Identity Crisis? Problems and Issues in the Sociology of Education

This article looks at the recent history of the sociology of education and draws lessons about the future from that review. Beginning with a consideration of the reorientation of sociology of education in a hostile political context, it analyses recent official attacks on sociologically-informed research in education. This paper locates this reorientation in the changing relationship between sociologists of education and policy-makers since the 1960s. In so doing, it documents briefly the shift towards neo-Marxist critiques of education as a vehicle for maintaining and sustaining inequality, and the subsequent dismissal of sociology of education by policy-makers. The ways in which theoretical debates within the main discipline have affected the direction of work in the sub-discipline are also considered. Finally, we explore the possibilities for sustaining and supporting sociology of education as a key arena for the maintenance of a narrative of modernity while accommodating more recent movement towards a recognition of complexity, contingency and subjectivity.