Table Of ContentMaking Spaces
Citizenship and Difference in Schools
Tuula Gordon, Janet Holland
and Elina Lahelma
Making Spaces: Citizenship and Difference in Schools
Also byTuula Gordon
FEMINIST MOTHERS
SINGLE WOMEN: On the Margins?
UNRESOLVED DILEMMAS: Women, Workand the Familyin the United States,
Europeandthe FormerSovietUnion (co-editorwithKaisa Kauppinen)
DEMOCRACY INONE SCHOOL? Progressive Educationand Restructuring
Also by[anet Holland
THE MALEINTHE HEAD (with CarolineRamazanoglu, SueSharpeand
RachelThomsoni
• SEX,SENSIBILITYAND THE GENDERED BODY(co-editor withLisa Adkins)
• SEXUALCULTURES(co-editor withfeffrey Weeks)
DEBATESAND ISSUESIN FEMINIST RESEARCHAND PEDAGOGY
(co-editorwith MaudBlair)
IDENTITY AND DIVERSITY:Genderand the ExperienceofEducation
(co-editor withMaudBlair)
• From thesamepublishers
Making Spaces: Citizenship
and Difference in Schools
Tuula Gordon
ProfessorofWomen's Studies andSoeialSeiences
DepartmentofWomen'sStudies
UniversityofTampere
Ianet Holland
ProfessorofSoeialResearchand
DireetoroftheSoeialSeieneeResearchCentre
FaeultyofHumanitiesandSoeialSeienee
SouthBankUniversity, London
and
Elina Lahelma
DepartmentofEdueation
UniversityofHelsinki
andSeniorFellow
AeademyofFinland
Consultant Editor:JaCampling
FirstpublishedinGreat Britain2000by
MACMILLANPRESS LTD
Houndmills,Basingstoke,HampshireRG21 6XS and London
Companiesand representativesthroughoutthe world
Acataloguerecordfor this bookisavailablefrom the BritishLibrary.
ISBN978-0-333-66441-4 ISBN978-0-230-28797-6(eBook)
DOI 10.1057/9780230287976
Firstpublishedinthe UnitedStatesofAmerica2000by
ST.MARTIN'S PRESS, INe.,
Scholarlyand ReferenceDivision,
175FifthAvenue,NewYork, N.Y.10010
ISBN978-0-312-22619-0
LibraryofCongressCataloging-in-PublicationData
Makingspaces:citizenshipand difference inschools/
TuulaGordon,JanetHolland,and ElinaLahelma.
p. cm.
1ncludesbibliographicalreferences(p. )and index.
ISBN978-0-312-22619-0(cloth)
I. Highschoolstudents- England- London- SocialconditionsCross
-culturalstudies. 2. High schoolstudents- Finland- Helsinki-
-SocialconditionsCross-culturalstudies. 3.Education,Secondary-
-England-LondonCross-cultural studies. 4. Education,Secondary-
-Finland-HelsinkiCross-cultural studies. 5.Sex differences in
education- England- LondonCross-culturalstudies. 6.Sex
differences ineducation- Finland- HelsinkiCross-culturalstudies.
1.Gordon.Tuula. 11. Holland.Janet. 111.Lahelma,Elina.
LC208.4.M35 1999
306.43- DC21 99--29160
CIP
©TuulaGordon.JanetHollandand ElinaLahelma2000
All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made
withoutwrittenpennission.
No paragraphofthis publicationmay be reproduced,copiedortransmittedsave with written
pennission or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and PatentsAct
1988, or underthe tenns ofany licence permitting limitedcopying issucd by the Copyright
LicensingAgcncy,90TottenhamCourtRoad,LondonWIPOLP.
Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to
criminal prosecutionand civilclaimsfordamages.
Theauthorshaveassertedtheirrightstobeidentifiedastheauthorsofthis workinaccordance
with theCopyright,Designsand PatentsAct 1988.
Thisbookisprintedonpapersuitableforrecyclingandmadefrom fully managedandsustained
forestsources.
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 I
09 08 07 06 05 04 03 02 01 00
Contents
Acknowledgements vi
Introduction: Do You Wanna Dance? 1
1 Individual Citizens 9
2 Space and Place for Markets: New Right and the
Restructuring of Education 23
3 Curricula for Nations 36
4 lnvitation to the Dance: Exploring Everyday Life
in Schools 52
5 One Two Three, OneTwo Three: the Official School 65
6 Stepping Here, SteppingThere: the Informal School 101
7 'Strictly Ballroorri': the Physical School and Space 136
8 'Twist and Shout': Bodies in the Physical School 165
9 Who are the Wallflowers? 192
Appendix: Methods in Use 204
Notes 209
References 214
Index 227
v
Acknowledgements
This book is one of the results of a Finnish-English research project
entitled 'Citizenship, Difference and Marginality in Schools - with
Special Reference to Gender'. We are deeply indebted to the people
whose observations and analyses we have used in this book. The
Finnish research project consists of Pirkko Hynninen, Tuija Metso,
Tarja Palmu, Tarja Tolonen, Tuula Gordon and Elina Lahelma. Pirkko,
Tuija, Tarja and Tarja were each specialisingin a particulararea of the
research, but sharing experience and data with us. The keen eyes,
sharp observations and innovative Interpretations of these women
havebeen irreplaceablefor theanalysiswhich wepresentin thisbook.
Sinikka Aapola and jukka Lehtonen joined the Finnish research
project later; their contribution to the analytic discussions in our
meetings has been invaluable. The Finnish team has been helped by a
number of people and we especially want to thank Päivi Haavisto
Vuori, Marja Peltovuori, Marita Lampinen, Katariina Hakala and Sirpa
Lappalainen.
janet Holland had two able and committed researchers, each of
whom worked with her, undertaking observations and interviews in
one ofthe London schoolsand someanalysis. KayParkinson read and
commented on the manuscript of this book. [anet's gratitude to
Nicole Vitellone and Kay Parkinson is unbounded for their contri
bution to the work, inspiration and friendship. Ianet would also like
to thank the Finnish research team, and of course Tuula and Elina for
bringing her into the project, and for being such excellent colleagues
and collaborators.
We are grateful to numerous people for many reasons, for example
for enjoyable and useful discussions on joint interests or for
commenting on our papers or parts of this book. We especially want
to mention AnneLise Arnesen, Ilse Eriksson-Stjernberg, Mary Kehily,
Leena Koski, Melanie Mauthner, Marjatta Saarnivaara, Hannu Simola
and Rachel Thomson, and the members of the research network
Gender and Education/EDDI in Finland. We also thankJo Campling
for her encouragement and advice.
During the research Tuula, Elina and janet have worked in the
following institutions: the Department of Sociology and Department
of Education at the University of Helsinki, the Department of
vi
Acknowledgements vii
Women's Studies at the University of Tampere, the Social Science
Research Unit at the Institute of Education in London, the Open
University, and the School of Education, Politics and Social Science at
South Bank University, London. We would like to thankthe Academy
of Finland for the major funding for this research. We were also
funded by the Youth Research 2000 Programme (Finland), the Open
University and South Bank University. We are grateful to all these
institutionsfor materialsupportandto ourcolleagueswithinthemfor
friendship and discussions.
Most of all, we want to thank the teachers, students and other
people at our research schools, City Park and Green Park in Helsinki,
and Oak Grove and Woburn Hili in London. This research would not
have been possible without their support, friendliness and tolerance
for our continuing presence and endless questions.
Lastbut not least, we wantto thank RobertAlbury, Dougie Gordon.
Mikko Gordon, janne Gordon. Eero Lahelma, Anna Lahelma and
Marja Lahelma for love and support.
TUULA GORDON
JANET HOLLAND
EuNA LAHELMA
Introduction:
Do You Wanna Dance?
When the research team in Finland concluded its main fieldwork
periodin two schoolsin Helsinki, we thankedthe students and teach
ers by singingwhat we cal!ed the 'ethnographers' song', with courtesy
(and apologies) to Sting and Police (from the album Synchronicity,
1983):
EveryBreath You Take (bySting)1
Everybreathyoutake
everymoveyoumake
everybondyoubreak
every stepyoutake
1'11 bewatehingyou
Everysingleday
everywordyousay
everygameyouplay
every place youstay
1'11bewatehingyou
Ohcan'tyousee
youbelong tome
Howmypoorheartaches
with everystepyoutake
Everymoveyoumake
every rule youbteak
everysmileyou[ake
everyclaimyoustake
we'l! bewatehingyou
2 MakingSpaces
Everyday life at school is like a complicated dance with formal and
improvised steps in a ballroom consisting of classrooms, halls, stair
ways and corridors. Itisthe range ofthese steps thatwegazeat in this
book. We examine them in order to explore the part played by the
school in the production ofdifference, and in theconstruction ofciti
zenship and otherness. In everyday processes and practices students
are differentiated along several dimensions, notably gender, social
dass and ethnicity. In the ethnography we explore practices in
schools which seek to normalise school students from diverse social
and cultural backgrounds through the notion of the abstract pupil.
These processes of abstraction and differentiation have effects on the
formation of subjectivities of those in schools.
Weare interestedin the official andinformalprocessesoftheschool
andthewayin whichthephysicalspace affects pedagogyandpractice;
we also want to trace a 'curriculum of the body' (Lesko, 1988). Peter
Woods (1990) notes that students entering a new school are intent to
find a living space. He uses space metaphorically, but we want to ask
specifically how school students make spaces for themselves; space
and spatiality are our central concerns. Paraphrasing Philip Wexler
(1992), who explores the process of 'becomingsomebody', we analyse
how school students become somebodies somewhere. Whilst our main
interestisin how studentsexerciseagencyin schools, wealso turn our
attention to teachers.
Bya comparative approach we mean that we compare and contrast
processes in Britain and Finland, with illustrative references to the
USA.2 We contextualise our study through a discussion of New Right
politics and policies, education systems and the curriculum. By a
crosscultural approach we refer to our interest in what constitutes 'a
school', and in particular how space and embodiment are implicated
there. Focus on space and embodiment have both been neglected in
education research; basing our analysis on schooling in two countries
and in four schools enables us to extract theoretical and analytical
insights which are not completely context-bound.
Historically schools have been expectedbothto confirm and to chal
lenge social divisions; a continuous strand in educational thinking has
emphasisedschools assitesofemancipation,andchannelsforadvancing
social change (Davies, 1990; Green, 1990; Donald, 1992). Schools then
are siteswith multiplelevelsand practices, some ofthem contradictory,
and within them there are spaces for agency, negotiation, avoidance,
opposition, and resistance. These spaces are limited, but significant in
thecontextoftensionsbetweenemancipationand regulation.
