Racism and bullying in rural primary schools in England: protecting white identities post-Macpherson
Racism and bullying in rural primary schools in England: protecting white identities post-Macpherson
This article examines how two primary schools in rural England with overwhelmingly White populations (of students and teachers) dealt with incidents of racist bullying in relation to their race equality policies. The data are drawn from in-depth interviews with parents, head teachers and teachers. The article draws on the work of Foucault to argue that students are situated in a ‘historical moment’ in which schools acknowledge racism formally and publicly, but this does not reflect their informal, private practices. Consequently, whilst systems are established that could respond to racist bullying, in practice these do not necessarily emerge in the school. A local discourse emerges that counters suggestions of racism by pointing to the existence of anti-racist systems and describing racism as something distanced geographically and historically from rural settings. White identities are both privileged and protected by this process whilst non-White students are disadvantaged
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Myers, Martin
7c2c36aa-1db3-425c-9bab-cbb5f7b70ee1
Bhopal, Kalwant
5ac0970e-1c42-4757-87df-6fdb6f826314
1 September 2015
Myers, Martin
7c2c36aa-1db3-425c-9bab-cbb5f7b70ee1
Bhopal, Kalwant
5ac0970e-1c42-4757-87df-6fdb6f826314
Myers, Martin and Bhopal, Kalwant
(2015)
Racism and bullying in rural primary schools in England: protecting white identities post-Macpherson.
British Journal of Sociology of Education, .
(doi:10.1080/01425692.2015.1073099).
Abstract
This article examines how two primary schools in rural England with overwhelmingly White populations (of students and teachers) dealt with incidents of racist bullying in relation to their race equality policies. The data are drawn from in-depth interviews with parents, head teachers and teachers. The article draws on the work of Foucault to argue that students are situated in a ‘historical moment’ in which schools acknowledge racism formally and publicly, but this does not reflect their informal, private practices. Consequently, whilst systems are established that could respond to racist bullying, in practice these do not necessarily emerge in the school. A local discourse emerges that counters suggestions of racism by pointing to the existence of anti-racist systems and describing racism as something distanced geographically and historically from rural settings. White identities are both privileged and protected by this process whilst non-White students are disadvantaged
Text
BJSE_rural_racism pdf.pdf
- Accepted Manuscript
More information
Accepted/In Press date: 5 May 2015
e-pub ahead of print date: September 2015
Published date: 1 September 2015
Identifiers
Local EPrints ID: 376787
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/376787
ISSN: 0142-5692
PURE UUID: 00ef9524-be9a-4e91-b517-08490ab2724e
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Date deposited: 11 May 2015 13:16
Last modified: 14 Mar 2024 19:50
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Author:
Martin Myers
Author:
Kalwant Bhopal
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