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‘Roundabout routes and sanctuary schools’: the role of situated educational practices and habitus in the creation of transnational professionals
Author(s) -
WATERS JOHANNA L.
Publication year - 2007
Publication title -
global networks
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.685
H-Index - 65
eISSN - 1471-0374
pISSN - 1470-2266
DOI - 10.1111/j.1471-0374.2007.00180.x
Subject(s) - situated , habitus , embodied cognition , salience (neuroscience) , sociology , identity (music) , class (philosophy) , situated learning , public relations , political science , pedagogy , cultural capital , social science , epistemology , aesthetics , psychology , philosophy , computer science , cognitive psychology , artificial intelligence
In this article, I examine the role of ‘education’ in the formation of transnational professionals in contemporary Hong Kong. A significant body of work has been devoted to considering the ways in which knowledge within particular global financial centres is embodied through the practices of a transnational capitalist class (TNCC). Yet, very few researchers have discussed how this TNCC is actually created. In this article, I highlight the importance of one faction of the TNCC ‐‘overseas‐educated locals’‐ and describe the sense of common identity and mutual recognition that binds them. Drawing on fieldwork conducted in Hong Kong and Vancouver between 2000 and 2003, I demonstrate the salience of embedded and spatialized practices of education in the creation of the TNCC. In particular, I look at the role of inculcation within a school/university and home environment, as well as the significance of a distinctive habitus, and conclude that these situated processes are indeed crucial to the development of an exclusive class of transnational professionals.