Stigmatisation, identity, and educational exclusion in postindustrial societies: A qualitative synthesis of research from UK, Germany, and the Nordic countries

ABSTRACT

From existing research, we know segregation in poverty-intensive and immigrant-dense suburban spaces cannot be easily dissociated from educational inequality and exclusion. Our aim in this paper is to explore the link between urban segregation, social deprivation, migration and education by bringing together the findings from several ethnographic studies conducted in Europe. The starting point for our discussion is the findings from one meta-ethnogaphy which examined youth experiences of territorial stigmatisation, ethnification of poverty and educational inequality in economically challenged residential areas in Nordic cities. Our analysis has attempted to synthesise the findings from that study with those from ethnographies conducted in England and Germany. Results show how formal education is not only failing to contribute to the disruption of the processes which sustain social segregation, poverty and territorial stigmatisation but it is itself subjected to those. We argue that the value of education when this is conceptualised as commodity and promoted in the context of a market economy cannot but be at least partially dependent upon the inequality in its provision.

Notes

¹ Original quote: “Diese türkischen Schüler, die aus einem solchen Ghettomilieu kommen, sind in einer deutschen Schule verraten und verkauft, absolut chancenlos; da produzieren wir (sic) schon deren weiteren gesellschaftlichen Abstieg” (Schiffauer et al., 2002, p. 197).

² Students of the “Hauptschule,” which in Germany’s segregated school system is the secondary school meant to receive the most underachieving students.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Dennis Beach

Dennis Beach is Professor of Education at the Department of Education and Special Education at the University of Gothenburg and at the School of Librarian, Education and Informational Sciences at the University of Borås, Sweden. His main research interests are in the sociology of education, education policy and ethnography. He is the commissioned editor for the Wiley International Handbook on Ethnography of Education and former chief editor of the journal of Ethnography and Education.

Bettina Fritzsche

Bettina Fritzsche is Professor for General Education with an Emphasis on Qualitative Methods at the University of Education in Freiburg / Germany. In her last research project, she undertook a comparative ethnography of teacher-student-relationships in an English and a German primary school (funded by German Research Foundation). Her research interests lie in cultural-comparative educational research, reconstructive research on education, ethnography and videography of pedagogical practices and diversity in schools.

Michalis Kakos

Michalis Kakos is a Reader at the School of Education at Leeds Beckett University, UK. His research interests are in citizenship education, social inclusion and ethnography. In his current research he examines educational practices for the inclusion of migrant and refugee students in Europe.