Introduction
Conflict Theory is one of the approaches developed and used in sociology. The purpose of the article is to compare and contrast gender differences in cultural capital and educational programs opportunities. The connection of a conflict theory to gender differences is that of means to end. Gender differences are the issues; it prizes mental freedom and responsibility, and a tolerant and humane spirit. The article concentrates on the role of habitus in cultural capital and differences between boys and girls. The hypothesis is that gender and motivation are the main determinants of different achievements and outcomes of educational programs (Wallece and Wolf 2005).
The author underlines that this means-end association should be clarified in curricular deliberations for 8th grade, it needs conversation in higher education programs. Interestingly, cultural capital is not necessarily a purely general one, since a free and critical intelligence is developed by the researcher of just one or a few particular subjects. Indeed, the subjects included in a modern educational programs were relatively small in number.
Discussion
There are, of course, impressive reasons to think that educational programs are a good basis for cultural capital. But a conflict theory is neither a necessary nor a sufficient condition for learning. Hence, researchers return to philosophical foundations in order to understand what main factors enable a conflict theory to be liberating. Actually, there are two separate conceptions of why general studies should compose cultural capital, each based on a different desired outcome. There is one distinction between these two conceptions of conflict theory. The approach holds that there are certain themes and truths which every learner should study, whereas the rhetorical one holds that it does not matter much what learners study as long as it relates to society. A conflict theory, for the cultural program, means that there should be a broad base in knowledge essential to our humanity, in learning which pertains to the large, perennial issues of human thought and action. The learner should be brought to consider certain pervasive concerns about the nature of the universe, the meaning of life and our common duty–as a prelude to working out his or her own frame of reference.
The article identifies Bourdieu as the main theorist who explains gender and cultural differences in learning. On the rhetorical scheme, a conflict theory means that there should be broad contact to as many different viewpoints as possible, a learning which reflects the diverse opinions extent in the modern world. This view denies that it is significant for learners to know about anything in particular and considers dogmatic the claim that certain kinds of facts are more worthwhile or more humanizing than others. In recent decades, during which schools have seemed to opt for this model, researchers have seen course offerings for an educational programs include transcendental thought as well as psychology, While these examples are a bit extreme, they nonetheless expose the insolvency of the rhetorical model to educational programs and suggest its inability to produce a liberated intellect. One main cause of such deficiencies is the loss of a logical understanding of what gender differences really are (Wallece and Wolf 2005).
When gender differences are mistakenly equated with a personal selection of courses, then there is no basis for holding that some courses are more important to our humanity than others and thus should be required of all seeking a degree. Of course, there are good causes for introducing courses. Certainly, liberally educated students are willing to learn from a variety of perspectives and be conscious of their critiques of fixed views. The point is that all educational programs should be evaluated in terms of their promotion of the goal of capital theory (Wallece and Wolf 2005).
The data was collected from the first panel of the National educational programs Longitudinal Study. The sample involves 24, 599 students (males and females) of 8th grade. Administrators and staff members who arrange their general curriculum by requiring “a little of each subject” or letting learners “pick a course from each group” are forfeiting the high, The frame of gender differences and the precise kind of conflict theory it demands. The lower conception dominates when there is no guiding agreement about what courses constitute cultural capital. Curriculum decisions become political: departments simply require “their share of the core,” or curriculum committees reorganize the core purely on the basis of comparison with other “attractive” schools, or learners pressure for fashionable courses which seem “relevant” (Wallece and Wolf 2005).
It was found that since a sole curriculum format cannot be agreed, each institution will have to work out exactly what courses it understands to be most realistic to the great legacy of liberal education programs and the humanities. Though, a college need not strive for a core program which is overly general, but only one general to the extent that it sufficiently acquaints learners with the great ideas and lasting values of humankind as well as transmits the essential skills of continued learning. This is the way to construct cultural capital which is general in the sense of ranging over a number of subjects, but is focused in the sense of focusing on the main themes and discoveries cultural capital. In the long run, such an approach to cultural capital will add surpass other approaches (Wallece and Wolf 2005).
In fact, the very existence of formal educational programs reflects the confidence that parents and culture must rear their young inappropriate ways, transmitting important information to them and encouraging certain patterns of behavior in them. It is inevitable, then, that the specific ethical preferences of a school infuse its activities: the subjects chosen for study, the way they are taught, the playground rules and innumerable teacher-pupil communication. The question of educational programs in ethics and values becomes complicated in a secular and pluralistic society because of opposing preferences.
The author comes to conclusion that gender differences are culturally determined and stipulates by personal preferences of students. The first position, that educational programs should be value neutral, has validity only in certain contexts. Many teachers who hold this notion rightly guard against instruction and champion the right of learners to make free choices. But some embrace the fallacious dualism between fact as objective fact and value as slanted preference, or at least the dichotomy that fact can be taught and personality can in no way be taught. The second position identifies information and gender. Those who hold this position believe that cultural capital translates into practical action, such that knowing the right is a plenty of conditions for doing the right.
Between the two extremes described above, there is a reasonable position which holds that educational programs can influence development in at least two important ways. First, educational programs can have a direct influence on growth by helping to shape the will, inculcating proper behavior and dispositions. Second, educational programs can have an indirect power on the moral life of learners by enlightening the mind, establishing the conviction that certain principles are approvable and certain kinds of actions right. Even on this position, there is the matter of specifying what constitutes the life and determining what procedures are appropriate for developing it in learners. On the other hand, the learner’s behavior must not simply be in conformity with accepted standards, but must be motivated by his or her own inward support of those standards. Therefore, it is supreme that discipline be administered with fairness and love, that reasons be given for it, that models earn the respect of the teens and enunciate the moral principles on which they act, and that there be sufficient practice in reasoning from general moral principles to specific applications.
Conclusion
In sum, the strengths of the article are that it investigates the question of gender differences and their relations to cultural capital. In light of the foregoing account, the query of whether educational programs should be a separate subject or a measurement of all subjects is not extremely difficult. To be a place of real moral learning, the school, at a minimum, must be a moral community. The weakness is the analysis of data and lack of comparison between two samples. This means that cultural capital is encouraged in extracurricular activities and that moral issues are given serious consideration whenever they arise in any class. Although there may be helpful classes for certain kinds of cultural capital, nothing can substitute for a whole environment which is permeated by opportunities for cultural learning. In terms of Conflict Theory, it is possible to say that gender differences are important in learning process influenced by social and cultural values.
References
Dumais, S. A. (2002). Cultural Capital. Gender and School Success. Sociology of Educational programs, 75 (1), pp. 44-68.
Wallece, R., Wolf, A. (2005). Contemporary Sociological Theory-Expanding the Classical Tradition(sis. Prentice Hall; 6 edition.