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China has been experiencing rapid economic growth over the past few decades accompanied by an overwhelmingly large number of rural habitants out-migrating to urban areas for work and better earnings. However, children of migrants are not entitled to free schooling provisions in these urban destinations and so millions of school-aged rural children have to be “left behind” by their migrating parent(s) in their home place. This study investigates the educational aspirations of Chinese “left-behind children”. Via an ethnographic, qualitative case study approach it captures the impact of “left-behind-ness” on aspirations Findings indicate that whilst educational aspirations are embedded in left-behind children’s disadvantaged social background, they are also shaped by the consequences of being “left-behind”. By doing so, it seeks to highlight an important area as well as illustrating the value—or not—of using Western theories of social inequalities with an Eastern context.
Yang et al. (Tue,) studied this question.