Willis Learning To Labour

‘Learning to Labour’ is an ethnographic study of twelve working class ‘lads’ between the years of 1972 and 1975. The observation of the ‘lads’ throughout their final year of secondary school and in to the workplace found that they intentionally rejected the rules and regulations of school, along with authority. Through doing so they found themselves in manual labour work after they had finished their school years, which also seemed to exclude them from the opportunities that education could have provided. However, society has changed quite a bit since Willis conducted this study. The account that Willis has created of the ‘laddish’ culture is still relevant today; although has been over generalised through his statements about culture, underachievement

They believed that conforming to the school system would not serve them in life. The ‘lads’ thought that doing well in school would only get them an office job, which they believed was a very ‘feminine’ job, and they believed would give them significantly less status in comparison to working in a manual ‘masculine’ job. The ‘lads’ realised that the meritocratic system wasn’t entirely forced, but also ‘penetrated’ the drawbacks that they had been faced with. the ‘lads’ were able to find a form of status within their working- class culture and achievement that they could not find during their time in education. The counter school culture that the ‘lads’ valued so much, offered practical skills as well as life experience and ‘street wisdom’ over academic knowledge. Willis argued that the ‘lads’ decided to fail school because they knew that they did not want to succeed within education. It was the mental work that they saw as a threat to their masculinity, as it was mandatory for them to obey to the school’s rules, but the ‘lads’ were willing to enter manual work despite this deceiving them in to a system that they will unlikely be able to get out of. Willis them argues that since the ‘lads’ has only made a partial commitment, as they were ‘unwitting conspirators’ in their

In many ways the ‘lads’ saw themselves as superior to the rest of the pupils at the school; especially the conformist boys (also referred to as the ‘ear holes’), girls, in addition to ethnic minorities. The ‘lads’ believe that they were better than the ‘ear holes’ as they were not conforming to the school’s authority, and they were still part of the school. The ‘lad’s’ oppression towards authority was expressed as a style and almost became a ritualistic part of their daily routine for the children who followed and believed in this counter- culture lifestyle; and from this their sexist and racist ideology and comments were not taken seriously. Despite that ‘lads’ believing that they were better than the conformist boys, they wanted to position themselves in jobs that were seen as sub-standard in regards to wage, skills and working conditions; and it is through rebelling during school that they ensured that they would go in to these forms of jobs. Although, through resisting and going against the school’s rules and ideology, the counter culture ensured that the ‘lads’ were destined for the jobs that the capitalist system required from them. The ‘lads’ placed themselves in the working- class group by rebelling against school. It is because of this that education is seen as a method of ‘working class reproduction’ for those students who appear to have accepted their fate of their