Precarious Mobility

• In Event: 3429 - Section on Sociology of Education Refereed Roundtables (1 hour)
  In Refereed Roundtable 60min: 11. Higher Education and Mobility

Abstract

Traditionally, sociology uses imagery of blocked mobility to describe the challenges low-income young people face as they try to get ahead. Blocked mobility analogies describe social structure as a barrier or a strong countervailing force that keeps aspirants stuck in place. College, it would seem, should be ground zero for blocked mobility in the United States: most low-income students now enroll in college, but only 11% earn bachelor’s degrees within six years (Engle and Tinto 2008; Snyder and Dillow 2015). Yet, drawing on data from a two-year ethnographic study about the transition to college for low-income Americans, I find that blocked mobility is a poor conceptual fit for describing my participants’ struggles in college. I propose an alternative concept, precarious mobility, showing that it more aptly captures what made college difficult for my participants. Their experiences suggest that successfully ascending pathways to upward mobility in the United States can demand an unintuitive approach characterized not by unbridled striving, but rather by abundant caution and self-denial.

Author

• Tom Wooten, Harvard University