Community Service and Perceptions of Social Class

As Pierre Bourdieu proposes in his paper “Cultural Reproduction and Social Reproduction,” cultural, economic, and social capital demonstrate a person’s social status and cultural competence, and they can reproduce across generations. However, unlike the other two, cultural capital is more obscure and is often ignored when we try to examine a person’s social class. However, its importance should not be underestimated. Cultural capital is defined as “the accumulation of knowledge, behaviors, and skills” that a person possesses. It is greatly associated with the education, from both school and family, that a person receives. Thus, if someone is constantly instilled with a set of values from a very young age, this person would very likely internalize those values and practice them later in life. 

Takau English School, an elite international school in Taiwan, has a service-oriented culture. That means students attending this school would be required to participate in community service through which they should be able to gain a better understanding of social class and a reflection on their own privileges. However, in the interviews, we see that not all students truly understand the meaning of community service, and they have a variety of interpretations of social class–proof of their failure to internalize the values the school tries to instill. Across two interviews, I saw two completely different approaches to interpreting social class and privileges. 

In the first one, the student acknowledged that she was born into a privileged family, and she was educated to be in service of the community since she was little. When asked about social class, she recalled her experiences of participating in community service during which she met people from different classes. She was indeed passionate about contributing to the community by helping underprivileged groups. Comparing her to other students, we see two unique features of her that play a significant role in shaping her identity and perception of social class. 

Firstly, her family is wealthy and compassionate as they work in the medicalfield. Influenced by her family, she was determined to become a doctor andbe in service to the community in the future. Secondly, she went to Takau English School since pre-school, so she was instilled with service-oriented ideas in school from a very young age. Growing up in such environments, she fully understood the purposes of community service and her own privileged status in society. The education she received from school and her family made up her cultural capital and allowed her to be a true elite (in a good way). Born into the elite class, she was able to internalize the values instilled in her and accumulate cultural capital along the way. 

The second student, however, demonstrates a completely different view of social class. He did not believe that he was advantaged even though all students attending this school should be considered advantaged because the school does not provide any financial aid. When the interviewer asked him to define his family’s social class, he answered middle class which he described as having “no difficulty in living and enjoying life.” Besides, he defined the social class as “division based on wealth.” However, in reality, social class is much more complicated than that. Furthermore, when asked about social class, his initial reaction was to recall the wealthiest student he had seen in school instead of people who were less advantaged than him. When mentioning community service, he acknowledged that there were people who are less wealthy but his reaction was that he could not say “‘go there and do something’” to these people. From his responses, I cannot see any awareness of his privileged status or understanding of community service. Unlike the previous girl, he only attended this school for two years. Apparently, he was not able to internalize any of the school’s service-oriented values. Although he was attending this school, he failed to accumulate the cultural capital he could have gained by reflecting on social status.