Back to Search
Start Over
An emotional journey: pursuing a bachelor's degree for rural students in four elite universities in Shanghai, PRC.
- Source :
- Cambridge Journal of Education; Dec2019, Vol. 49 Issue 6, p711-725, 15p
- Publication Year :
- 2019
-
Abstract
- In the People's Republic of China (PRC), educational expansion together with the promotion of market competition is taken as a measure of addressing a structural rural–urban divide in educational inequality. In following the emotional journeys of pursuing a bachelor's degree for 32 rural students in four elite universities in Shanghai, this paper explores an emotive impact of such a measure on rural students. Despite feeling pride at getting into university, many respondents were ashamed because of their perceived academic and social inadequacies vis-à-vis their urban classmates. The stigmatisation of the rural accentuated their feelings of shame and even made many respondents not feel confident about seeking a career in a city. An individualistic approach framed in a self-reliance discourse, even in a socialist society, to address structural educational inequality, is doomed to fail to confront an unequal opportunity structure, but offloads the cost of change, including the emotional cost, to individual students. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Subjects :
- BACHELOR'S degree
RURAL geography
MARKETING research
UNIVERSITIES & colleges
Subjects
Details
- Language :
- English
- ISSN :
- 0305764X
- Volume :
- 49
- Issue :
- 6
- Database :
- Complementary Index
- Journal :
- Cambridge Journal of Education
- Publication Type :
- Academic Journal
- Accession number :
- 139328515
- Full Text :
- https://doi.org/10.1080/0305764X.2019.1592114