Conclusion

Shields, S

doi:10.1007/978-3-030-88935-7_8

Conclusion

Lookup NU author(s): Dr Samantha Shields

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Abstract

© 2021, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.Archer’s (Structure, agency and the internal conversation. Cambridge University Press, 2003) concept of internal conversation enables an exploration of how working-class women agentically operate within the societal structures that they are involuntarily located. Pertinently, the working-class women had different sets of enablements and constraints contributing to differences in identities, choices and emotions which overall facilitated morphogenesis or morphostasis in relation to the ‘modus vivendi’ of higher education. This chapter proceeds with first a discussion of morphogenetic enablement or morphostatic constraint in relation to friendships, secondly teachers, thirdly family support, fourthly working-class femininities and finally primary teaching careers. Overall, it is suggested that neoliberal ‘post-feminist’ discourses are not meaningful for many working-class women and the prioritisation of family and locality are not concomitant with individualised ambitions of upward social mobility.