Beyond the white norm: the use of qualitative methods in the study of black youths’ schooling in England

There is at present in England great confusion concerning the schooling of black youths. Much conventional “race‐relations” research is underpinned by models of social pathology that perceives the youths as a “problem.” While carrying out a study of black students, of Afro‐Caribbean and Asian parentage, qualitative research pointed to the need to re‐conceptualise their experience of schooling within a framework that moves beyond liberal assumptions of a de‐racialised, de‐gendered and de‐politicised school system. Placing students at the centre of the research enables us to see how school for black youths is part of a wider alienating response to them that results in their experience of a “different reality” from the white population. In response to this, the students have creatively developed a number of survival strategies. This article explores the implications of the relative autonomy of methodology from wider theoretical and substantive concerns. In this largely autobiographical account the dialectical nature of ethnography is illustrated, with the theoretical#shconceptual analysis grounded in the data gathering process.     

Where words collide: social class,schools and linguistic discontinuity

The prestige accorded to standard language varieties, particularly within the field of education, together with language management role of schools with respect to the variety and the extent to which linguistic differences construct discontinuous relationships between the school and specific social groups provide the rationale for this paper. This qualitative study, based on a friendship focus group design, was conducted with two groups of 12-year-old children from contrasting ‘ideal type’, socio-economic groups over the period of one school year. Findings outline specific practices where the linguistic expectations and demands within school-space create different implications and outcomes for middle-class and working-class children as a result of their linguistic experiences in non-school space. The implications of these linguistic interactions on patterns of engagement with the school among the children in the sample are also considered.     

Schooling,masculinity and class analysis: towards an aesthetic of subjectivities

The retreat from social class within the sociology of education has been accompanied by the intensification of socio-economic and cultural inequalities. This paper seeks to draw upon cultural analyses of social class by addressing a classificatory shift of white English working-class males, who have moved from an ascribed primary socio-economic status to an embodied aesthetic performance. We examine the reconfiguration of social class within state schools and historical and contemporary shifting images of white working-class males within the education literature. We suggest the need to engage with a multi-dimensional explanatory frame in order to understand how working-class young men now inhabit a new cultural condition in the post-colonial urban space of inner-city schools. This shift is best captured by exploring the simultaneous articulations of multiple categories of difference – including class, gender, ethnicity, sexuality and generation – in relation to contemporary representations of social class.     

Geometrical effects in microfluidic-based microarrays for rapid, efficient single-cell capture of mammalian stem cells and plant cells

In this paper, a detailed numerical and experimental investigation into the optimisation of hydrodynamic micro-trapping arrays for high-throughput capture of single polystyrene (PS) microparticles and three different types of live cells at trapping times of 30 min or less is described. Four different trap geometries (triangular, square, conical, and elliptical) were investigated within three different device generations, in which device architecture, channel geometry, inter-trap spacing, trap size, and trap density were varied. Numerical simulation confirmed that (1) the calculated device dimensions permitted partitioned flow between the main channel and the trap channel, and further, preferential flow through the trap channel in the absence of any obstruction; (2) different trap shapes, all having the same dimensional parameters in terms of depth, trapping channel lengths and widths, main channel lengths and widths, produce contrasting streamline plots and that the interaction of the fluid with the different geometries can produce areas of stagnated flow or distorted field lines; and (3) that once trapped, any motion of the trapped particle or cell or a shift in its configuration within the trap can result in significant increases in pressures on the cell surface and variations in the shear stress distribution across the cell’s surface. Numerical outcomes were then validated experimentally in terms of the impact of these variations in device design elements on the percent occupancy of the trapping array (with one or more particles or cells) within these targeted short timeframes. Limitations on obtaining high trap occupancies in the devices were shown to be primarily a result of particle aggregation, channel clogging and the trap aperture size. These limitations could be overcome somewhat by optimisation of these device design elements and other operational variables, such as the average carrier fluid velocity. For example, for the 20 μm polystyrene microparticles, the number of filled traps increased from 32% to 42% during 5–10 min experiments in devices with smaller apertures. Similarly, a 40%–60% reduction in trapping channel size resulted in an increase in the amount of filled traps, from 0% to almost 90% in 10 min, for the human bone marrow derived mesenchymal stem cells, and 15%–85% in 15 min for the human embryonic stem cells. Last, a reduction of the average carrier fluid velocity by 50% resulted in an increase from 80% to 92% occupancy of single algae cells in traps. Interestingly, changes in the physical properties of the species being trapped also had a substantial impact, as regardless of the trap shape, higher percent occupancies were observed with cells compared to single PS microparticles in the same device, even though they are of approximately the same size. This investigation showed that in microfluidic single cell capture arrays, the trap shape that maximizes cell viability is not necessarily the most efficient for high-speed single cell capture. However, high-speed trapping configurations for delicate mammalian cells are possible but must be optimised for each cell type and designed principally in accordance with the trap size to cell size ratio.     

邻家男孩已长大,乖乖“B宝”也变坏?

成长从来都不是件容易的事,特别是娱乐圈。这一次是"万人迷"——贾斯汀·比伯。自从将标志性的厚刘海换成一头凌乱短发开始,"B宝"便开始像脱缰的野马般"离经背道"起来:飙车、和狗仔队吵架、派对闻事、演唱会迟到、拒绝粉丝拥抱……种种顽劣行径,让媒体不禁揣测他是不是就要步小甜甜布兰妮和林赛罗翰后尘了。     

Cultural sensitivity: How important is it for effective home visits?

The implementation of home visits as a technique for involving parents has recently resurfaced. This educational trend has received additional emphasis as the nation attempts to meet the national education goals — particularly the first goal, which states, By the year 2000, all children will enter school ready to learn.Sally A. LaPoint is an Assistant Professor of Early Childhood Education at the University of South Carolina at Beaufort. She also administers the At Risk Early Childhood Family Initiative, located at the historic Penn Center on St. Helena Island, South Carolina. Gloria S. Boutte is an Assistant Professor, Kevin J. Swick is a Professor, and Mac H. Brown is an Associate Professor, Early Childhood Education, at the University of South Carolina, Columbia, S.C.     

Coming‐of‐age in 1980s England: reconceptualising black students’ schooling experience

Much conventional ‘race‐relations’ research of the schooling of black youth has tended to be underpinned by models of social pathology and subjective discrimination. It is argued here that there is a need to reconceptualise black youths’ schooling experience within a theoretical framework that moves beyond mono‐causal explanations and examines the multifaceted dimensions of racially structured English schooling. Placing students at the centre of the research enables us to see how schooling for black female and male youths is a central part of an alienating social response to them, that results in their experience of a structured ‘different reality’ from the white population. In response to this, they have, collectively and individually, creatively developed coping and survival strategies. These are examined here.