Rebels with our Applause? A Critique of Resistance Theory in Paul Willis's Ethnography of Schooling

Abstract

The importance of conflict, contestation, and pupil resistance in schooling has been stressed in recent accounts of schooling's role in social reproduction. One of the most influential instances of this “resistance theory” of reproduction is Paul Willis's Learning to Labour, an ethnography of schooling. After some critical remarks about use of the term “resistance,” this paper analyzes Willis's ethnographic data and his presentation and interpretation are criticized for unduly romanticizing the “resistant” practices (or “counter-school culture”) of the subjects (“the lads”). Although Willis reveals the sexism, racism, and self-defeating manualism of “the lads,” he implicitly endorses educational and cultural notions which misrepresent the conditions for a progressive working-class education and for breaking the nexus between education and the reproduction of oppressive social structures. An alternative view of “resistance” is offered, in which the evaluation of nonconformist practices becomes a more socially relative and historically contingent issue.