Nicola Rollock
Biographic Data
| ID | 227067 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Nicola Rollock |
| GIVEN NAMES | Nicola |
| FAMILY NAME | Rollock |
| SIGNATURE | ROLLOCK N |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Birmingham |
| VERIFIED | No |
| TOTAL WORKS | 22 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 348 |
| WORKS AS AUTHOR | 22 |
| WORKS AS EDITOR | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2006 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2022 |
| H-INDEX | 11 |
Reimagining Education
How do you change anything without hope?’ An Interview with Steve Garner
I Would Have Become Wallpaper Had Racism Had Its Way”
In 2019, AdvanceHE reported that there were just 25 UK Black female full professors in British universities. Black women are less likely to occupy a role at this level than their male and White counterparts. Despite this, Black women remain relatively absent in institutional initiatives to advance gender equality, and there is little commitment amongst UK universities to explicitly address structural inequalities of race as they affect the experi…
Race, self-interest and privilege amongst students at elite U.S. and U.K. universities
Warikoo’s The Diversity Bargain describes the findings of research which explores how students at elite universities in the U.S. and the U.K. conceptualize race in relation to the admissions process and their experiences on campus. This is an important study, which reveals differences in the degree of comfort and caution displayed by white students in their framing of race. There are three areas worthy of further exploration: the subjective posit…
Moving the goalposts
Drawing on a secondary analysis of official statistics, this paper examines the changing scale of the inequality of achievement between White students and their Black British peers who identify their family heritage as Black Caribbean. We examine a 25‐year period from the introduction of the General Certificate of Secondary Education ( GCSE ), in 1988, to the 20th anniversary of the murder of Stephen Lawrence in 2013. It is the first time that th…
Self-Identity and Its Discontents
This article introduces one of four e-special issues designed to celebrate 50 years of Sociology by showcasing the depth of material in the journal’s archive. ‘Identity’ was chosen as the focus for an e-special issue about the 1990s as this was an important period in the development of public and academic discussions around this slippery concept. A review of the journal’s content from that era reveals a surprising dearth of work on the politics o…
Race, Class and ‘The Harmony of Dispositions’
This response piece is informed by recent public discussions concerning the BBC ‘Great British Class Calculator’ – a survey which seeks to rethink traditional ways of categorising class for the 21st century. This article focuses on how individuals feel about, and respond to, their class location. Drawing on data from a two-year study about the black middle classes, it is argued that class identity cannot be fully understood without taking account…
Social mix, schooling and intersectionality
This paper addresses some particular aspects of the complex intersections between race and social class. It is based upon data collected as part of a two-year Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) funded project exploring the 'Educational strategies of the Black Middle Classes' (BMC). ('The Educational Strategies of the Black middle classes', ESRC RES-062-23-1880). The project as a whole focuses on the educational perspectives, strategies a…
Three generations of racism
This paper draws on qualitative data exploring the experiences of first-generation middle-class Black Caribbean-heritage parents, their own parents, and their children. We focus on the different ways in which race and class intersect in shaping attitudes towards education and subsequent educational practices. We argue that the nature of racism has changed, but it still remains, mainly in more subtle, insidious forms. We conclude that race cannot …
Middle class by profession
Drawing on data collected during a 2-year Economic and Social Research Council-funded project exploring the educational perspectives and strategies of middle-class families with a Black Caribbean heritage, this paper examines how participants, in professional or managerial occupations, position themselves in relation to the label ‘middle class’. Our analysis reveals five distinct groupings: those who are ‘comfortably middle class’, ‘middle-class …
A political investment
This paper draws upon a two-year Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) funded study into the educational strategies of the black middle classes to examine the role of race and racism in the research process. Specifically, it explores how my political positioning and experiences of racism, as a black female scholar, shaped not only my engagement with the research but also how I was perceived and positioned by others. This is analysed in term…
Raising Middle-class Black Children
The enrolment of middle-class children in extra-curricular activities is a recent trend in many affluent countries. It is part of what Annette Lareau refers to as a classed parenting style - 'concerted cultivation' which sees the child as a project with skills and talents to be fostered and developed. Controversially, Lareau argued that class, rather than race, was the most influential factor in determining this particular parenting style. In rel…
You got a pass, so what more do you want?’
The article discusses the findings of an ESRC funded project (RES-062-23-1880) which used in-depth interviews to explore the educational experiences and strategies of 62 Black Caribbean parents; the biggest qualitative study of education and the Black middle class yet conducted in the UK. The article focuses on the parents' interactions with their children's teachers and, in particular, their experience that teachers tend to have systematically l…
The invisibility of race
It has been argued that racialised Others occupy a liminal space of alterity; a position at the edges of society from which their identities and experiences are constructed. Rather than being regarded as a place of disadvantage and degradation, it has been posited that those excluded from the centre can experience a ‘perspective advantage’ as their experiences and analyses become informed by a panoramic dialectic offering a wider lens than the wh…
Intersectional work and precarious positionings
This paper reports on data drawn from a study exploring the educational strategies of 62 Black Caribbean heritage middle-class parents. In this paper, we consider the respective roles of race and class in the shaping of parents’ educational strategies, deploying an analysis that focuses on their intersection and seeks to hold both race and class in productive tension. Drawing on empirical data, we illustrate how parents’ classed and raced identit…
Being strategic, being watchful, being determined
This paper reports on qualitative data that focus on the educational strategies of middle-class parents of Black Caribbean heritage. Drawing on Bourdieu's key concepts of habitus, capital and field, our focus is an investigation of the differences that are apparent between respondent parents in their levels of involvement with regard to schools. We conclude that, within a broadly similar paradigm of active involvement with and monitoring of schoo…
Unspoken rules of engagement
Racial microaggressions are brief, everyday interactions that send denigrating messages to people of color because they belong to a racially minoritised group. Compared to more overt forms of racism, racial microaggressions are subtle and insidious, often leaving the victim confused, distressed and frustrated and the perpetrator oblivious of the offense they have caused. Drawing on the counter‐narrative aspect of critical race theory that stresse…
Market movements
The Public Identities of the Black Middle Classes
Drawing on data from a two-year ESRC-funded project into The Educational Strategies of the Black Middle Classes, 1 this article examines how middle class blacks negotiate survival in a society marked by race and class discrimination. It considers respondents' school experiences, marked as they are by incidents of Othering and racism and explores both the processes by which they came to an awareness of their status as racially minoritized and how …
Response to Woods – When rewards and sanctions fail
Explored through a focus on the behaviour and related experiences of a 9 year old Muslim Somalian boy called Zak, Woods offers a fascinating in‐depth case study account of the rewards and sanctions
Legitimizing Black academic failure
The continued lower academic attainment of Black (especially Black Caribbean) pupils is now well established. Yet, to date there has been no single coherent national Government strategy that has successfully closed the gap in educational attainment between either Black and White pupils or between Black pupils and the national average. Academic and policy debates centring on the causes and potential ways of addressing this gap remain marred by con…
Beyond the status quo? Challenging normative assumptions about race
Tackling the roots of racism: lessons for success R. Bhavnani, H. S. Mirza & V. Meetoo, 2005 Bristol, The Policy Press £15.99 ISBN 1‐86134‐774‐X During a recent live interview with actors Hugh Jack
You got a pass, so what more do you want?’
The article discusses the findings of an ESRC funded project (RES-062-23-1880) which used in-depth interviews to explore the educational experiences and strategies of 62 Black Caribbean parents; the biggest qualitative study of education and the Black middle class yet conducted in the UK. The article focuses on the parents' interactions with their children's teachers and, in particular, their experience that teachers tend to have systematically l…
Being strategic, being watchful, being determined
This paper reports on qualitative data that focus on the educational strategies of middle-class parents of Black Caribbean heritage. Drawing on Bourdieu's key concepts of habitus, capital and field, our focus is an investigation of the differences that are apparent between respondent parents in their levels of involvement with regard to schools. We conclude that, within a broadly similar paradigm of active involvement with and monitoring of schoo…
The Public Identities of the Black Middle Classes
Drawing on data from a two-year ESRC-funded project into The Educational Strategies of the Black Middle Classes, 1 this article examines how middle class blacks negotiate survival in a society marked by race and class discrimination. It considers respondents' school experiences, marked as they are by incidents of Othering and racism and explores both the processes by which they came to an awareness of their status as racially minoritized and how …
Raising Middle-class Black Children
The enrolment of middle-class children in extra-curricular activities is a recent trend in many affluent countries. It is part of what Annette Lareau refers to as a classed parenting style - 'concerted cultivation' which sees the child as a project with skills and talents to be fostered and developed. Controversially, Lareau argued that class, rather than race, was the most influential factor in determining this particular parenting style. In rel…
Race, Class and ‘The Harmony of Dispositions’
This response piece is informed by recent public discussions concerning the BBC ‘Great British Class Calculator’ – a survey which seeks to rethink traditional ways of categorising class for the 21st century. This article focuses on how individuals feel about, and respond to, their class location. Drawing on data from a two-year study about the black middle classes, it is argued that class identity cannot be fully understood without taking account…
Middle class by profession
Drawing on data collected during a 2-year Economic and Social Research Council-funded project exploring the educational perspectives and strategies of middle-class families with a Black Caribbean heritage, this paper examines how participants, in professional or managerial occupations, position themselves in relation to the label ‘middle class’. Our analysis reveals five distinct groupings: those who are ‘comfortably middle class’, ‘middle-class …
The invisibility of race
It has been argued that racialised Others occupy a liminal space of alterity; a position at the edges of society from which their identities and experiences are constructed. Rather than being regarded as a place of disadvantage and degradation, it has been posited that those excluded from the centre can experience a ‘perspective advantage’ as their experiences and analyses become informed by a panoramic dialectic offering a wider lens than the wh…
Unspoken rules of engagement
Racial microaggressions are brief, everyday interactions that send denigrating messages to people of color because they belong to a racially minoritised group. Compared to more overt forms of racism, racial microaggressions are subtle and insidious, often leaving the victim confused, distressed and frustrated and the perpetrator oblivious of the offense they have caused. Drawing on the counter‐narrative aspect of critical race theory that stresse…
Legitimizing Black academic failure
The continued lower academic attainment of Black (especially Black Caribbean) pupils is now well established. Yet, to date there has been no single coherent national Government strategy that has successfully closed the gap in educational attainment between either Black and White pupils or between Black pupils and the national average. Academic and policy debates centring on the causes and potential ways of addressing this gap remain marred by con…
Social mix, schooling and intersectionality
This paper addresses some particular aspects of the complex intersections between race and social class. It is based upon data collected as part of a two-year Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) funded project exploring the 'Educational strategies of the Black Middle Classes' (BMC). ('The Educational Strategies of the Black middle classes', ESRC RES-062-23-1880). The project as a whole focuses on the educational perspectives, strategies a…
I Would Have Become Wallpaper Had Racism Had Its Way”
In 2019, AdvanceHE reported that there were just 25 UK Black female full professors in British universities. Black women are less likely to occupy a role at this level than their male and White counterparts. Despite this, Black women remain relatively absent in institutional initiatives to advance gender equality, and there is little commitment amongst UK universities to explicitly address structural inequalities of race as they affect the experi…
Intersectional work and precarious positionings
This paper reports on data drawn from a study exploring the educational strategies of 62 Black Caribbean heritage middle-class parents. In this paper, we consider the respective roles of race and class in the shaping of parents’ educational strategies, deploying an analysis that focuses on their intersection and seeks to hold both race and class in productive tension. Drawing on empirical data, we illustrate how parents’ classed and raced identit…
Moving the goalposts
Drawing on a secondary analysis of official statistics, this paper examines the changing scale of the inequality of achievement between White students and their Black British peers who identify their family heritage as Black Caribbean. We examine a 25‐year period from the introduction of the General Certificate of Secondary Education ( GCSE ), in 1988, to the 20th anniversary of the murder of Stephen Lawrence in 2013. It is the first time that th…
A political investment
This paper draws upon a two-year Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) funded study into the educational strategies of the black middle classes to examine the role of race and racism in the research process. Specifically, it explores how my political positioning and experiences of racism, as a black female scholar, shaped not only my engagement with the research but also how I was perceived and positioned by others. This is analysed in term…
Three generations of racism
This paper draws on qualitative data exploring the experiences of first-generation middle-class Black Caribbean-heritage parents, their own parents, and their children. We focus on the different ways in which race and class intersect in shaping attitudes towards education and subsequent educational practices. We argue that the nature of racism has changed, but it still remains, mainly in more subtle, insidious forms. We conclude that race cannot …
Self-Identity and Its Discontents
This article introduces one of four e-special issues designed to celebrate 50 years of Sociology by showcasing the depth of material in the journal’s archive. ‘Identity’ was chosen as the focus for an e-special issue about the 1990s as this was an important period in the development of public and academic discussions around this slippery concept. A review of the journal’s content from that era reveals a surprising dearth of work on the politics o…
Beyond the status quo? Challenging normative assumptions about race
Tackling the roots of racism: lessons for success R. Bhavnani, H. S. Mirza & V. Meetoo, 2005 Bristol, The Policy Press £15.99 ISBN 1‐86134‐774‐X During a recent live interview with actors Hugh Jack
Legitimizing Black academic failure
The continued lower academic attainment of Black (especially Black Caribbean) pupils is now well established. Yet, to date there has been no single coherent national Government strategy that has successfully closed the gap in educational attainment between either Black and White pupils or between Black pupils and the national average. Academic and policy debates centring on the causes and potential ways of addressing this gap remain marred by con…
Response to Woods – When rewards and sanctions fail
Explored through a focus on the behaviour and related experiences of a 9 year old Muslim Somalian boy called Zak, Woods offers a fascinating in‐depth case study account of the rewards and sanctions
Unspoken rules of engagement
Racial microaggressions are brief, everyday interactions that send denigrating messages to people of color because they belong to a racially minoritised group. Compared to more overt forms of racism, racial microaggressions are subtle and insidious, often leaving the victim confused, distressed and frustrated and the perpetrator oblivious of the offense they have caused. Drawing on the counter‐narrative aspect of critical race theory that stresse…
Market movements
The Public Identities of the Black Middle Classes
Drawing on data from a two-year ESRC-funded project into The Educational Strategies of the Black Middle Classes, 1 this article examines how middle class blacks negotiate survival in a society marked by race and class discrimination. It considers respondents' school experiences, marked as they are by incidents of Othering and racism and explores both the processes by which they came to an awareness of their status as racially minoritized and how …
You got a pass, so what more do you want?’
The article discusses the findings of an ESRC funded project (RES-062-23-1880) which used in-depth interviews to explore the educational experiences and strategies of 62 Black Caribbean parents; the biggest qualitative study of education and the Black middle class yet conducted in the UK. The article focuses on the parents' interactions with their children's teachers and, in particular, their experience that teachers tend to have systematically l…
The invisibility of race
It has been argued that racialised Others occupy a liminal space of alterity; a position at the edges of society from which their identities and experiences are constructed. Rather than being regarded as a place of disadvantage and degradation, it has been posited that those excluded from the centre can experience a ‘perspective advantage’ as their experiences and analyses become informed by a panoramic dialectic offering a wider lens than the wh…
Intersectional work and precarious positionings
This paper reports on data drawn from a study exploring the educational strategies of 62 Black Caribbean heritage middle-class parents. In this paper, we consider the respective roles of race and class in the shaping of parents’ educational strategies, deploying an analysis that focuses on their intersection and seeks to hold both race and class in productive tension. Drawing on empirical data, we illustrate how parents’ classed and raced identit…
Being strategic, being watchful, being determined
This paper reports on qualitative data that focus on the educational strategies of middle-class parents of Black Caribbean heritage. Drawing on Bourdieu's key concepts of habitus, capital and field, our focus is an investigation of the differences that are apparent between respondent parents in their levels of involvement with regard to schools. We conclude that, within a broadly similar paradigm of active involvement with and monitoring of schoo…
Social mix, schooling and intersectionality
This paper addresses some particular aspects of the complex intersections between race and social class. It is based upon data collected as part of a two-year Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) funded project exploring the 'Educational strategies of the Black Middle Classes' (BMC). ('The Educational Strategies of the Black middle classes', ESRC RES-062-23-1880). The project as a whole focuses on the educational perspectives, strategies a…
Three generations of racism
This paper draws on qualitative data exploring the experiences of first-generation middle-class Black Caribbean-heritage parents, their own parents, and their children. We focus on the different ways in which race and class intersect in shaping attitudes towards education and subsequent educational practices. We argue that the nature of racism has changed, but it still remains, mainly in more subtle, insidious forms. We conclude that race cannot …
Middle class by profession
Drawing on data collected during a 2-year Economic and Social Research Council-funded project exploring the educational perspectives and strategies of middle-class families with a Black Caribbean heritage, this paper examines how participants, in professional or managerial occupations, position themselves in relation to the label ‘middle class’. Our analysis reveals five distinct groupings: those who are ‘comfortably middle class’, ‘middle-class …
A political investment
This paper draws upon a two-year Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) funded study into the educational strategies of the black middle classes to examine the role of race and racism in the research process. Specifically, it explores how my political positioning and experiences of racism, as a black female scholar, shaped not only my engagement with the research but also how I was perceived and positioned by others. This is analysed in term…
Raising Middle-class Black Children
The enrolment of middle-class children in extra-curricular activities is a recent trend in many affluent countries. It is part of what Annette Lareau refers to as a classed parenting style - 'concerted cultivation' which sees the child as a project with skills and talents to be fostered and developed. Controversially, Lareau argued that class, rather than race, was the most influential factor in determining this particular parenting style. In rel…
Race, Class and ‘The Harmony of Dispositions’
This response piece is informed by recent public discussions concerning the BBC ‘Great British Class Calculator’ – a survey which seeks to rethink traditional ways of categorising class for the 21st century. This article focuses on how individuals feel about, and respond to, their class location. Drawing on data from a two-year study about the black middle classes, it is argued that class identity cannot be fully understood without taking account…
Self-Identity and Its Discontents
This article introduces one of four e-special issues designed to celebrate 50 years of Sociology by showcasing the depth of material in the journal’s archive. ‘Identity’ was chosen as the focus for an e-special issue about the 1990s as this was an important period in the development of public and academic discussions around this slippery concept. A review of the journal’s content from that era reveals a surprising dearth of work on the politics o…
Race, self-interest and privilege amongst students at elite U.S. and U.K. universities
Warikoo’s The Diversity Bargain describes the findings of research which explores how students at elite universities in the U.S. and the U.K. conceptualize race in relation to the admissions process and their experiences on campus. This is an important study, which reveals differences in the degree of comfort and caution displayed by white students in their framing of race. There are three areas worthy of further exploration: the subjective posit…
Moving the goalposts
Drawing on a secondary analysis of official statistics, this paper examines the changing scale of the inequality of achievement between White students and their Black British peers who identify their family heritage as Black Caribbean. We examine a 25‐year period from the introduction of the General Certificate of Secondary Education ( GCSE ), in 1988, to the 20th anniversary of the murder of Stephen Lawrence in 2013. It is the first time that th…
I Would Have Become Wallpaper Had Racism Had Its Way”
In 2019, AdvanceHE reported that there were just 25 UK Black female full professors in British universities. Black women are less likely to occupy a role at this level than their male and White counterparts. Despite this, Black women remain relatively absent in institutional initiatives to advance gender equality, and there is little commitment amongst UK universities to explicitly address structural inequalities of race as they affect the experi…
Reimagining Education
How do you change anything without hope?’ An Interview with Steve Garner
Sociology (22 works) · Political science (18 works) · Critical Race Theory in Education (17 works) · Gender Studies (17 works) · School Choice and Performance (13 works) · Gender Studies (12 works) · Law (12 works) · Middle class (9 works) · Psychology (9 works) · Epistemology (8 works)