British-Chinese Pupils’ Constructions of Gender and Learning

Abstract

British-Chinese pupils are the highest achieving ethnic group in the British educational system, and British-Chinese boys’ performance equals that of girls. This paper investigates aspects of British-Chinese pupils’ constructions of learning, focusing particularly on subject preferences and their constructions of themselves as pupils. The results are analysed according to gender as well as social class, and demonstrate that British-Chinese pupils’ constructions of gender, subject preference and self-image as pupils differ in some respects from those of pupils from other ethnic groups. Reasons for such differences are considered, and the paper also reflects on the implications of these findings in relation to broader findings concerning the stereotyping and ‘othering’ of the British-Chinese within the British education system