‘Working class academia must work harder’

It was as if they were stuck in the outside lane, says a PhD researcher at Utrecht University.
It requires more effort and energy to make a career in academia if you were not raised on the culture of the higher classes from birth. This was the tone of the discussions that researcher Mick Matthys had with 32 academics during the course of his PhD research. Matthys will receive his PhD from Utrecht University based on his research of those who came from working class roots but made their careers in academia. “They had to keep fighting and transcend their backgrounds”, says Matthys, who also comes from a working class family.
Do the children of lawyers have an easier life than the children of plumbers? This is not something Matthys studied, but one thing that did emerge in the course of his research: nearly all his respondents – aged between 44 and 65 years old – stated that they had run into problems due to their working class origins. What type of study should they pursue? What languages must they learn? Which jokes were appropriate to make? And because they came from working class families, they had no one to ask for help in answering such questions. 

“I studied how these people formed their identities, and this was strongly related to their social backgrounds”, Matthys explains. “One of my respondents became a surgeon and recounts how he and his wife had once been invited out to a dinner, only for it to transpire that he was actually being tested to see whether he also knowledgeable about wine. They were looking to see if he really belonged. He did not grow up in a home where such knowledge was deemed important and he had no experience of these social codes.”
The people Matthys interviewed during his research all had a ‘professional identity’: they primarily identified themselves with their profession and did not aspire to management positions. They felt that they had planned their careers less strictly than others and that they had left more to chance. It was not self-evident that they should want to climb higher. “And that feeling went back to their childhoods and was something they had to contend with.”
Matthys’ research revealed that teachers had played crucial roles in the lives of professionals who originally came from working class backgrounds. “Virtually all of them had a teacher who saw what they were capable of and encouraged them.” Matthys therefore advocates that today’s teachers be given enough flexibility to also play such roles in the lives of working class children of immigrants to Holland, for example.

Matthys himself comes from a working class family: “For a long time I could not imagine that I would receive my doctorate. It was already a huge achievement that I had a steady job and enjoyed the work I was doing.”

Naam: Anoe Doebe (22)
Studie: Farmacie in Utrecht, derdejaars

“Ja, ik heb alleen een basisbeurs. Dat is voor mij niet nodig. Ik word gesponsord door mijn ouders. En ik ben nog inwonend, dat scheelt natuurlijk ook wel. Zelfs als ik in Utrecht op kamers zou gaan, hoef ik niet bij te lenen. Financieel is het niet nodig dat ik erbij werk. Daar heb ik ook de tijd niet voor. Ik fitness vier keer per week tweeënhalf uur  en ik heb tijd nodig voor reizen met de trein, studie en sociale dingen.” Aan het eind van mijn studie verwacht ik geen studieschuld te hebben. Farmacie duurt zes jaar. Ik red het wel om dat binnen tien jaar af te ronden. Ik denk dat ik een jaar of zeven nodig heb.”