Acquiring Cultural Capital: Understanding Variation Between Parent and Student Stocks of Cultural Capital

• In Event: 151 - Section on Sociology of Education Refereed Roundtable Session and Business Meeting
  In Refereed Roundtable 60min: Table 05. Trends in Intergenerational Mobility and Influence: How Parents Matter

Abstract

Culture and educational outcomes are linked through the ways families interact with educational institutions. Specifically, middle class cultural norms encourage students to directly access and question authority figures, such as faculty and staff, leading to improved outcomes. Although students often learn these cultural skills and strategies from parents, research suggests less advantaged students can learn cultural attitudes and behaviors that align with dominant institutions if intentionally taught. This research largely assumes that cultural capital within less advantaged homes clashes with the cultural capital of upwardly mobile children. However, there is little research that aims to understand the cultural transmission process as it plays out in the family, considering both parents’ and students’ cultural predispositions and expectations. Through interviews with 35 low-income families, I investigate whether and to what degree students develop cultural capital while participating in a concerted cultural context (college access program) and in turn analyze how closely aligned the cultural toolkits parents are to their children. Preliminary findings suggest that alignment between parent and student stocks of cultural capital varies in unanticipated ways depending on the college scenario parents and students consider. Also, students from families with no college experience developed greater amounts of cultural capital than students from families with some college experience. Overall, this research suggests that the cultural capital transmission is not a straightforward process, but rather characterized by variation.

Author

• Denise Deutschlander, Univeristy of Virginia