Interviews with primary school teachers

1. Interview Method

I interviewed a number of primary school teacher in France. The interviews were conducted one by one as semi-structured interviews. Each of teachers answered same questions during 30 minutes of the interview. During these interviews, the other teachers were present but answered separately. Organizing them as a group in the same place not only saved time as they took place in the course of a visit to France; it also allowed the interviewees to feel more comfortable in a less formal setting.

As for Bourdieu's analysis, the analysis of the interviews follows the same pattern in that it defines the characteristics of the teachers in terms of their feelings regarding the three capitals: cultural, economic, and social. Each answer was categorized according to the capital associated with it (cultural, economic, social, and inheritance).

2. Selection of Subjects

The people selected for the interviews were all young (under 30 years of age). This made it possible to compare the new generation of today with that in Bourdieu’s study, which is today considered to be the older generation of teachers. The number of women interviewed was much higher than the number of men. This is partly due to the significantly higher number of women in the profession.

If I selected these subject for the interview, it was for practical purposes. As the interviewees came from the same area; it was easier to contact them. besides a person of confidence being part of the trade. It was easier for me to have concords for this research.

But it is also to make the search on a micro level more than macro level

Table 1 Details of the interviewees interviews were conducted online via Skype for practical reasons, since I live in Taiwan and they live in France. These new interviews were conducted to be able to show the simplified diagram of the social space of Bourdieu’s positions (see the results’s part). No time was set but the individual interviews lasted between 30 minutes and one hour, depending on the interviewees’ answers.

3. Teachers’ Background

3.1. Interviewee 1

This first interviewee has a special family situation since she has only one parent at her side. Her father died when she was young around 12 years old. He leaving them with a fairly strong ancestry which gives her family a decent income. His mother is a caregiver.

She also has a yearling younger sister. As a result, her status is more like a middle class.

She says she did not miss anything but not rich neither.

3.2. Interviewee 2

For this interviewee, the family situation is also a bit complex. She is the child of a second union and the youngest of her fraternity. She has four older brothers and sisters. She thinks that the relationship with her siblings is a bit complicated because she is the youngest. However, being the child of a second union, her parents cared for her. She also didn’t miss of anything. Both parents are teachers. His father is a junior high-school teacher and his mother is teaching in high-school. So, on the other hand, it also belongs to a middle class.

3.3. Interviewee 3

This interviewee is the only boy in this study. However, his family is not very different from other cases. Indeed, his father is a police officer and his mother is a medical secretary. Once again, this is a fairly average family model at the level of social class.

He also has a 2 years’ younger brother.

3.4. Interviewee 4

This interviewee has a fairly classic family situation. Her two parents are still together.

Her father is a manager and her mother is an official at the county council. In view of wages, this family can again be classified in the middle class but remains higher than others families presented here. She also has a little sister who is 4 years younger than her and she has been caring for her since childhood because she is the eldest of the family.

3.5. Interviewee 5

The last interviewee has a fairly similar family background since her parents are also still together and she also has a younger sister 3 years younger. Her parents practice fairly standard trades. His father is an accountant and his mother is a secretary. Thus, she also belongs to an average middle social class.

4. The Assignment of Classes to Teachers

The type of class assigned to teachers depends on the number of “points” that the teacher obtains. Those points are usually obtained in relation to seniority and the teacher’s family situation (married, dependent child or not, etc.). Obviously, the more points a teacher has is important, as this allows him or her to choose which school he or she wants and the level of the class he or she prefers. One often sees young teachers in their first year of teaching being substitutes in several schools before they obtain more points and get to be in a class in the long term. The principal of the school can also play a role in the distribution of classes to teachers.

5. Particularity of Marseille

5.1. About the City

Marseille is the second-largest city of France. The main city of the historical province of Provence, today it is the capital of the department of Bouches-du-Rhône and region of Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur. It is located on France’s south coast near the mouth of the Rhône river.

In the study of INSEE (2016), Marseille is depicted as a city where the most

“difficult” neighborhoods are concentrated. These are often poorer neighborhoods with a higher proportion of foreign communities. The poverty rate is higher in these neighborhoods than in other parts of France. Thus, professional integration is particularly difficult in these districts of the city of Marseille, especially for women: 62.9% of women aged 15 to 64 are unemployed.The size of the neighborhoods varies considerably: half of them have fewer than 2,000 inhabitants, while some exceed 10,000 inhabitants, or even 20,000 inhabitants in two districts of the center and north of Marseille.

If we insist on these kinds of neighborhoods, it is because they are numerous and that primary school teachers, the youngest especially, are often assigned to these districts.

There is also a financial bonus for teachers who teach in areas that are perceived to be more difficult.

To justify the choice of the restriction of these interviewees to only one city in France, I concur with what Jaboin. (2007) states in his study: It is always interesting to conduct a new local study on widely known data. Moreover, it can be said that, on the one hand, “nothing is ever identical to anything else” and, on the other hand, “every field

him tells us about the general phenomenon” (Becker 1998, p. 97). Moreover, each case is different regarding certain points since everything that is related to, included in, or depends on the local context necessarily affects the object studied.

5.2. Primary Schools in Marseille

Schools in Marseille are distributed in the various districts of the city. Each child is assigned to his school according to his place of residence except special derogation granted.

In the diagram below, I defined each school with the social class that was designated to it. This ranking is possible in relation to the district in which the school is located.

Some Marseille’s Districts are richer than others. Thus the children who go to these schools will belong to a higher social class. For example, a study by INSEE (2015) shows the different average incomes per rounding. This study also states that Marseille juxtaposes a poor population in the north of the city and a more affluent population in the south. The 3rd district of the city is the poorest of the municipalities of metropolitan France. This is why it is possible to say that a school located in the 3rd district will belong to a disadvantaged social class.