Parental Support for Students’ Music Learning

Abstract

Based on Bourdieu’s cultural capital argument, this chapter reviews a broad selection of literature on the impact of parental socio-cultural background on the provision of parental support and how this influences the intergenerational transmission of cultural capital and students’ musical development. Socialisation is a central way of facilitating the intergenerational transmission of cultural capital and requires significant levels of parental support to put into effect. Parental cultural capital and support for students’ cultural activities may contribute to their academic success (DiMaggio, 1982; DiMaggio and Mohr, 1985) and reproduce parents’ social status in students. Moreover, familial factors (e.g., parental educational attainment and cultural background) affect parental involvement in and support for students’ cultural development. Parents with diverse cultural backgrounds or social classes show different parental strategies for and parental support for students’ cultural development and music learning. Through parental support, parental cultural capital may be directly or indirectly imparted to students and displayed through students’ disposition towards high-brow culture and possession of cultural knowledge.