UC San Diego

This dissertation researches how educational inequality is reproduced by the intersection of identity, face-to-face interaction and the politics of contested meaning. Using ethnographic field methods, I explore how a disrespectful classroom culture is initiated by societal forces such as racism, classism, anti-immigrant beliefs, community narrative, and neighborhood context, but more importantly co-produced by teachers and students inside the classroom.

To uncover the dynamic role (dis)respect plays in schooling, I draw from theories of symbolic interactionism to examine teachers’ and students’ divergent interpretations and meanings of (dis)respect. In doing so, I offer a theoretically grounded and evidence-based argument of how meanings and practices associated with (dis)respect matter to student engagement and teacher-student relationships. As this project demonstrates, student-teacher conflict does not arise from students’ oppositional attitude to education or authority, or stem from a warped sense of respect, but occurs as a reaction to feeling disrespected by their teachers. In response, students use a “reprisal process” as a strategy to protect their identities and retain the respect of their peers, which many teachers interpret and label as disrespectful.

Data suggests the vast majority of students do respect and accept the authority of teachers and desire, even crave respect from their teachers, however, teachers’ ideas of (dis)respect are also mediated by their identities and a belief that respect is asymmetrical. In turn, the struggle for respect ensues leaving teachers and students feeling equally wounded, unrecognized, and suffering from the politics of contested meanings of (dis)respect. Together, this influences a disrespectful school culture that contributes directly to failure for some students and indirectly to a sense of alienation for all students. As defined in this study, the meaning students and teachers attach to (dis)respectful interaction is both shared and contested, but ultimately driven by identities that intersect with face-to-face interaction that impacts the everyday lives of the individuals I studied. Thus, the central contention of my doctoral work is that the concept of respect holds theoretical and social significance as it is co-produced within the school setting.