Outsider status, and racialised habitus: the experiences of Gypsy, Roma, and Traveller students in higher education

Abstract

This qualitative study explored the university experiences of 13 students from Gypsy, Roma, and Traveller (GRT) communities in England and Scotland. Using conceptual tools, informed by the work of Bourdieu, such as racialised habitus and racialised cultural capital, as well as Elias’s work on established-outsider figurations we show that GRT students are ‘racialised’ outsiders in university established white habitus, with students experiencing the devaluing of their cultural capital including anti-Gypsy and anti-Roma rhetoric within university settings. Moreover, a destabilised habitus was evident, for some, who experienced ‘cultural dissonance’ between community and university expectations as well as feelings of ‘not being good enough’. This was compounded by the racialised controlling images they encountered, resulting in hyper-vigilance about the sharing of their ethnic identity. For some, this led to painfully ‘fragmented selves’ which was exacerbated by a lack of support from universities and invisibility within institutional established white habitus.