Students in Goa: Social Lives, Schooling, School Orientations and Aspirations

An ethnographic description of teaching and learning in schools where pupils from low social classes study is presented in this article. It explains how pupils in Goa who reach the end of secondary school are not assimilated in the school’s middle-class ethos but modify, negotiate and, to an extent interpret and accommodate it in their own way. Students’ social lives, scholastic careers, future aspirations and orientations in school are analysed. But this article is not just about social origins and destinations. Sociological studies that establish correlations between working class positions and low scholastic achievement and low aspirations are well known. This submission attempts to take the argument forward. Prolonged exposure to the lives they lead and poor scholastic achievements in school reinforce each other to abbreviate a students’ school career. There is a continuous interplay between subjective experiences and objective class futures. The inclusion of a pupils’ perspective and orientation in school enriches this sociological analysis