Making meaning
4.3 Beyond symbolic interactionism: theoretical developments in subjectivity
4.3.1 Introduction
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This study has factored relations of power into the interaction process. The theory of symbolic interactionism has particular value for this study in that it provides a firm foundation to make sense of meaning, language and action during interactional events in school. The study sought to explore how leaders come to each encounter, how past interactions influence present interactions, how leaders adapt themselves to fit the topic discussed and the people they are interacting with and how leaders change according to what happens in an interactional event. Leaders’ interaction within a reference group, for example the SMT, helped to understand how the culture of the school is defined by the consequences of the actions of individuals on the larger school group.
Through various interactions one forms relations. Chapter 9 shows how these relations play out in four relations of power. Therefore, the concepts of subjectivity and discourse are useful additions to symbolic interactionism. Since I am employing multiple constructs to look for meanings in the interactional events, the concern for the dynamics of power is sufficiently addressed. Symbolic interactionism uses a bottom up approach. The theory of subjectivity is useful in moving beyond symbolic interactionism to also look at the self. In addition, the theory of subjectivity looks at the macro issues.
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Marxism that there is a denial of agency; Marx himself believed in the revolutionary power of the working class which suggests that there must be agency.
In social sciences, subjectivity is an effect of relations of power (Foucault, 2000). Our understandings are sometimes referred to as subjective when they are distorted by our personal biases. MacNaughton (2000) argues that our subjectivity is formed by social constructions of gender, race, ethnicity etc. She uses as an example of how female subjectivity would have particular perceptions and interpretations that only females would have of the world. Mansfield (2000 cited in Edwards, 2000, p. 1) traces the meanings of subjectivity by distinguishing between the subject and self:
Although the two are sometimes used interchangeably, the word 'self' does not capture the sense of social and cultural entanglement that is implicit in the word 'subject': the way our immediate daily life is always already caught up in complex political, social and philosophical-that is-shared-concern.
These social and cultural entanglements are evident in Chapter 6 when I discussed the subjectivities of the principal. From a feminist post-structuralist perspective, Weedon argues that subjectivity is socially produced:
The assumption that subjectivity is constructed implies that it is not innate, not genetically determined, but socially produced. Subjectivity is produced in a whole range of discursive practices: economic, social and political- the meanings of which are constant struggles over power. Language is not the expression of unique individuality; it constructs the individual's subjectivity in ways, which are socially specific. Moreover for post- structuralism, subjectivity is neither unified nor fixed. Unlike humanism, which implies a conscious, knowing, unified, rational subject, post-structuralism theorizes subjectivity as a site of disunity and conflict, central to the process of political change and to preserving the status quo. (1987, p. 21)
The range of discourses circulating in the economic, social and political practices of institutions creates conflict and disunity. This conflict experienced by individual subjects is an important thread in this study. This study examines how conflict arises through either resistance or compliance with policy, for example the integrated quality management system (IQMS) policy.
This causes conflict in the appraisal rating of educators (see Chapter 7). I also explored the conflict between the official policy discourse and the discourses of the management and management practices. Similarly, Hey (2000) explored sites of conflict in a study on teenage
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pregnancy amongst young women and the subjectivities formed by these women. A major finding of the study shows that government policy and the community (based on traditional gender roles) are out of sync with the aspirations of these young women (with liberated views on parenting), resulting in sites of conflict and disunity. Bullen, Kenway and Hey (2000) show in their study of teenage pregnancy how subjectivity is constantly reconstructed by a number of factors, including individual, institutional, political, cultural, environmental, and social factors. They argue that in dealing with teenage pregnancy, interventions fail as they portray the female in traditional concepts of motherhood and romance. A pregnant female teenager receives political, social and cultural disapproval and censure. Therefore female subjectivity needs to be reconstructed to consider sociological frameworks that form and mould female subjectivities. In this study, this has implications for females that are part of the SMT (see Chapters 8 and 9).
Kenway, Willis, Blackmore and Rennie (1994, p. 26) show how language and discourse shape subjectivity:
We see post-structuralism as theory which acknowledges discourse and practices of struggle and resistance, which recognizes the dynamic interplay of social forces, and which therefore can readily be deployed as a theory of and for change. Post-structuralism is a term applied to a very loosely connected set of ideas about meaning, the way in which meaning is struggled over and produced, the way it circulates amongst us, the impact it has on human subjects, and finally, the connections between meaning and power. For post- structuralists, meaning is not fixed in language, in other cultural symbols or in consistent power relationships. It shifts as different linguistic, institutional, cultural and social factors come together in various ways. Meaning is influenced by and influences shifting patterns of power. And finally, it constitutes human subjectivity which is, again, regarded as shifting, many faceted and contradictory.
Kenway et al draws attention to how meanings are struggled over and produced. One possible explanation for this is offered by Ball, Maguire and Macrae (2000) who argue that subjectivity as a personal value (like honesty and integrity) may be inequitable in its distribution. Linked to vast inequities in wealth, class and resources in South African schools, this perspective locates subjectivity outside an individual’s control. Subjectivity is therefore located in larger institutional and social forms.
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In Walkerdine’s study in the UK, it was found that girls from the middle and working classes controlled their sexuality differently. The sexualized image of working class girls was presented as having “latent pathology” whereas middle class girls portrayed a “super-girl identity”
(1997,p.199). As argued by Ball et al (2000), subjectivity is located in larger institutional and social frameworks. Subjectivity is therefore a complex construct and each perspective adds new meaning to the concept of the subject and the way in which subjectivities are formed. In the discussion that follows I present various perspectives on subjectivity and how subjectivity is formed and conclude this chapter by drawing on those perspectives that would be useful to illuminate the data for this study.