This article draws on data from 20 years of qualitative projects with parents to discuss and analyse four issues. The first is the apparent responsibilities of parents to deliver both the school and home setting which will provide "the best" for their children. Second, the gendering of parental responsibilities. Third, I investigate how…

This paper re-examines the purposes of a planned and intentional parenting style--"concerted cultivation"--for different middle-class groups, highlighting that social class fraction, ethnicity, and also individual family disposition, guides understandings of the purposes of enrolling children in particular enrichment activities. We…

This paper reports on data drawn from an "Economic and Social Research Council"-funded project investigating the experiences of UK-based students training on level-2 and level-3 childcare courses. We focus on the concept of emotional labour in relation to learning to care for and educate young children and the ways in which the students'…

Professor Carol Vincent gets the 2012 Professorial Lecture series underway with a thought provoking talk drawing on research projects conducted over the last twelve years. The lecture will explore factors identified in current policy, media, and other social and political forums as the risks and responsibilities of contemporary parenting, with a…

This paper draws on qualitative data exploring the experiences of first-generation middle-class Black Caribbean-heritage parents, their own parents, and their children. We focus on the different ways in which race and class intersect in shaping attitudes towards education and subsequent educational practices. We argue that the nature of racism has…

This paper reports on data drawn from a study exploring the educational strategies of 62 Black Caribbean heritage middle-class parents. In this paper, we consider the respective roles of race and class in the shaping of parents' educational strategies, deploying an analysis that focuses on their intersection and seeks to hold both race and class…

This paper addresses some particular aspects of the complex intersections between race and social class. It is based upon data collected as part of a two-year Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) funded project exploring the "Educational Strategies of the Black Middle Classes" (BMC). ("The Educational Strategies of the Black…

The article discusses the findings of an ESRC funded project (RES-062-23-1880) which used in-depth interviews to explore the educational experiences and strategies of 62 Black Caribbean parents; the biggest qualitative study of education and the Black middle class yet conducted in the UK. The article focuses on the parents' interactions with their…

This article draws on data from two recently completed Economic and Social Research Council funded projects in order to examine class differences and similarities in choice of school and choice of childcare. The authors argue that there is every reason to believe that in many circumstances, within its particular mechanisms and practices, choice…

Childcare is a condensate of disparate social forces and social processes. It is gendered and classed. It is subject to an excess of policy and political discourse. It is increasingly a focus for commercial exploitation. This is a paper reporting on work in progress in an ESRC funded research project (R000239232) on the choice and provision of…

Analyzes the patterns and variations of "grapevining," or social networks, through interviews with 172 parents who were in the process of choosing secondary schools for their children. Finds that there are three types of parent responses to using the grapevine as a means for school choice: (1) suspicion; (2) doubt; and (3) acceptance. (CMK)

Explores the social class/parental agency relationship by analyzing findings of a qualitative research project exploring parental voice in British secondary schools. A typology of parental interventions illustrates differentials in parents' access to and deployment of social, cultural, and material resources. Occupational pathways and spatial…