprocity in relationships suffer indignities of utilitarianism. Such interactions are much in contradiction to the tenets of convivencia.

The analysis investigates the vortex caught between appearance and essence of social interactions to capture the social distance. The essence is understood through the manifestation of expression of inequalities driven by power underlying the interactions and affecting social distance. Hence, the understanding of interaction processes helps us lay bare the structural violence that is embedded in it. In this way, it tries to get beneath the social reality and uncover the dominant ideology. It attends to the complexities of “asymmetrical power relationships that exist in seemingly neutral spaces” (Bajaj, 2008, p. 143). As pedagogy, it resonates with the growing scholarship on critical peace education which “lends towards a more activist approach that interrogates power relations, structural forms of oppression and the importance of learners’ agency” (Bajaj, 2018, p. 4).

A working definition of peace and violence for this article: violence is being defined as structural violence, a problematic of vertical social relations (defined by power) and peace as an embodiment of convivencia (diluting the power), both affecting in social distance. This definition also finds resonance with interpersonal theories which are situated at the vertex of meta-concepts of agency and communion. (Luce et al., 2017)

3. School as the field site

As an elite international residential school, pseudonymously, Rolland School with its extensive campus and exorbitant fee structure is catering to the crème de la crème of the world population. It represents the acme of school education with more than a century-and-a-half old legacy. The school’s student body boasts of diversity with about 500 students from 31 different nationalities, with about half the representation from India while the other half from the world over (during the fieldwork period, Thai and Koreans were more in numbers than others). The gender balance remains nearly equal at the school (with about 252 males and 244 females).With about 160 faculty members, residential and support staff drawn from across the globe, the school maintains a teacher-student ratio of 1:7.³ The school anchors its identity in strong philosophical underpinnings⁴ which guide the vision, mission and educational discourse of the school. The curriculum offered at the school is tailored according to the Advanced Placement (AP)⁵ and International Baccalaureate (IB)⁶ Programs. The school has boarders as well as the day scholars. The latter are, generally, the children of staff but also include a few others staying on the hillside. Situated in the pristine Himalayan setting, nature serves as a backdrop to the rhythm of life at the school.

Though “performative” indicators serve as parameters of quality in a neo-liberal regime, Rolland School markets itself with “formative” blocks of its values, attitudes and behavior which are fundamental to the vision and mission of the school. The school subscribes to humanism as a greatest educational value when the larger educational narrative has turned a blind eye to or which gets veiled under the tyranny of the urgent. The “resurrection of humanity” within the commodity market of education is central to the market impression of the school. The school’s dominant narrative is to define its educational practice as an alternative to the state-ed paradigm. Unconstrained by conventional regularities of schooling, Rolland is presumably liberated from rigidities and limitations of a mainstream school in its structures, size and operations.

It is against this background that the research explores education at Rolland School that emphasizes Peace Education ideals of democratic principles, global citizenship and a commitment to peace. It discerns how the school community enacts and negotiates these ideals in the school and beyond, by paying particular attention to how the school community’s actions, conceptualizations, and discourses surrounding their experiences both intersect with and diverge from its stated mission.

Most often case-studies such as this are considered as a unique educational ecology or as an ‘ideal type’⁷ in Weberian understanding with its findings being under-represented for a comparative analysis and not applicable to the wider social reality. In this backdrop, it is important to locate the school as an “ideal” site. For studying complex structures like schools, ethnographers engage in “both explicit and implicit forms of sampling” (Ball, 1984, p. 75). Sampling here does not imply in the statistical sense but as an opportunity for the naturalistic coverage of the research area. Explicitly, the school’s educational philosophy is reflective of its commitment to values of peace. The choice of this school was driven not only by methodological demands but equally by demands of an educational context in background of peace and violence framework. Given variables associated with Peace Education framework, the site seemed conceptually proper to explore the intersection of theory of peace and educational practice. The fieldwork naturally granted an opportunity to study if the institutional structures, processes and pedagogical models undermined its very goals of education which signify Peace. If so, do they produce violence and what expression does that “violence” take? In other words, to understand if the “schooling” at any level interferes with its “education” to produce violence or whether its schooling is as peaceful as its educational goals. Hence, a school like this was a favorable field site to analyze these intersections. Secondly, while “mainstream/traditional” narratives of schooling or “subaltern” perspectives have both long been part of sociological inquiries of education, “elite schools” which have been the choice of the privileged have rarely been subject of educational research primarily because of difficulty in negotiating access to elite spaces (Gaztambide-Fernández, 2009b, p. 224). One such academic inquiry has been S. Srivastava’s (1998) work on the life world of an elite education institution as “making of modernity” through the lens of post-colonialities in India. As discussions on social justice are central to the Peace Education effort (Galtung, 1969), it is essential to understand the role played by the social world of elites in maintaining inequalities.

4. The methodological approach: participant observation

The impetus for this project is rooted in the lived experiences and pedagogical observations of the everyday life at the school. The research uses the qualitative research method of participant observation over a six months long ethnographic field work in the year 2018, to study aspects of the self and the school community by being in prolonged proximity to the everyday lives of the participants. Ethnography is “living with group of people for extended period in order to document and interpret their distinctive ways of life, beliefs and values integral to them” (Hammersley & Atkinson, 2007, p. 1). It is reification of social thought which considers the subjective interpretation of social reality of people. V. K. Srivastava (2012) sharply puts it as “knowing from them what they know about themselves” (p. 361). Hence, perception of social reality becomes more important than the existing objective reality as it involves interpretive understanding of the meanings rather than just the externally observed behavior. It provides necessary understanding of how actors co-construct their social realities by giving diverse meanings to their actions. Capturing “subjectivities” i.e. understanding ways and means of understanding the world as it exists for them is at the heart of the research and is provided by elements of ethnographic methods.

The thick description of qualitative data supported by field observation and reflective notes guides the analysis of this research. Apart from participant observation, the research uses structured/semi-structured interviews, life history interviews, survey questionnaires, projective techniques, etc., to gather material.

Semi-structured interviews or free-floating conversations gave most substance to the study. Staff, though not forthcoming, were open to have conversations barring few who either had inhibitions (or a reflexive sense of inhibition due to gatekeeping acts) or those who were constrained by time and work. More formally structured interviews happened largely with the leadership of the school. The questions were more structured, and related to the larger educational discourse or that of the school. While with the academic and non-academic staff, questions mostly focused on school processes, activities and structures. A total of 77 structured/semi-structured interviews were conducted including 27 with students.

Most of the sparkle was found in these informal encounters which were serendipitous and organic. This helped offer understandings which surfaced the gap between school’s normative discourse vis-à-vis everyday life. It was these informal conversations, “naturalistic or behavioral talks as they occur in natural course of events” (Woods, 1986, p. 31), which were (and remain) a good means of data collection.

Assemblies, homerooms, advisor time, other special events when the whole school community got together. Their observations opened up doors to understanding the institutional culture of the school. It also examined all the important documents related to the school to augment understandings and to triangulate insights gained from other data sources.

Classroom observations featured consistently in my everyday activities throughout the period of the study. Preference for high-school students and a combination of wide variety of subjects were provided for classroom observations. I was particularly interested in observation of subject areas of social sciences (they being “carrier” subjects) which would have given me a potential window to understand classroom transactions according to the ideals of Peace Education (cognitive, social, physical, affective). This would include how teacher orchestrates classrooms, deconstruction of the agency of the teacher given the subjectivity of the topics involved, the means of teaching of contested narratives, the channelization of student agency. Understanding peer culture and student experiences was of significant importance in relation to the category of significance. Besides class room observations, this intersection was explored in different physical settings (classrooms, fluid spaces in school, and public spaces like bazaars, during special events) through interviews and casual meetings.

The research was mostly conducted in English barring conversations with the blue-collared employees and Indian staff which were in Hindi. The understanding about school processes which kept building upon as understandings from different set of data sources added to the “thicknesses” of the material and its analysis. .

The methodology specifically addresses the call for peace educators “to examine divergence between theory and practice” (Brantmeier & Bajaj, 2013, p. 146). Capturing this divergence is the greatest analytical strength of ethnography (Jerolmack & Khan, 2014) which this research employs as a method. It is this aspect of ethnography as distinguished from just interviewing which takes care of the gap between situated behaviour and verbal accounts. Institutional ethnography also enables a rich narrative analysis and thick,⁸ understandings that are much required for deconstructing complexities of Peace Education praxis which any quantitative method given its objectivity would fail to provide (Rubin & Rubin, 2005).

The study follows an inductive rather than deductive approach, i.e., themes emerging from the data through sustained fieldworks guide the analysis (Bryant & Charmaz, 2007). This assisted more organic narratives to emerge from the field, offering epistemological addition to the theoretical perspectives which guide and enrich the terrain of peace theory, practice and research. This becomes significant in the context of limited narrative-based research which explores tensions in Peace Education practice (Kurian, 2020)

Hence, analysis of Peace Education from an ethnographic perspective is, therefore, not based on any one objective truth to be discovered but rather how social actors perceive and experience social problems, which enable unfolding relationalities of peace for the study. Hence, it is the school community’s everyday life which form the basis for generating understanding of peace in praxis.

5. Discussion and analysis

To capture the rich tapestry of life at school, the article deconstructs telling episodes of everyday life at the school which capture the structural complexities of interactions through the symbolic extravagance of the context. These episodes of interactions are aimed towards understanding complexities of (de)formation of social distance by deconstructing engagement between social structures and human agency. The richness of ethnographic data lies not in presence of significant details, but in its thickness and density.

The article manoeuvres through a variety of social interactions (ethnographic data sets) so as to understand how social distance emerges and operates in relations of power. The first set of interactions highlights “class identities” determined by power relations as a measure to understand social distance. The second set of interactions throws light on my own encounters as an ethnographer and how she negotiates the “experienced” social distance. The third set of interactions uses “physical space” as an embodiment of power and as a variable governing how social distance is actually experienced.⁹

To protect the confidentiality of participants, all names used in this article are pseudonyms besides the expression of self as AK.

5.1. Interaction 1

In the first instance, I stand in conversation with a high-status/high power individual named Tom in the hierarchy of this particular school. The encounter is casual and the conversation flows naturally. What follows is an episode of a face-to-face interaction with Tom.

Tom:

Good morning AK. How are you doing today?

AK:

Good morning Mr. Tom!! All well! How are you doing?

Tom:

Very well AK! And how is your work progressing?

AK:

Things are smooth. We are furthering the survey questionnaires with Teachers and Students. But that seems to be taking a lot of time. The percentage of inertia is very high as of now.

Tom:

Yeah … I understand. It is difficult to seek a response to such surveys …

(While we savor this conversation, it gets punctuated by the introduction of an individual of similar stature to his)

Duke (Entrée)

Good Morning Mr. Tom!

Tom:

Good Morning Mr. Duke!

Soon enough a subdued exchange of morning greeting follows between Duke and myself. In expectation of conversation budding between Tom and Duke, I for a moment “role-take” (Mead, 1934, p. 160) and step back. I relinquish the “safety” of silence, acknowledging the power profiles of both these individuals and my positionality in this “psychological hierarchy” of social relationships in this triad. But in Tom’s non-disengagement from the conversation, I soon found my answer.

Tom:

Ashmeet!! (in a reaffirming tone). So let me know if I can be of any help to you.

AK:

I think, if you can send an all-staff email from your end, it would be really helpful.

Tom:

Okay, send me an email and mark Ms. Joyce in cc, so that she is in the loop.

AK:

Sure, thank you so much! I am hopeful that this would be helpful.

(Our conversation continues for few more minutes meandering through a variety of topics.)

(Source: From researcher’s field notes)

While Tom very graciously acknowledges the presence of Duke, he continued fueling our on-going engagement. He signals no rush to wrap his words, while Duke stood awaiting his turn. Tom’s elaborated means of communication conveys a lot without overtly saying anything. A harmony of smile stretches across my face. Watching this social web un-weave becomes a moment of delight because I was no longer experiencing myself from the space of deprivation but expansiveness. Despite the consciousness of distance, this interaction left me with a greater sense of belonging. This is because the status difference was bridged by Tom travelling the normative social distance between us.

But this trimming of normative social distance (as exemplified by Tom) requires countering structures consolidated by the unfortunate macro-social reality. The larger normative social context which is of interest-oriented action influences the micro-level social interactions (Spillman & Michael, 2013). Utility rationalized social life informs the social construction of reality and in loop social actions and interactions. Since utility and interest-driven actions shape social structure, a labyrinth of actions and interactions reek of instrumentalism, inequality, and disenfranchisement. Actors get respected on their contingent market worth, through an instrumental lens, regardless of their intrinsic human worth or qualities. This gets manifested in the callous experiences in the social cosmology of interpersonal relationships. Tom however exemplified positive discrimination in interpersonal relationships that day. He dismantled hierarchy rather than cementing it by shedding off that instrumental lens. It is social visions like Tom’s which offers us the impetus to negate the present order and demonstrate values of being human. This also came along with a sense of realization that emotionally positive interactions can have life-changing consequences on others.

What I also derive out of this simple interaction is that social actions in the social sphere have metamorphic implications because watching and imitating also form rudiments of learning. Social interactions carry their own social cost because interactions affect other interactions, i.e., interactions influence and are influenced by interactions. In this setting, Tom’s actions colored social perception (meaning) of co-actors and observers (myself and Duke) by not only violating the dictates of the social structure but also by redefining normative social distance. He did this by not only recalibrating the social culture but simultaneously cultivating appropriate emotions.

By living this experience, we (Duke and myself) were being shaped by it through immersion in these ideas. Character training that day was more of a function of lived experience than knowledge consumption, of celebrating and emphasizing expectations of behavior and character. It proved that humans are capable of an agency—especially a moral agency. We both perhaps absorbed the learning from this “experience” and chewed the values that come along with such an experience. Peaceful interactions can be cultivated experiences by interacting socially in a way that promotes each other’s well-being and uplifts each other. It demands the skill of responsive interaction, an appreciation ritual that encourages people to celebrate one another irrespective of their status difference.

Perhaps, experiences of peaceful interactions remain the same across the spectrum, because humans as social beings crave for respect and dignity. The following interaction shares a degree of familiarity with the my own experience stated above.

5.2. Interaction 2

It was a typical rainy day of the month of July. I navigate my way to the bazaar downhill after an early morning hailstorm which has peppered the hills in a wintry white look. Sheltering myself from a stray rain shower in an eatery, I meet a former colleague from an organization I was earlier associated with. He was surprised to see me again.

AK:

Good morning Mr. Jim!!

Jim:

Good morning Madame. It is such a pleasure meeting you again. You have changed a lot. It was difficult to recognize you.

Jim:

Madame, but how do I see you here again?

AK:

I am here for my doctoral research with the school.

Jim:

Ohhh!!! That’s nice!! It is a good school. Glad to see you again!

AK:

(With an inquisitive undertone) But why is it a good school?

Jim:

I worked with this school for some years in the 90ʹs. It was good being with them. The staff used to carry their own stuff; they did not bother us. But that is not the case with our organizations. (He meant Indian governmental organizations, where he is currently employed)

AK:

Hmmm … .

Jim:

It feels good to be respected and treated well!!

(Source: From researcher’s field notes)

This brief moment referred by Jim might seem like a random act of kindness but surely has the potential to ignite inspiration, which can be socially contagious because as Foucault says “agency is such that people may know what they do and why they do what they do but what they don’t know is what they do does”.¹⁰ The agency interjected (of school staff) in this case violates the dictates of the fossiled social structure by redefining the social culture and recalibrating normative social distance. The agency (school staff) left behind a vehement appropriation of space of dignity for Jim. This act of kindness bestowed dignity as a gift to Jim. The school staff’s action was a prestation, a gift of social structure, because it did not let social hierarchy consolidate. It resonates with Reardon’s understanding of the value and the purpose of Peace Education’ to be transformation of social order and its implicit pattern of thought (Snauwaert, 2012). Jim’s memory might be in stark contrast to his present situation given that he has been working with the cradle of Indian bureaucracy and it’s an open secret that it is hierarchical, with an impressionable normative social distance.

In both the instances above, social distance is inscribed in words, body language, and gestures as they work as “significant symbols” (Mead, 1934, pp. 268–9). Symbols help actors in interpreting meanings in the situation and further conveying the meanings to others. Symbols determine the kind of social meanings people attach with actions. Therefore, interactions have to be understood from the point of view of the symbols because it involves subjective meanings of the actor which are socially constructed and culturally shared. “The cognitive schema through which we know, interpret and actively assemble our world is a social construct” (Bourdieu, 1996, foreward)

Significant symbols—like the language of social proximity—which include words, gestures and body language, acknowledge humans as “humans” while deepening relationships with ritual and recognition. Such simple, yet significant, rituals are an essential means of humanization. But, locating peace in this most ritualized part of the social interactions also demands it to grow beyond the necessities of lip service of courtesy or pro-social behavior (the school staff in Interaction 2 and Tom in Interaction 1). Social interactions rooted in peace logic must go beyond the ritualized embodiments to a transformative spirit. It demands to transgress the norms which domesticate consciousness. The sonority of body language occurs when the consciousness deepens. Hence, such emotional reciprocity can only be fostered by building inner resources.

These situations also subscribe to Mead’s interpretation of human behavior in society. Mead believes, and these episodes of interaction reinforce, that individuals are genuine actors who are capable of interpreting their social reality and initiating creative action. So, despite human behavior being culturally shaped by “ME”, actors are nonetheless capable of taking a deliberate stand towards the culture and give it meaning; shaped by “I”,—rising above an institutionalized individual (Mead, 1934, p. 210). Individuals can innovate differently from the established norms and values of society because “there is action, history, preservation, and transformation of structures only because there are agents” (Bourdieu, 1996, p. 38).

“But institutionalization of the action occurs whenever there is a reciprocal typification of habitualized actions by different types of actors” (Berger & Luckmann, 1966, p. 72). In Interaction 1, my behavior was a circumscribed social, in tandem with the exchange rules which are determined by the normative expectation of the others or the generalized role performance or the larger structure. It is behavior “in line with the expectations impinging because of the norms contained in roles contained in statuses through which one enacts his/her social self” (Galtung, 1969, p. 177). On the other hand, the social action of Tom in Interaction 1 and the staff of the school in Interaction 2, embody creative, active and assertive aspects of human action. Their agency is reflective of such a beneficiary of the social structure, who may themselves “have severe and sincere doubts about that structure and prefer to see it changed, even at their own expense” (p. 180).

However, it must also be acknowledged that significant symbols if extended as mere rituals- without any substantial depth to them can rather prove to be counter-intuitive and just ways of “impression management”, thereby only maintaining the social distance. Stephan et al. (2010), notes politeness as a form of impression management and an expression of high social distance. But Bourdieu terms this non-intentional but rather instinctive downplay of distances in cross-class encounters as “strategies of condescension” of elite behavior (Bourdieu, 1984, p. 472). Bourdieu (1989) calls “strategies of condescension”, as those undertaken by “agents who occupy a higher position in one of the hierarchies of objective space symbolically deny the social distance between themselves and others, a distance which does not thereby cease to exist, thus reaping the profits of the recognition granted to a purely symbolic negation of distance” (p. 16). This affirms the growing recognition that elite behavior has shifted from being snobbish to omnivore (Jarness & Friedman, 2017)

We next explore the tacit dimension of social distance through my own position as I experience the machinery of social constraint as an ethnographer. The interactional relationship between the ethnographer and the institution was marked by institutional expectations of gatekeeping. The inhibiting factors to the study were the gaps between the institution’s outlook towards the research vis-à-vis its “provided” versus the “desired” impetus to operationalize the research. In other words, gatekeeping reflected in the extent to which the ethnographer “could” and to the extent the ethnographer was “allowed” to penetrate into the understanding of the school and its community.

Control on flow of information or exchange of ideas between the ethnographer and the larger community was exercised by the gatekeepers. The gatekeepers sought to control the flow of information by acting as intermediaries between the ethnographer and the school community, largely determining what was appropriate for exposure and disclosure. These acts of control and measurement were reflected in the social distance maintained between the gatekeepers and the researcher. This naturally affected not only the nature of the gatekeepers’ relationship with the ethnographer but my relationship with the school community as well. It affected the nature of engagement and relationships I had with the larger school community because “social actions carry their own social cost”. Social actions affect social distance and, in the loop, this distance affects interactions, i.e., social distance influences and is in turn influenced by the social perception of co-actors and observers (i.e., the school community). Mistrust, suspicion and often not being sympathetic is a natural consequence of gatekeeping reflecting that power is negatively related to experience of socially engaging relationships (Magee & Pamela, 2013). This, quite naturally, featured as a constraining aspect of my social closeness with community members. Thus, the act of gatekeeping charged with meaning, creates challenges and ambiguities in possibilities of interactions with the community. Subtle forms of resistance and restrain featured in my interactions with the community members to an extent that it was difficult for the school community to reciprocate my effort and, at times, even the community’s desire to associate with me from outside the purview of my presence as a researcher. Breaking through the barriers of suspicion and distance (if any) only came with time.

Thus, in this ethnographic setting, gatekeeping reinforced my presence as an “outsider” and as someone not an intrinsic part of the community. All possible visual cues, which might be indicative of my inclusion in the community, were avoided by the gatekeepers. For example, the school’s decision not to provide me with accommodation on campus not only limited the opportunities of sustained observation of the “imponderabilia of actual life” (Malinowski, 1922, p. 21) but also in building of proximate relationships with the school community thus exacerbating the social distance. Hence, social distance kept through acts of gatekeeping affected both, the “researched” as well as the “researcher”.

In the following instance, I initiate a conversations on individual terms with the school staff, seeking participation in the survey questionnaires for the research. It was a perfect autumn morning with crystal clear azure skies, bright and warm sun, symphonies of fluttering leaves and a whiff of approaching winter. While the school is abuzz with the annual book fair being organized by the school’s library network, I encounter a staff teacher Ms Kavita. My relationship with her has been friendly and warm since the beginning. Based on my good rapport with her, I approach her with the request to fill up the survey questionnaire, but her response is reflective of a sense of skepticism; that she is s unsure of whether it is something “safe” to be shared with the researcher without the acknowledgement and approval of the school leadership.

5.3. Interaction 3

AK:

Hi Ms. Kavita! How are you?

Kavita:

Good … Good … . (While she scans through the bookstalls)

AK:

Can I request you to fill up the survey questionnaire; Ms Benz must have sent it to you?

Kavita:

What all does it entail? And would that be anonymous?

AK:

They are just some questions about your teaching experience at the school. And yes, of course, it’s all anonymous!! So, no worries there.

Kavita:

(In brushing off-tone) Okay, I will see … .

AK:

(In a hopeful requesting tone) yeah … I will be really glad if you could fill that up.

Kavita:

Yeah. Got it. I mean … Thank you for the information … I will see if I can do that!!

(Source: From researcher’s field notes)

Such experiences of social distance result from encounters of “otherness” and are markers of the ethnographer’s foreignness in the school. This results in a variety of negative emotions to funnel through the social exchange processes during the period of study. This aspect becomes important because it is the social positionalities associated with power which lead an individual to feel a variety of negative or (positive) emotions (Lawyer & Thye, 1999) because structural violence is often gets recorded as psychological violence. Hence, affective gratification is an important aspect of a given actor’s psychic nature because just like material needs, social actors also have psychological needs. It is human actor’s need to feel valued, safe, belonged, and cared for. Unrealized actualization of self, in this case through social interactions, hampers the psychological and emotional well-being of the actors possibly manifesting as psychological violence and thereby only further exacerbating social distance.

Physical settings are a medium/vehicle to realize social distance as physical space is socially constructed. The décor and the layout also tend to serve as topography for how distance is experienced or perceived to be experienced because “social space gets manifested in physical space functioning as a metaphor of social order” (Bourdieu, 2018, p. 107). The inert fact of the placement of the furniture and layout of the room carries embedded meanings. While a traditional static setting is indicative of power and hierarchy, welcoming spaces dis-credit the views of domination and hegemonic beliefs while lending themselves to social dispositions. Hence, physical space is important because it goes hand-in-hand with how social distance is experienced. Against this background, it must be noted that elite boarding schools which are marked by architectural extravagance and spatial elegance carry a “subliminal message” which defines the social climate of the school (Cookson & Persell, 1985, p. 47). It is this social climate which is fundamental to how students experience an elite schooling. The following interaction is reflective of how physical space is fundamental towards formation of a social space.

5.4. Interaction 4

AK:

What are the most positive variables of a school culture?

Camilla:

I think the social; the physical structure of a school has a huge impact on ethos. You see if our schools are designed and built as factories, or clinically efficient corporate structures, we will diminish the ability for relationships to form.

If our schools have physical environments that lend themselves to social engagement and interaction … because in this sense I really believe very much in Vygotsky’s view that all higher mental faculties, including memory, are mediated in a social setting. So the social setting in schools for me is absolutely critical. The physical design, the ambiance, I think these are very important.

Secondly, I think times when schools collectively meet together, assemblies, home rooms, advisor groups; I think these are also fundamental in terms of determining ethos. I don’t think ethos is determined by rules and regulations so much as by the social context, the social setting.

At the one level we think that these are the things that make a difference. Whether it’s discipline, or rules, or policies, but actually the things that really make a difference can sometimes be tacit, and under the ground. So for me, the social setting, the communal engagement, and the examples set by adults. Like Young said, a child learns by what the adult is, not by what they say. So I think that’s fundamental in terms of ethos.

(Excerpt from a recorded interview Camilla, member in the leadership of the school)

Class room infrastructure is another visual medium through which power is transacted. Teachers require a method and the architecture to amplify and project their power (Jones, 1990, p. 63). Misoska and Loader (2021) shows that how school spaces can be used to maintain normative social distance. Pedagogic routines in classroom settings offer teachers to exercise physical control over bodies reflected in sitting, talking, walking, responding to questions, raising questions, standing up to greet, accounting to repetitive exercise of power. Hence, the setting affects the order and pattern of interactions which naturally affects the social distance between the teacher and the taught. What transpires is a description of an iota of social reality but with an impact of greater significance for calculating the social distance in interactional space.

It’s a fluid time in between classroom hours. The school bell rings leaving the high school building hallway abuzz with activity. Conversations, the noise, the chatter inside the building are in much contrast with the melancholy of the mist surrounding the hills outside. The movement of students and staff has made the hallway come alive. Exiting myself from a classroom observation session, I encounter Mr. Mark. As we engage ourselves in a conversation, a sophomore girl comes running towards him. Arms wide open; she hugs him with a cheerful shout out “We won, we won, we won!!” and quickly makes her way out past me. She came in as quickly as she went away. Her hug was not measured by control. This informality finds expression in her body language as well. The teacher appeared almost in conjunction with the student’s behavior. He also reciprocated with due fervour.

(Source: From researcher’s field notes)

Although, the enthusiasm of the moment was perhaps more context-dependent, yet it was illustrative of the social proximity in the teacher–pupil relationship; in contrast with “vertical distance situation of a teacher–pupil relationship” (Bogardus, 1928, p. 597).

When I arrived it was a cultural shock. Even though I have lived in India all my life, coming to this school was completely different from anything I had ever experienced before. Being friends with teachers, not calling them mam and sir, saying “what’s up?” to my principal and having my opinions heard. Never heard of that”

(Excerpt from a student’s graduation speech)

These interactions are a symbolic celebration of the congenial relations and the fraternity which most often is reflected in the social distance between the teacher-student in the school. The pastoral care environment perhaps adds to the fraternization of the bond. However, this was largely determined by the informality and freedom which prevails in the school which is homologous to the expectations, dispositions and background of the students (Bourdieu & Passeron, 1977). This undefined social interaction is evidence of a strong, democratic, functional and humane relationship between the teacher and the taught; rooted in teacher’s understanding of the social situations of the taught (Bogardus, 1929).

At the same time, it is also essential to understand that free spaces at times may conceal more than they reveal. Free interactions might only be a visible celebration but true connections are determined by the strength of the bond. The following situation offers an insight into the measure of social distance on the other end of the spectrum.

5.5. Interaction 5

AK:

So has the new school dining kind of changed the dynamics?

Camilla:

Yes, absolutely.

AK:

I haven’t seen the previous one, what was it like?

Camilla:

Oh, it was like Charles Dickens, tables and benches all in rows.

AK:

Now it has a cafe kind of a feeling?

Camilla:

Yes, it was functional. But it was not … I said I want a dining hall that looks more like a wine bar, because you want people to hang out, to engage. Why? Because the social dynamics are fundamental.

(Source: Excerpt from a recorded interview)

Puffing my way up from one hillside to another, I approach the dining hall of the school. The newly done dining caters to its diverse population of the school with an array of cuisines to satisfy their palate. So much so it appears that the school meals could be a potential academic subject by themselves, offering students to digest a lesson in culture as well. This edible education has a potential to build up a sense of appreciation for different cultures, besides turning students into fine diners. It is this “habitus” which the students internalize, and which help them navigate elite spaces with much comfort, confidence and belongingness (Khan, 2011; Lareau, 2003).

Queuing myself to the food counters, I encounter Allen.

5.6. Interaction 6

Allen:

So do you like the food here?

AK:

Yes, It’s quite a spread they offer but I miss home-cooked food.

Allen:

Now they have made it like a restaurant. Earlier, there used to be a partition for the staff. Though earlier also staff used to sit with the students but then they had the luxury of having a quiet corner to themselves.

AK:

I used to like it. I would love to have food in quiet.

Allen:

Earlier we all (staff) use to have food together. The leadership use to sit with us during lunch. I could talk anything to them but now I can’t!

AK:

But I have seen them sitting anywhere randomly.

Allen:

But they are still surrounded by their circle only.

(Source: From researcher’s field notes)

This reveals an interesting viewpoint from social distance perspective. The new dining hall was “intended” to be socially functional (Reference Interaction 5), but as per Allen’s perspective, it has not been able to bring social proximity amongst the social actors of the school. The physical space is manifested a social space in an ensemble of invisible relationships. Social actors sharing social proximity are found to be seated (either by choice or by necessity) in physical proximity with each other. This happens because social positionalities of the social actors are expressed in the “commonality of set of practices and appreciation of such practices through an iterative experience” of habitus¹¹ (Bourdieu, 1989). Gaztambide-Fernández (2009a) shows how “spatial arrangements naturalize social distinctions” by making social distance appear organic, noticeable, yet unspoken about. In Allen’s perspective, the physical structure of the dining hall is only representative of a symbolic degeneration of social distance and not that the social distance ceases to exist.¹² Rather, it takes the form of invisible habitual and cultural distance (Karakayali, 2009)

5.7. Interaction 7

A spatial analysis of protected spaces serves as an apparatus for measuring and evaluating signals of control, authority, leadership style as ostentation of physical space gets translated into ostentation of power, helping maintain normative social distance. Personal and protected space largely gets determined by the orientations of the person inhabiting that physical space. I enter the office of Ms. Dena. The very first impression of this office of power is a free-flowing, fluid and welcoming space. Her work station (with no symbolic extravagance), at a corner adjoining a huge one-way glass window offers her a spectacle of the buzz of the school. She tells me that from this window she counts about 20 students and notes how many are smiling at a given time. She also takes note of when people seem to have frowning brows or something, indicating to me that social health of the school community is an important consideration for her and perhaps for the school. As I absorb the configuration of the surroundings, I observe that the majority of the space in the room is left for others, indicative of the importance of others for engagement with in her office. This dynamic utilization of space with chairs placed in a circular setting, gives guests, staff, and colleagues coming in not only physical but social proximity i.e. a sense of equality, warmth, togetherness, and accessibility. This setting has the potential to alter the fundamental aspects of interaction and the experience of social distance. By undermining the archetypical face-forward orientation of an interaction order, it gives individuals a better sense of partnership while improving engagement. Otherness gets better addressed in spaces that feel more comfortable, familiar and accessible.

Spaces are anchored by personal beliefs and hence tend to mirror the same. Not only physical spaces but the cartographic embodiment of the physical space carries explanatory significance in terms of distance experienced. Mapping the “map” of the school was suggestive of underlying reflections. One weekly staff meeting introduced a new map of the school. In a brochure-like format, the school map was presented to the audience, not just as a map or as an organizational chart, but the rubrics of the map in the form of a “tree” that reflected it as an integrated organic whole, breathing with life and relationships, in concurrence with the school’s philosophical framework. Presenting it in the form of a symbol of a tree (which also represents the school’s emblem) turned it into a harmonious functional symbol of interdependence and communitarian unity. The text box suggestive of guidelines on how to use the map read:

“We see this map as more helpful than a traditional organization chart, in terms of helping you understand the relationship between different areas of the school. At first glance, you may find the information on this guide overwhelming! If so, you are not alone. With more than a century years of history, the school is a complex, living system that takes time to understand”.

(Documentary evidence)

Presentation of this sort is a symbolic embodiment of the spirit of “community” which matters most to the school. The brochure very prominently reads “school and its Community” on its cover page suggesting social closeness amongst the ensemble of its physical structures. It is an intentional attempt to stage the structure of social relationships of the school Community to reinforce a sense of community’s universe of social ties. It is also an attempt to activate the school’s ideological aims as operative goals. This was part of consistent messaging extending to unfold schooling ideals reminding the community of the school’s core philosophical values and principles. But did it ring true with the community members?

5.8. Interaction 8

AK:

“What is your most lasting impression of the school?

Bryan:

The whiteness, the white American whiteness. North American I guess. Of how certain people get promoted, how certain teachers critique students of color. Just hierarchy of what is the idea of Christianity. But of course Christianity’s much larger than any single race, yes. If you notice majority of the leadership, they are all tall white men. They’re all in leadership positions. That’s it. You can take a picture of all the leaders in the school, and looked at it, and put all their demographics onto the side, you would see similarities. And of course, it’s like people trust their own”.

(Excerpt from a recorded interview with Brayan, a faculty at school)

This interaction highlights how a sense of difference is essential to Bryan’s understanding of relationships in the school. He feels socially distant despite Dena’s best efforts to construct a concrete visual evidence of social proximity. His persistence attention to the profile of the leadership of the school is to draw attention to the school’s relationship with “whiteness”. Bryan is indicative of discrimination of skin tone masked under the overarching idea of Christianity. This impression taps into his sensibilities as working of an insidious force of ideology. On the other hand, this invisible and inaudible, and often sublimated yet essential, cultural labor assigned to Indian administrative and ground staff further exacerbates this “consciousness” of separation.

“All they (the school) are breeding (Indians) is more chowkidars,¹³ more waiters, so they can continue to serve them in the fashion that they are used to”

(Excerpt from an interview with a renowned literary figure in the town)

Similar voices indicating social distance emerged in a student body meeting with newly appointed board members. It is a democratic classroom where the board member as “problem poser” is encouraging students to critically analyze their life world at the school. As a problem poser, the students are “encouraged to perceive critically the world with which and in which they find themselves” (Freire, 1970, p. 83). Students are vocal in sharing their disappointment of how they don’t find themselves in an inclusive presence in the school: “see representation and inclusion are not same. I feel Christianity is given more importance” says a student body member. Reacting very politely, says another student body member, “but Christians feel they not represented well in a Christian minority school”. These deliberations do indicate that the school is successful in inculcating not just a spirit of criticality but critical thinking amongst students, a vital peace skill, by encouraging them to reflect on their own dominance.

This strongly resonates with Krishnamurti’s understanding that if any collective identity (especially religious and/or linguistic) is promoted through education; it would potentially diminish its capacity to educate for peace. The natural process of “othering” happens with those who have different identities those being promoted or protected (Krishnamurthi, 1953). The visual of students sitting in that room together deliberating these understanding suggests that the physical distance has shrunk but social distance has not.

6. Conclusion

The article introduces social distance as a unit of analysis in Peace Education research. The article examines aspects of social distance from a peace and violence perspective by analyzing how diverse social positions interact in the school. This is understood by deconstructing interactions as a negotiation between social structures and human agency in a variety of social situations. By mapping a set of social interactions, the article helps offer an understanding about how asymmetries in power result in asymmetric social distance in social relationships. Social proximity is a precondition towards possibilities of peaceful interactions with individuals in positions of power who are also better capacitated to shorten this distance. As social distance influences affective content of social interactions, it recognizes social distance as a variable significant from a peace and violence perspective. Hence, questions of vertical social relations affecting social distance are integral to justifying arguments of peace and violence in social interactions. This also reaffirms the faith that Peace Education is a question of method or forms of communication than content (Haavelsrud, 2008).

The forgoing analysis also offers us an understanding that agency is central to reducing social distance. Reducing social distance demands cultivation of a transformative agency and attends to the outcomes of Peace Education (Bajaj, 2018). In subordination, it involves negotiating structural constraints, contesting social reproduction through schooling, questioning structures of power, questioning knowledge construction, the mechanisms of domination and systemic inequalities. In super-ordination, it involves questioning one’s owns privileges and norms established by wider social society, to value alternative social norms and most importantly enabling dissent. However, are those in positions of authority ready to do that? While critical thinking and agency are skills in vogue, in educational discourse, it is not easy to practice and enable agency which offers a critical analysis of power relations, challenges established structures, which interrupts and transforms unequal conditions especially in schools, which being a disciplinary site, act in a restrictive context and undermine the ability to act.

On another hand, this reduced social distance based on omnivorousness thesis become elites’ own mark of distinction. This elite ease has got embodied as an interactional resource, skilling them interact beyond social boundaries of class(Khan, 2011). This dilution of social distance can be seen as an expression of downplaying the differences which “helps hide durable inequality by naturalizing socially produced distinctions” (ibid:16).It preserves hierarchies while just making them invisible (ibdi:57).Therefore, the (re)production of elitism remains unchallenged by being masked under the anti-oppressive communication. This display of “pedestrian elite” becomes another means of social reproduction and thus fortifying the very process of becoming elite.

However, a larger question in the educational context remains as to the meaning of this “informality” provided by the new humanitarians against the traditional disciplinary role holder? Does this help dilute the school as a disciplinary site? Does this social proximity juxtapose the idea of good discipline? Does this diminish the capacities of a residential school like Rolland as a “total institution”? Goffman’s (1961) understanding of “total” offers a sense of mistreatment, a complete control over bodies, negligible freedom and a strict disciplinary culture. This understanding seems too drastic and less applicable in this case.

Yet, the “total” re-emerges in Foucault’s concept of “governemntality”. It affirms that power needs to be filtered through structures homologous to subjects in order to be effective. Subjects should to taught to be compliant and participating in the structures. It exploits the same agency it tends to foster as it capitalizes on the human desire to govern itself. Foucault says that state’s disciplinary power “cannot be exercised without knowing the inside of people’s minds, without exploring their souls, without making them reveal their innermost secrets. It implies knowledge of the conscience and an ability to direct it” (Foucault, 1982, p. 783)

Hence informal pedagogy provides for just a new kind of grip. It now asserts its power through more intimate but also more insidious way as it works on “social genesis of the cognitive structures” of its elite subjects (Bourdieu, 1996, p. 2). Informality has powerful attraction because it is able to satisfy the longing of the actors to be part of the system which is depersonalized. This informal pedagogy proves to be a more intrusive pedagogy than a disciplinary one, more enveloping and more blanketing pedagogy in terms of the fact that it’s powerful but not aggressive. It’s powerful because it is tacit and non-repressive. Hence, in this space Peace Education ideals are still negotiating the structures of violence through the systemic markers available in the school.

Disclaimer

All the references about institutional actors, structures used in this article are pseudonyms besides the expression of self as researcher/ethnographer to protect the confidentiality of the institution and the participants. No potential competing interest was reported by the author.

Acknowledgements

I thank Dr L.N. Venkataraman, Dr. Meenakshi Thapan and Dr. Nedim Karakayali for reading and commenting on the earlier version of this article.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

The author received no direct funding for this research.

Notes on contributors

Ashmeet Kaur

Ashmeet Kaur is a peace education researcher and an educator. She works towards institutionalisation of peace education in K-12 schools. Presently, she is a fellow with International Rescue Committee, New York. Her doctoral research works deconstructs institutionalisation of peace education through an ethnographic study of an elite school in India. Her research interests include Peace Education, Decolonisation of Peace Education, Elite Schooling and Qualitative Research Methods. Her research works have been presented at platforms like Emerging Researcher’s Conference, EERA; British Sociological Association, UK; George Arnold Peace Conference, Germany and alikes.Ashmeet Kaur

Notes

1. Ashmeet Kaur, TERI School of Advanced Studies, New Delhi, India. Email: [email protected].

2. In personal communication on 29 November 2019 in Chandigarh, India.

3. The average teacher-student ratio mandated by GoI is 1:30 (MhRD Report, 2017) (. Accessed on 17 January 2020).

4. A set of guiding documents for the school and its educational philosophy.

5. Advanced Placement (AP) is a program in the United States and Canada created by the College Board which offers college-level curricula and examinations to high school students.(https://ap.collegeboard.org/). Accessed on 17 January 2020).

6. International Baccalaureate (IB), formerly known as the International Baccalaureate Organization (IBO), founded in 1968 is an international educational foundation headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland. The IB offers an education for students from age 3 to 19, with four programmes which focus on teaching students critical and independent thinking, and inquiry with care and logic. To teach these programmes, schools must be authorized by the IB (https://www.ibo.org/about-the-ib/). Accessed on 17 January 2020).

7. According to Weber, Ideal type is a methodological tool. It is a way of investigating selectivity. An ideal type is formed by the one-sided accentuation of one or more point of view and by synthesis of great many diffused, discreet, more or less present and occasionally absent concrete individual phenomenon, which are arranged according to those one-sidedly emphasized viewpoints into a unified analytical construct. In other words, reality is looked from a certain point of view (told by the researcher) and build a model of reality highlighting only those elements which are relevant from only that point of view (Weber, 1949:90).

8. “A thick description does more than record what a person is doing. It goes beyond mere fact and surface appearances. It presents detail, context, emotion, and the webs of social relationships that join persons to one another. Thick description evokes emotionality and self-feelings. It inserts history into experience. It establishes the significance of an experience, or the sequence of events, for the person or persons in question. In thick description, the voices, feelings, actions, and meanings of interacting individuals are heard” (Denzin, 1989:83).

9. This is in contrast with mainstream discussions of paradigm of domination and social distance which has been limited to caste specific factors in India.

10. Quote from Michael Foucault’s Madness and Civilization: A History of Insanity in the Age of Reason published in 1961.

11. Habitus implies “the internalized structures, schemes of perceptions and actions common to all members of the same group” (Bourdieu, 1977, p. 86). It is formed by socialization, which guides actions and practices of the community. Habitus is thus considered by Bourdieu as “a socially structured situation” which defines “agent’s interests, objective functions and the subjective motivations of their practices” (p. 77). Internalization takes place when the objective structures get embedded in actor’s unconscious and comes to regulate their behavior, actions, habits and situations. These actions that result from the deeply interiorized structural rules, get transmitted to the whole community and are carefully harmonized by all the members of the group.

12. Social distance in India is usually marked by structural constraints of caste reflected in practice of commensality (Dumont, 1980).

13. Chowkidars means security guards in Hindi language.