Social Stratification and the Socialization of Competence¹

This paper treats competence as a linkage between socialization and adult role‐repertoire. The traditional approach to the study of socialization of cognitive, motivational, and social skills, or competences, in the United States generally makes an invidious comparison with white middle‐class socialization of the same skills. Investigators often conclude that subordinate‐group parents are a failure as socialization agents, incapable of transmitting white middle‐class skills to their children. The author suggests another interpretation. He argues that typical social, occupational, political, and other valued adult roles in a society determine what skills parents seek to transmit to their children. However, in a racially stratified society like the United States, such roles —and the cognitive, motivational, and social skills associated with them —tend also to be stratified. Consequently, subordinate‐group parents teach their children to acquire different skills necessary for their subordinate future adult roles, rather than the white middle‐class skills.