Pierre Bourdieu coined the term symbolic violence to describe what takes place in the school system as well as in other social institutions that engage in the reifica- tion of hierarchical structures in society. Schools officially proclaim an egalitari- an ideology, and there is much public proclamation of the idea that education is officially open to all, but in reality some groups hold a monopoly on its rewards. Symbolic violence is enacted in the distribution of life chances, and expectations:
When powers are unequally distributed, the economic and social world presents itself not as a universe of possibles equally accessible to every possible subject—posts to be occupied, courses to be taken, markets to be won, goods to be consumed, properties to be exchanged— but rather as a signposted universe, full of injunctions and prohibitions, signs of appropri- ations and exclusion, obligatory routes or impassable barriers, and, in a word, profoundly differentiated, especially according to the degree to which it offers stable chances, capable of favouring and fulfilling stable expectations. (Bourdieu 2000, 225)
The wrestling fan activities involved an affirmation of their identities as Latinos— during a time when bilingual education at the school was essentially outlawed by the Blueprint for School Success and curricular reform mandates called for excis- ing any Spanish from the classroom. Wrestling talk was usually done in Spanish. Whenever the WWE websites were pulled up, comments about the on-screen mate- rial and instructions to one another on how to successfully download video or audio files were in Spanish. These discussions of wrestling in Spanish continued over a period of years, and involved many different friendship circles of bilingual students. These expressions of identity occurred in the midst of a schooling process char- acterized by Angela Valenzuela as “a powerful state-sanctioned instrument of cul- tural de-identification, or de-Mexicanization.” Valenzuela notes that “‘no Spanish’ rules were common in US-Mexican schools in Texas throughout the 1970s, and California initiated a return to the notion of English as the gold standard of edu- cation.” By the time the Blueprint for School Success was in place in 2000, the Washington principal was enforcing rules for no Spanish words in the classroom, and teachers were forbidden to translate English words on standardized tests for struggling students for whom Spanish is their first language after the passage of Proposition 187. This is just one of the ways that Latino “students’ cultural iden- tities are systematically derogated, and diminished. . . . Their proficiency in two languages is deemed a barrier to be eliminated. Their names are Anglicized or mis- pronounced” (Valenzuela 1999, 173–74). The boys’ competence as translators between their teacher and their parents—who are trying to negotiate the school system when teachers know no Spanish and the paperwork from the school is rarely translated—seems a source of shame rather than accomplishment. Teachers and
administrators openly display impatience with the students’ parents, who are accustomed to radically different school cultures in Mexico.
The outward characteristics of the Latino students—compliant, polite, defer- ential—provided a stark contrast to the wrestlers they loved. Wrestling’s appeal lies in its stark presentation of the unfair, the contest in which the fix is already in, and rewards are heaped on the egotistical (and Anglo) bullies of the world. To the Latino boys in my class, the school system must have looked like just such a rigged game, and the wrestlers perhaps expressed some of the boys’ subterranean anger. Wrestling offers a universe inscribed with themes of social melodrama that bear a relation to conflicts encountered in their everyday lives—especially at school. Wrestling’s value system mirrored what could be observed in the classroom com- munity of Latino students, in which loyalty and friendship are rated more highly than getting ahead.
Latino boys were the most likely targets of ethnic slurs in the classroom. On several occasions, boys would be brought to tears after verbal battles in which they were attacked for their diets (“bean eaters”), weight, the poverty of their mothers (typical taunts being “you don’t have any food at home” or “your mother’s a maid”) or the status of their fathers (“your dad’s homeless” or an “illegal”). It was not only other children who created the hostile environment. Administrators freely dispar- aged Latino parents to anyone who would listen as failing to value education, the teachers complained that Latino families buy video games but not books, and make no effort to make school attendance a family priority. Janitors feel free to order the boys around. Even when I was present and had given permission for them to stay late or use the phone, one Anglo janitor shouted “Vamanos!” to clear the class- rooms, when the boys were there after hours. In some ways the worst insults came in the form of “mock Spanish” of this kind (Hill 1998) instances where non- Spanish speakers inject Spanish words into their speech.
In my class, despite the fact that Valenzuela’s book was assigned reading and we discussed the discrimination against Latinos in the public school system, I wit- nessed countless scenes in which university students who acted as teacher’s aides presumed that the Latinos in the class were passive, slow-witted, and poor speak- ers of English. Indeed, the Latino boys differed greatly from the working-class Anglo boys, who constantly demanded adult attention, and frequently got in trou- ble, but were nevertheless treated as more intelligent. As Valenzuela points out, silence and politeness are often misinterpreted in school settings: “The ‘politeness’ and ‘compliance’ of immigrant youth follows logically from their lack of social power. Their ‘politeness’ is perhaps as much about deference as it is about power- lessness or an expression of their belief that they are not ‘entitled’ to openly defy school authority or assert their own vision of schooling” (1999, 140). The univer- sity students identified much more strongly with the interests of the Anglo students
(video games, Neopets, Nickelodeon cartoons) and would often suggest new web- sites with additional information, or help the Anglo students navigate new sites. There was considerable tolerance, sympathy, or even support among the universi- ty students for Web research on more transient interests such as skateboarding, Heely skate shoes, Eminem, Harry Potter, punk wear, or the Insane Clown Posse. But wrestling was always sniggered at, as a bad joke. As Valenzuela notes about rebellious behavior among Texas high schoolers, “this is typical of the tendency in classrooms where acts of resistance among students who occupy a privileged posi- tion in the school population hierarchy and are in higher rungs of the curriculum (i.e., not remedial or ESL) are viewed more positively than when expressed by those of a lower status” (229).
Teachers’ actions could bring the boys to tears. One day, after Edwin and Americo were selected to go to mandatory remedial summer school, I could see from their faces that something was terribly wrong. They entered the computer lab, but rather than race to the computers as they usually did, they quietly put their heads down on the desk and cried. The blame for the school’s failure to deliver better test results is delivered to the Latino children and their parents. Edwin, Americo, Andres, and Carlos experience symbolic violence on a daily basis at school, through disenfranchisement and degradation. No wonder they gravitate toward the super- powerful and hypermasculine wrestlers as their idols.