Sociological knowledge and transformation at ‘Diversity University’

Jenkins, Celia; Barnes, Caroline; McLean, Monica; Abbas, Andrea; Ashwin, Paul

Abstract

Diversity University’ is a large university in London, UK, which appears in the bottom-third of national league tables and provides education for poorer students, often from ethnic minority groups. The Sociology Department at Diversity was the focus of research exploring quality and inequality in undergraduate degrees and here, with concrete examples, we discuss how its curriculum and pedagogy can be conceptualised as socially just. Concepts drawn from the work of the sociologist of education Basil Bernstein are employed to justify challenging students to make the necessary effort to bring difficult, abstract sociological knowledge into juxtaposition with everyday problems of life and society. In this way, tutors offer a quality of education that is equivalent to any in high-status universities;and, by way of knowledge acquisition, support relatively disadvantaged students to access what Bernstein calls ‘pedagogic rights’ to individual enhancement, social inclusion and political participation.

• Acceptance Date: Sep 1, 2016
• Publication Date: Jan 4, 2017
• Deposit Date: Jan 9, 2017
• Publicly Available Date: Jan 5, 2020
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Series Title: Palgrave studies in global citizenship education and democracy
• Book Title: Socially just pedagogies, capabilities and quality in higher education: global perspectives
• ISBN: 9781137557858
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-55786-5
• Keywords: Socially-just pedagogies, Higher education teaching and learning, Curriculum, Bernstein
• Public URL: https://nottingham-repository.worktribe.com/output/841994
• Publisher URL: http://link.springer.com/book/10.1057%2F978-1-137-55786-5
• Additional Information: Celia Jenkins, Caroline Barnes, Monica McLean, Andrea Abbas, Paul Ashwin, Sociological knowledge and transformation at ‘Diversity University’, 2017 Palgrave Macmillan reproduced with permission of Palgrave Macmillan.; This extract is taken from the author's original manuscript and has not been edited. The definitive, published, version of record is available here: http://www.palgrave.com/de/book/9781137557858