Reflection 1

Darryl Leroux.   3360                              Reflection # 1                                       Harry Reddin

                                                      Gender-Based Cultural Capital 

          I believe gender-based cultural capital has impacted my education, specifically due to


society’s beliefs and expectations bestowed upon me from a very young age.    This

phenomenon is also referred to as social reproduction and this process began for me the

moment I exited the womb. Bourdieu focuses on cultural reproduction, particularly the

concept of habitus, where gender is embedded into education, as he refers to as a pillar of

cultural capital.  This deeply rooted thinking process and hegemonic attitudes have affected

my education form my early childhood to my entering the workforce.
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Family

               
     Culture is passed through diffusion which spreads elements such as language,

norms, sanctions and values from generation to generation.  This process of diffusion is

both formal and informal, and it is the latter, the informal norms also known as folkways

that govern our everyday behaviors.  In many societies around the world, folkways exist to

reinforce patterns of male dominance (Grekul & Schaefer, 2007, p.43). In my early

education it was these informal norms that created my schema of what roles male and

females played in society, and it was during this preparatory stage when I began to use

symbols to express my inclination towards carpentry, often following my father around the

house banging pieces of wood together.

School         

       

       Once I was institutionalized into Rutland Elementary School in Kelowna British

Columbia, through a system of reward and punishments I was praised for my athleticism

and called a good boy for my accomplishments on the sports field, whereas I would be

chastised through my peer groups for showing any signs of femininity like the times I helped

my sister choreograph her cheerleader workouts for the Kelowna Sun football team. I surely

won’t make that mistake again.

Workplace

        
       Moving forward onto my first legitimate job other than cutting lawns, and shoveling

driveways which was MacDonald’s when I turned of legal age, which was 15 years old in the

1980’s.   The relationship between education and my first real world work experience came

in the form of utility and how gender played a key role in where and how employees were

used in this structured workforce.  It quickly became evident to me that the majority of

females were used more for service whereas males were used exclusively as cooks and more

labor intensive positions.  I was used mainly as support for unloading trucks and

maintenance, which was perfect for my personality at the time and the male servers tended

to get made fun of back then anyway.    

     
       In conclusion,   gender based cultural capital has played a key role in my education form

a very young age and even though now that I am now trained to critically examine ways in

which I process information, the tendency is still there for  me to reproduce this process and

the methods in which  this knowledge was gained.

                                                                       References

Grekul & Schaefer, (2007). Culture and Socialization. Sociology Matters (Canadian Edition). McGraw-Hill Ryerson. 36-71