ERIC Number: EJ680457
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2004-Apr-1
Pages: 20
Abstractor: Author
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0142-5692
EISSN: N/A
Disordered Eating and Disordered Schooling: What Schools Do to Middle Class Girls
Evans, John; Rich, Emma; Holroyd, Rachel
British Journal of Sociology of Education, v25 n2 p123-142 Apr 2004
This paper focuses upon relationships barely explored in the sociology of education either in the UK or elsewhere that lie between the practices and processes of formal education and the aetiology (the 'causations') and development of eating disorders, specifically, anorexia nervosa (AN) in young women and girls. In so doing, it also touches on other relationships relatively under explored in the sociology of education, between formal education and 'the middle class'. Our analyses point to the ways in which social trends outside schools relating to 'the body' and health generate and intersect with what we refer to as performance and perfection codes following Bernstein (2000) and Evans and Davies (2004) . These create conditions of school work that, while increasingly difficult for many students, may be deeply damaging to the identities and health of the vulnerable few, especially if they coincide with other problematic features of their lives. Our request, as articulated through the voices of the young people in our study, is for greater understanding of the ways in which formal education and schooling may be implicated in the production of disordered eating and ill-health. Such understanding might better equip teachers and others to help young people, irrespective of their class and cultural background, avoid falling prey to conditions that may damage or even potentially destroy their young lives.
Descriptors: Sociocultural Patterns, Middle Class, Females, Cultural Background, Young Adults, Educational Sociology, Eating Disorders, Health, Educational Environment
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Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: Secondary Education
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A