Mutual rejection

Abstract

• At an elite school in Sweden, social science education contradicts the ideals of democratic education. • Micro-power actions change when students outperform their teacher’s subject knowledge. • Micro-interactional power is expressed by recognition and misrecognition in the classroom. • As an observer in the elite school, one simultaneously becomes loud and invisible. • Further ethnographic “studies up from below” are needed in social science education. Purpose: This paper offers insights into the dynamic of misrecognition in an elite school. It presents new findings on micro-interactional power relations in the classroom and argues for additional ethnographies of social science education in elite schools. Methodology: This paper uses an ethnographic method. Its research employs the observational position of a “belonging stranger” is put forward in contrast to the idea of “going native”. The focus is on the power of micro-interaction. Findings: A key empirical finding is the change in power relations that occurs when students outrank their social science teacher in subject knowledge.

Keywords

• social science education
• classroom ethnography
• micro-interaction
• power
• elite school
• recognition and misrecognition