Class Consciousness, Power, Identity, and the Motivation to Teach

Abstract

This article reports on a small-scale research project that explored the class-consciousness and working-class identities of a small group of student teachers in a university in south-east England. It describes and uses classic Marxist perspectives and sociological theory as an analytical framework to interpret the views of eight student teachers who provide their perspectives in a series of in-depth interviews. It is argued that these student teachers' identities and class experiences have sculpted their motivations to become teachers and that the form of class-consciousness that they exhibit ultimately acts to mould attitudes and perspectives that suit the objectives of twenty-first-century primary education in a capitalist society. Power relations are played out through the struggle between the potential social power that working-class-conscious teachers possess and the forms of professional labour power that are fostered through initial teacher education courses and the habitus from which these students emerge.