Still Jenny from the block? Working-class women, higher education & social mobility in the COVID-19 context

大学教育通常被视为提高社会和经济地位的途径。也就是说，它被认为是向上社会流动的催化剂。然而，所有的毕业生都有这样的“机会”吗？2019冠状病毒病大流行如何影响年轻人的毕业轨迹？上世纪90年代，英国的社会科学家发现，虽然越来越多的工薪阶层学生进入大学，但他们并没有像中产阶级和精英那样从中受益。正是后者垄断了毕业生劳动力市场上的“优质工作”（Brown and Scase, 1994, p.17）。长期以来，来自工薪阶层背景的毕业生，尤其是白人白人女性，在毕业后或毕业后都面临着低薪、不稳定的就业市场。今天的情况仍然如此，因为全球人才拍卖随之而来，调动高价值资本的非正式过程，而不是正式的学术证书，在谁得到哪份工作方面发挥着重要作用（Brown和Souto-Otero， 2020）。由于这是一个相当大且日益严重的问题，因此需要更密切、更深入地研究社会特权通过高等教育（再）产生的途径。在我的博士研究中，我就这样做了，我采访了15名在英国一所大学学习的工薪阶层女性。他们毕业时面对的是一个饱和的就业市场，这个市场给他们提供的专业就业机会很少。由此，我设计了一套概念工具，使我能够采用“阶级内”的理论方法来理解工人阶级妇女的叙述。概念化这些使我能够将那些将“工人阶级”类别视为同质的工作问题化，在一个阶级类别中分解并谈论不同阶级经历的细节。这将我的研究与其他社会学家，尤其是其他布尔迪厄学派的学者区分开来。这是一个重要的理论贡献，我将在整个奖学金期间继续发展它。我在论文中发现，毕业是各种形式的不平等重现的时刻。有必要围绕COVID-19进行研究，因为人们公认，妇女、年轻人和非白人族裔群体受疫情影响最严重。设立这一研究金的目的是关注这一重要的社会问题，进行进一步的研究并产生政策影响，以便更平等地分配机会。通过开始我设计的课程，我将置身于即将出现的关于COVID-19对年轻工人阶级，特别是年轻女性所面临的社会流动性和社会不平等影响的学术政策辩论的核心。

A university education is generally viewed as a route through which social and economic standing is enhanced. That is, it is considered a catalyst for upward social mobility. However, are all graduates afforded this 'opportunity'? And how has the COVID-19 pandemic effected young people's graduate trajectories? In the 1990s, social scientists in the UK found that while increasing numbers of working-class students were accessing university, they were not benefitting from it in the same way that the middle-classes and elites were. It was the latter groups who monopolised the "superior jobs" in the graduate labour market (Brown and Scase, 1994, p.17). For too long, graduates from working-class background, particularly BAME women, have disproportionately faced navigating the low-waged, precarious jobs market upon graduation and beyond. This remains the case today as the global auction for talent ensues and informal processes of mobilising high value capitals, rather than formal academic credentials, play a major role in who gets which job (Brown and Souto-Otero, 2020). As this is a considerable and growing issue, a closer, more in-depth look at the routes throughout which social privilege is (re)produced through higher education is required. I did just this during my PhD research as I interviewed fifteen working-class women who studied at a UK university over a longitudinal basis. They graduated into a saturated employment market which offered them little opportunity for professional employment. From this, I designed a set of conceptual tools that allowed me to take an 'intra-class' theoretical approach to understanding the narratives of working-class women. Conceptualising these allowed me to problematise work which viewed those in the 'working-class' category as homogenous, unpick and speak to the details of differential class experiences within one class category. This delineates my work from other sociologists, particularly other Bourdieusian scholars. This is an important theoretical contribution which I will continue to develop throughout the Fellowship. I found in my thesis that graduation was a point at which where various forms of inequality are reproduced. To research this surrounding COVID-19 is a necessity, as it has been acknowledged that women, young people and BAME groups have been worst affected by the pandemic. This Fellowship has been designed to attend to this important social problem, to do further research and create policy impact which will allow for the distribution of opportunities in a more equal manner. Through embarking on the programme I have designed, I will be situated at the heart of academic policy debates that are about to emerge on the impact of COVID-19 on social mobility and social inequalities faced by young working-class people, particularly young women.