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Social reproduction theory names at least two distinct traditions, one of which has a long history in educational research. Social reproduction theory in education emerged out of a concern with education's relationship to capitalist inequalities. By contrast, social reproduction feminism developed out of feminist interventions regarding the role of women's unpaid care-work in the reproduction of capitalism. In this paper, we suggest that the renewed energy surrounding social reproduction feminism provides an opportunity to revisit social reproduction theorizing in education. We review the fields' histories and ready the ground for an integrated framework. At the heart of this integration is a feminist analysis of reproductive labor in its contradictory relationship to capitalism. Expanding the analysis from the reproduction of capitalist relations to the reproduction of life under capitalism, this approach avoids the pitfalls of determinism and attends to students' participation and teachers' work in the contested labor of social reproduction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores 'decolonial love' as a pedagogy of care among 16 first generation Black immigrants enrolled in predominantly White four- year colleges in the United States and Canada. The term 'decolonial love' and extensions of this original conceptualization focus on radical self-love and resistance to colonial oppression. Scholars have also connected decolonial love with Black liberation movements. Through a narrative analysis of the Black immigrant student experiences in university, this article uses a decolonial and intersectional approach to explore how higher educational institutions can embrace a radical decolonial praxis. This approach affirms and supports Black identities in a climate of anti-Black racism. The paper will discuss implications for institutions and educators whose aim it is to decolonize their teaching practices.

This paper presents an account of the development of the sociology of education in the UK, by means of an analysis of papers published in the field's flagship journal, the British Journal of Sociology of Education and its US equivalent, Sociology of Education. In particular, we examine the representation of two contrasting traditions in addressing social inequalities: 'political arithmetic'; and the more recent 'cultural turn'. We find that in the UK, the cultural turn dominates; whilst in the US, it is political arithmetic which does so. In accounting for these contrasting national profiles, we argue that they are underpinned by divergent social infrastructure and organisation. We also discuss some of the implications of the dominance of the cultural turn in the UK, specifically in terms of the relationship between the fields of academic research and policy and the development of a cumulative evidence base to address social inequalities in education.

This paper examines the long-term association of family socioeconomic status (SES), educational, and labor force outcomes in a regional US longitudinal sample (N = 2264). The results offer insights into the mechanisms underlying the role of family SES in transitions from secondary schooling to early work experiences. It was found that the academic achievement gap associated with SES widens during secondary schooling due in part to course-level tracking. Family SES relates to college enrollment mainly via its association with academic gains in school, but also through family income and father’s occupational status. Family SES is weakly but significantly related to adult offspring’s earnings but more strongly related to occupational status. Educational qualifications and cognitive skills make independent contributions to the explanation of labor force outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Drawing on the construct of 'externalisation', this article examines how and why national policy experts use international knowledge in education policymaking. To understand how national policy experts deal with external source of information and expertise, I analysed the bibliographic references in policy documents prepared for an education reform and conducted network-cued interviews with local policy experts in the United States, South Korea, and Norway. The results revealed that national policy actors' utilisation of international knowledge varies across countries in terms of frequency, function, and level of engagement. The national differences suggest that each country has internalised the act of externalisation in the national policy process, reflecting its own policymaking and reform contexts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Farzana Shain reviews two books: (1) Seeing Race Again: Countering Colorblindness across the Disciplines, edited by Kimberle Williams Crenshaw, Luke Charles Harris, Daniel Martinez HoSang and George Lipsitz, 2019; and Education and Race: From Empire to Brexit, by Sally Tomlinson, 2019, Bristol, Policy. Shain begins this review by saying that we are now entering a new period for race relations in the US and UK. What Gramsci (1971) described as the 'morbid symptoms of the interregnum', can be seen in the revival of populist politics and renewed enthusiasm for nationalist policies across a number of countries as they respond to the impact of the global crash in 2008. Immigrants, those seeking asylum and minorities were the first to be blamed for the failures of flawed neoliberal financialisation policies and the wild speculation that went with it, which most economists now agree caused the crash (Bresser-Pereira 2010; Pettifor 2017). From the UK's Brexit referendum in 2016, the Trump election in 2016, to the nationalist policies pursued by Prime Ministers' Narendra Modi in India, Shinzo Abe in Japan, Jair Bolsanaro in Brazil, and President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Turkey, the minority groups within each nation-state are being blamed for declining living standards. Similar trends have been identified in the Philippines, China and India and in South Africa. Across European countries, recent elections have seen a rise in support for parties that promote xenophobic nationalism, economic protectionism and anti-immigration rhetoric. There has been a shift to right populism by existing parties in order to win votes (Inglehart and Norris 2016; Dennison and Geddes 2019) in the particularly volatile and uncertain economic and political context following the global crisis of 2008, the effects of which are still continuing -- this is the 'new interregnum'. Political analyses of events such as the Brexit referendum and Trump's victory in the US election in 2016, and a number of right populist parties' performances in the European elections in 2019, have noted that a significant proportion of the electorate was motivated to vote for anti-immigration parties not only because of economic insecurity but for long standing reasons of cultural insecurity, racial resentment and a marked hostility to 'others', most notably, Muslims and asylum seekers. These sentiments are captured within the cultural backlash theory of voting behaviour. Slogans such as 'Take Our Country Back' (Brexit, UK, 2016), 'Make America Great Again' (Trump election campaign 2016), and 'Get Brexit Done' (UK General Election 2019), do not explicitly mention race but speak to the cultural insecurities of many whites through plugging into a nostalgia for the 'good old days'. In this review, Shain asks the following questions: (1) What is the cultural nostalgia for? and what role does education play in feeding it? Shain identifies these questions as at the heart of the two books under review and she discusses those questions in detail in the sections of this review that follow. She notes that the books contain many rich examples of the methods that sustain white supremacy including the operation of apparently race and power-blind discourses such as merit and opportunity. Both books speak to these decolonising movements which are still in the process of agreeing what decolonise means and how it must be achieved. Shain closes the review by saying that while neither book offers a substantive conclusion chapter, both books make an invaluable contribution to current debates at a time when the right populism is on the rise again. She states that there are, inevitably, some gaps in the books however she found them extremely timely and will no doubt be referenced widely in interdisciplinary conversations focussed on challenging new racisms in education.

Building from the classic Wisconsin model of status attainment, this study examines whether a specific style of parenting, concerted cultivation, and a close friend’s school-related attitudes and behaviors mediate the relationship between a family’s socioeconomic status and their child’s academic achievement in the United States. Using a recursive path model on nationally representative panel data of high school students (N= 10,350), the results confirm a direct association between socioeconomic status and concerted cultivation. In addition, concerted cultivation and close friends are shown to mediate the relationship between a family’s socioeconomic status and their child’s academic achievement. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

A growing body of literature has begun to explore the individual identities, motivations, and school choices of middle-class, typically white, parents who choose to reside in socioeconomically and racially mixed central city neighborhoods. Drawing on qualitative research in three US cities, we argue that a focus on middle-class parents’ collective engagement in schooling is particularly important in under-resourced urban contexts. In these environments, we show, middle-class parents’ use of social networks often extends beyond basic information-sharing about school quality to encompass a range of activities undertaken with other families ‘like them’ who have also chosen to enroll their children in an urban public school. We find that, in some instances, middle-class parents’ collective actions can benefit an entire class or school. Yet in other instances, their activation of social capital can contribute to processes of social reproduction in urban schooling by excluding or marginalizing low-income students and their families. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

International graduate students’ occupational trajectories have rarely been studied, although many studies exist on their learning experiences in foreign universities. Based on 80 qualitative interviews, this article aims to understand how, where, and why these students obtain jobs in academe and corporations. I focus particularly on Korean professionals who received graduate degrees from US universities and who later obtained jobs in Korea or the United States. The theoretical component of this work is based on two important concepts – global cultural capital and global positional competition – both of which are seen to be based on a global hierarchy of academic degrees and professional knowledge. This study empirically tests and elaborates Phillip Brown’s three rules of inclusion and exclusion in global positional competition. By looking at international students’ transnational occupational trajectories, this study aims to understand how global education, transnational job opportunities, and social inclusion and exclusion interact in diverse ways. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article uses Chicago public school closings as a case study for the rise of mayoral control and the decline of democratic participation – two common responses to stiff competition from global markets – in urban public schools in the United States. In response to the 2013 Chicago decision to close 50 schools and move 30,000 students, this article presents an in-depth look into the history and theory behind the situation. By drawing upon the history of restrictive education and housing policies for African Americans in Chicago and using a ‘critical spatial perspective,’ the authors argue that school closings are highly counterproductive to the fight for the ‘right to the city.’ The authors argue for increased democratic participation for students, parents, and community leaders in urban school systems across the globe. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]