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Subject choice as everyday accommodation/resistance: why students in England (still) choose the arts

Thomson, Patricia; Hall, Christine; Earl, Lexi; Geppert, Corinna

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Authors

Christine Hall

Lexi Earl

Corinna Geppert



Abstract

High school students are expected to make choices about which subjects they study. These choices are not completely open but steered by what is on offer, previous achievement and conversations with teachers, family and friends; choices are patterned by class, gender, able-ness and race. We offer the perspective of subject choice as resistance. The paper use student focus group data from a three year study of the visual and performing arts in thirty schools in England. We show that students chose the arts not simply what it might do for them in the future, but also for what it provided for them in the everyday. We suggest that the quotidian is an important aspect of choice-making which, in the case of arts pedagogies, both accommodates the highly regulated norm but also offers a counter. This analysis points to avenues for further research on subject choice as well as providing important clues for school reform.

Citation

Thomson, P., Hall, C., Earl, L., & Geppert, C. (2020). Subject choice as everyday accommodation/resistance: why students in England (still) choose the arts. Critical Studies in Education, 61(5), 545-560. https://doi.org/10.1080/17508487.2018.1525754

Journal Article Type Article
Acceptance Date Sep 13, 2018
Online Publication Date Oct 24, 2018
Publication Date 2020
Deposit Date Sep 20, 2018
Publicly Available Date Apr 25, 2020
Journal Critical Studies in Education
Print ISSN 1750-8487
Electronic ISSN 1750-8495
Publisher Routledge
Peer Reviewed Peer Reviewed
Volume 61
Issue 5
Pages 545-560
DOI https://doi.org/10.1080/17508487.2018.1525754
Keywords arts education, subject choice, resistance, pedagogy, England
Public URL https://nottingham-repository.worktribe.com/output/1092945
Publisher URL https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/17508487.2018.1525754
Additional Information This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis in Critical Studies in Education on [date of publication], available online: http://www.tandfonline.com/10.1080/17508487.2018.1525754
Contract Date Sep 20, 2018

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