Needing to be ‘in the know’: strategies of subordination used by 10-11 year old school boys

Travis:       Rex is too fat and he wants to [inaudible; much laughter]

JS:           ‘Cos of his weight? You mean ‘cos he’s fat? Why does that make

him not work hard?

Travis:       If he doesn’t make people think he’s funny they might go on about

his weight

JS:           Oh I see, so if he doesn’t play the class clown people would tease

him?

Travis:       Yeah

Subordination could also come through perceived exhibitions of immature and babyish
behaviour (doing ‘silly’ things, playing infantile games, or associating too closely with
younger children); displaying a lack of toughness (such as crying, showing fear, not
sticking up for yourself, and/or acting ‘soft’); being too passive and generally not active
enough during both school sports and informal playground games; and showing a
shortage of effort which was usually connected to a sporting context. Boys were also
subordinated for the perception that they were wanting in certain culturally acclaimed
traits, particularly connected with embodied forms of physicality/athleticism (such as
skill, strength, fitness and speed etc), and in areas of locally-defined class norms of
academic achievement (which included pupils who were on the school’s register for
Special Educational Needs (SEN)). Subordination could also accrue from an ignorance
of locally-celebrated knowledge. This could be, for example, in the latest culturally-hot
topics such as a TV programme, in the technical language of football, or unfamiliarity
with the latest computer games (such as PlayStation), and this could render a boy silent
and be used as a marker of difference. For example, Sam at Westmoor Abbey was
derogated because he did not understand the off-side rule in football, and neither he or his
friend Simon knew the names or descriptions of some of the main characters in the TV
programme South Park. It was also important for a boy to be able to show a commitment
to their adolescent future by being ‘in the know’ regarding the meaning of certain swear
words and matters of sexuality, although this did not appear as a main theme in any of the
interviews I conducted.

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