1. AN EXAMPLE OF A CASE STUDY: LEARNING TO LABOUR Willis, P. (1977) Purpose: to find out how working class kids get working class jobs and others let them (a)the need to link macro and micro sociology; (b)The need to need to analyze schooling in terms of macro-constraints and human agency (c)The need to see schools as sites of contestation, resistance and struggle in both a micro and macro sense.

2. PROCEDURE (a)Ethnographic study of a group of males ini their final year of school and then in their first year beyond school, working in factories and other short-term, manual employment (b)Study of their behaviour in school and how it feeds into their choice of post-school occupations

3. ELEMENTS OF LADS’ CULTURE Opposition to authority and rejection of conformity: clothing; smoking and lying; drinking; Celebration of the informal group; Excitement is out of school; Rejection of the literary tradition; Sexism Racism.

4. SHOP-FLOOR CULTURE Masculine chauvinism – sexism; Attempt to gain informal control of the work process; Rejection of the conformists in the factory; Rejection of ‘theory’ and certification; Rejection of the coercion which underlines the teaching paradigm; Shirking work/absenteeism/taking time off; No break on the taboo of informing; Speaking up for yourself; Present oriented; Rejection of mental labour and celebration of manual labour.

5. MAIN FINDINGS The behaviours and values which the lads sought and practised in school lead them into choosing deliberately and positively those post-school occupations that reinforce and let them practise these behaviours and values; There is a continuity between the lads’ life styles at school and their life styles out of school and post- school; The need for immediate cash, immediate gratification, anti-authority behaviour, chauvinism, rejection of mental labour, and celebration of the informal group find expression in school and post- school.

6. CONCLUSION Working class kids get working class jobs because that is what they choose and what they are driven to choose by the values that they hold.