The anatomy of ability

ABSTRACT

“Ability” is one of the most common concepts underpinning education. Generally, “ability” is central to notions of a meritocratic society. More specifically, schools are allocated the right to define, categorise and label students according to their ability. While there has been ample discussion of the role of ability in the creation of curricula, teachers’ concepts of “ability” have remained relatively unstudied. Using semi-structured interviews with 236 primary and secondary school teachers, we examined how teachers use concepts of “ability”, identify its conceptual components in their discourses (its anatomy), and show how the internal structure of the concept relates to specific institutional functions. Teachers’ uses of “ability” prompted us to recount a too-often forgotten perspective – the reframing of our understanding of schools as institutions. Recognising the internal anatomy of ability, as it is used in schooling, helps us better understand its capacity to survive within a broader ecology of schooling, and the degree to which schools are designed to limit learning and legitimise consequent social exclusion.

KEYWORDS:

• Ability
• teacher beliefs
• schooling
• institutions
• ability grouping
• tracking

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. Compare Bowles and Gintis (1976) with Bourdieu and Passeron, (1977).

2. We should note the conceptual shift from ideology to discourse here. Without the space to fully explain it, we would point out that where earlier notions of ideology have been associated with a realist epistemology that overtly names what is false, the notion of discourse leaves that epistemological status ambiguous (or “problematised”). In this case, given the ongoing debates in relation to ability, IQ and the genome, the notion of discourse seems more apropos.

3. Whether or not these criticisms are accurate here depends entirely on the degree to which you believe that Bernstein's or Bourdieu's analyses actually explain the unequal power relations they describe.

4. We should note that the ethic of hard work is not exclusively Protestant, a Confucian variant is pervasive in much of Asia.

Additional information

Funding

This study was supported by the Australian Research Council and the New South Wales Department of Education and Training [Linkage grant number LP0453851].

Notes on contributors

James G. Ladwig

James G. Ladwig is an associate professor of Education in the School of Education at the University of Newcastle, Australia. His areas of interest include the sociology of education, philosophy of education, curriculum and educational policy studies. His is author of many articles and book chapters, with works published in Europe, South American, Asia, Australia and North America.

Amy McPherson

Dr. Amy McPherson is a lecturer in the Education Studies programme at the Australian Catholic University. Her research is interested in equity-based policy and the politics of educational justice in schooling.