MARIA JOSE COPERIAS AGUILAR (Ed.

CULTURE AND POWE

CHALLENGING DISCOURSES

Valencia, 2000
 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Reaching the fifth volume of a publication is not an easy task, and even less so if
there is not a regular editor, association or publishing house behind it; that is the reason
why my first acknowledgement goes to all the people who have made these five issues of
"Culture and Power" possible by means of contributions, regular research in the field of
cultural studies. the diffusion of this discipline within Spanish academia, participation in
seminars and conferences, discussion meetings and very hard work in general.

I would especially like to thank those members of the "unofficial" Cultural Studies
group who have most closely participated in the preparation of this book: Chantal Cornut
Gentille, Felicity Hand, Rosa Gonzalez, David Walton. Dagmar Scheu, Mike Pritchard,
Jamie Fowlie, Sara Martfn and Chris Weedon. Special thanks are also due to friends and
colleagues who have always supported me in carrying out this project and have contributed
to this publication in different ways: Lidia Garcia Asensio, L!uYsa Fernandez i Huguet,
Carme Manuel, Vicent Andreu and Elizabeth Power.

Words of gratitude also for the generous help and enthusiasm of my "assistants":
Primera edici6n, 2000 Rosa Marfa Segui, Maria Jesus Castillo, Laura Cano, Sergio Saiz, Geoffrey Ingram, and
especially Jose Maria Contreras without whose technical know-how this book would not
Quedan rigurosamente prohibidas, sin la autorizaci6n escrita de los titulares de! have seen the light of day.
Copyright, bajo ]as sanciones establecidas en !as !eyes, la ieproducci6n parcial o
total de esta obra por cualquier media o procedimiento, comprendidos la On the institutional front I must thank the Conselleria de Cultura, Educaci6 i
reprograffa y el tratamiento informatico, y la distribuci6n de ejemplares de ella, Ciencia. the Vicerrectorado de Cultura (University of Valencia), the Facultat de Filologia,
mediante alquiler o prestamo publicos. the Department of English and German Philology, and the British Council for tht::ir
financial aid. However, institutions are made up of people, some of whom got personally
Maquetaci6n: Jose Maria Contreras Ramis involved in this project, and to them all my gratitude, especially to Susi Lucas at the British
Disefio cubierta: Jorge Garcfa-Fayos Council in Valencia, who did everything within her power to implement the success of this
Asesoramiento lingUistico: Elizabeth Power academic venture.

Maria Jose Coperfas Aguilar (Ed.) Finally, I would like to thank all the friends who, without being colleagues or
having any special interest in this field, have always supported this project simply because
it was mine and they trusted me. I would also like to apologize for any possible mistakes
Servei de Publicacions - Universitat de Valencia
made in the long process of editing a book: from the selection of articles, the often
Cl Artes Grafiques, 13 46010-Valencia
subjective comments and corrections made, to the final result. I hope our enthusiasm and
Tel. 96 386 41 15
commitment will make up for them.

I.S.B.N.: 84-370-4429-4
Marfa Jose Coperfas Aguilar
D.L.: V-2398-2000
Valencia, Abril 2000

Imprime: Grrificas Cervel/6, SL., Alboraya, Valencia

CONTENTS

I - CHALLENGES ............................................................................................................. I

Writing on Drugs
Sadie Plant ............................................................................ ....................................... 3

Certain Ongoing Truths Possessed by those without Power

to Which those with Power are Blind.
An Approach to John Berger's !1110 their Labours
Jose Manuel Estevez Sad ................................................................................................... 11

Challenging Postocolonial Discourse

Salvador Faura Sabe ................................................................................................... 17

Who's Educating whom 9

The Power Struggle in Educatillg Rita
Barry Penflock Speck .......................................................................................................... 23

Challenging the Hegemonic:

Raymond Williams's Re-Articulations of Culture and Citizenship
Almro Pina .................................................................................................................. 31

One Drop of Blood:

'Racial', 'Ethnic' and Biological Discourses oflnequality.
Mike Pritchard .................................................................................................................. 45

II - CHALLENGING THE TEXT ..................................................................................... 57

Absolutely Fabulous:
"Money Makes the World Go Round"
or a Politicised Notion of Fulfilment.
Chantal Comut-Gentille d'Arcy .......................................................................................... 59

"Greedy, Barbarous and Cruel":

The Image of the Arab in Western Films
Jo/111 Cunningham ................................................................................................... 71
Express Yourself: The Butcher Bar.
A Postmodernist Gaze on Power and Femininity the Difficulty of Transcending
Monica Calvo Pascual ................................................................................................... 83 the Image ofireland as Modernity's other
Rosa Gon::.cile::. ......................... ........ :............................................................................. 199
alt.eng.disc.clean.sex:
discourse@on I ine_bodi.es "What is History, Sir?'",
Jamie Fo1rlie .................................................................................................................. 93 Conflicting Discourses on East African Asians
Felicity Hnd ..................... .......................................................................................... 209
Undermining the Communicative Role of the Expert
Carmen Gregori Signes ................................................................................................. 105 Dialogue Journal Writing
as a New Challenging Revision
Marilyn Manson: The Limits of Challenge of the Neoslave Narrative in Shaphire's Push
Sara Ma,1(11 Alegre ................................................................................................. 119 Carme Manuel ................................................................................................................ 219

Discourse Analysis of Ads Gender and Discourse in Quentin Tarantino's Filmscripts:

Where the Product is Sexualised What about Women's Language'7
and Female Sexuality Commodified Jose Sanraemi!ia ................................................................................................. 227
Marfa Dolores Martfne::. Revent6s ................................................ .................................. 131
Single White Female Meets Jiminy Cricket:
Sinead O'Connor's Rap-Song 'Famine': Sexual Politics and Genre Restrictions
A Provocative Account or a Money-Making Cliche? in Sarah Dunant's Birth Marks and U11der 111r Skin
Anna Paira/6 Carda ................................................................................................. 145 Marfa Isabel Sa11taulc1ria i Capdevi!a :.................................................................... 239

Differences in the Interpretation of Discourse Britain Through the Looking Brass:

Shattering Politeness in lntercultural Communication Brass Eye, Homophobia,
U. Dagmar Scheu Lottgen ................................. ................................................. 157 Deconstructive Manoeuvres and the Alf Garnett Syndrome
David Walron ................................................................................................................ 249

Goodness, Gracious Me:

Comedy as a Tool for Contesting Racism and Ethnocentrism
III - CHALLENGING IDENTITY ................................................................. 165 Chris Weedon ................................................................................................................ 261

Discourse, Identity and Nationalism

Martin Montgomery ........................................................... ..................................... 167

"Are There Internal Colonies in the United States?"

The Chicano Experience: An Overview
Julio Cwiero Serrano ................................................................................................. 183

On the Far Side of the Fourth Wall:

A Glimpse of the Effects of Racism in Hispanic Plays
Russell Dinapoli ................................................................................................. 193
 INDEX OF AUTHORS

Calvo Pascual, Monica ............................................................................................... 83

Cafiero Serrano, Julio.................................................................................................. 183
Cornut-Gentille d'Arcy , Chantal................................................................................. 59
Cunningham, John....................................................................................................... 71
Dinapoli, Russell......................................................................................................... 193
Estevez Saa, JoseManuel....................................................... ..................... ................ 11
FauraSabe, Salvador ................................................................................................... 17
Fowlie, Jamie ............................................................................................................... 93
Gonzalez. Rosa ........ ............... ............................................................................. ........ 199
Gregori Signes, Carmen.................................................................................. ............ l05
Hand. Felicity .............................................................................................................. 209
Manuel, Carme .......................................................................................................... 219
Martin Alegre, Sara.. ................... ................................................... ............................. 119
Martinez Revent6s, Marfa Dolores.............................................................................. 131
Montgomery. Martin ..................................................................................................
Pairal6 Garcfa. Anna....................................................................................................
167
143
I. CHALLENGES
Pennock Speck, Barry .................................................................................................. 23
Pina. Alvaro................................................................................................................. 31
Plant, Sadie.................................................................................................................. 3
Pritchard, Mike............................................................................................................ 45
Santaemilia, Jose......................................................................................................... 227
Santaulariai Capdevila, Marfa Isabel .......................................................................... 237
Scheu Lottgen, U. Dagmar .......................................................................................... 155
Walton, David.............................................................................................................. 249
Weedon, Chris............................................................................................................. 261
22 SALVADOR FAURA SABE
Bibliography
Achebe. Chinua I 19771. Arrn,rofCod. London: Heineman.
Ahmad. Aijaz ( 1992), In Theorr, London & New York: Verso.
Anderson, Benedict ( 1983}, The Angel of History" in Imagined Co11111n111iries. Ref7ecrif//rs on rhe Origins &
Sp read ofNarionalis111. London er a/.: Verso.
Ashcroft, Bill, Gareth Griffiths & Helen Tiffin (19889), The Empire Wrires Back, London & New York:
Routledge.
Boehmer. Elleke (1995), Colc111ial & Postcolonial Liremt11re. Ox ford & New York: Ox for University Press.
Childs. Peter & Patrick Williams (1997), An l11trnd11uion to Po.<r-Co/011ial Tlreorr. London, New York et al.:
Prentice Hall.
Devi. Phoolan ( 1996). Jo. Pl"'olan Oeri. Reina del.< Bwrdirs. Barcelona: Columna.
Eagleton. Terry (1995 ), Lirerarr Theorr. An imrod11ctif//1, Oxford: Blackwell.
- I 1995), Entrevista/educaci6n popular en Guatemala'" in Crwderr"'s de pedagogfo, vol. 2-l I. Nov .. I 05-
111.
Fanon. Frantz ( 1986). Black Skim, Whire Masks. London: Pluto Press.
( 1977), The Wrerched <i(rhe Ecrrrlr. New York: Grove Press Inc ..
Freire, Paulo ( 1979), Pedagllgr'cr de/ Opri111ido, Madrid: Si2lo XX Editores SA.
Jameson, Fredric (1991), Post111odemi.rn1. or. The Ccrlrrn;,I Logic ol fore Capitali.w,, Durhan: Duke University
Press.
Machiavelli, Niccolo (1998), El Principe, Madrid: Tecnos.
Naipaul. V. S. (1988), The Enig11,a llfArril'(r/, London: Penguin Books.
Narayan. R. K. (1978). The English Twcher. London: Heineman.
Nkrumah, Kwame (1962). Un liderv wr pueblo. Mi!xico & Buenos Aires: Fondo de Cultura Econ6mica.
Rushdie. Salman (1982), Midnighr"s Children. London: Pan Books.
Said. Edward I 1978), Oriemalism, New York: Pantheon Books.
I 1994), Culture & /111ericrlis111, London: Vintae.
Seghers, Pierre led.I 11966). Poete.< d"a11jo11rd"h11i. Leopold Sedcrr Seui;lwr, Aubin Liguge (Vienne): Editions
Pierre Seghers.
Shahani, Govind I 1998), "'Posrcolonialism. Nation & Resistance" in BEAM (Bombay English Association
Magazine I. vol. 17. July. 4-7.
Spivak, Gayatri Chakravorty (1987). In Orlrer Worlds. Esscr1s in C11lrural Politics. New York & London:
Routledge.
( 1996). Tire Spirnk Reader, New York & London: Donna Landry & Gerald Maclean-Routledge.
Williams, Patrick & Laura Chrisman (eds.) (1994). Colonial Discourse & Po.<1-Colonicrl Theon. A Reader, New
York, London Toronto er al.: Harvester.
Young, Roben ( 1992). H1,ite M_l'/hologies. Writing His1orr a11d rlre West, London & New York: Routledge.
WHO'S EDUCATING WHOM?
THE POWER STRUGGLE IN EDUCATING RITA
BARRY PENNOCK SPECK
Universitat de Valencia
Relations of power exist in all societies and are manifested in many ways in every
kind of organisation from prisons. hospitals, and courts to schools and universities. The
education system is riddled with signs both overt and covert of such relations. Authority is
bestowed not only on teachers and educators but also on texts, authors and even varieties of
language. Most people rarely, if ever, question this state of affairs. Nevertheless, from time
to time someone comes along who, for one reason or another, does not accept things as they
are. The figure of the rebel fighting against the education system has featured in several
British novels, films and plays since the late fifties: The Loneliness of the Long-distance
Runner, If. Class Enemy, to mention just three examples. This is as sure a sign as any that
such behaviour has some basis in reality.
In the play Educating Rita, the rebellious character, who gives her name to the
play, is a young, working class. ladies' hairdresser enrolled in an Open University course.
Unlike the three works above, however. Rita's challenge to authority is carried out not
through violence or outright rebellion but through her discourse with her middle-aged,
middle-class, somewhat worse-for-wear tutor, Frank. It is my aim in this paper to show
how Rita questions the inherent superiority of ''high" culture through her dialectic struggle
with Frank and how she challenges the educational and gender stereotypes of her time by
failing to confo1m to them. I will conclude by briefly looking at whether the struggle
carried out by people like Rita has made obtaining higher education easier for working
class people.
Rita's clashes with her tutor. Frank, arise mostly because they belong to different
classes, which accounts for differences in their cultural backgrounds and the varieties of
English they use. Culturally, Frank's discourse is decidedly highbrow in contrast to Rita's,
whose speech is steeped in the culture of television and popular novels. Linguistically.
Frank's Standard English with an RP accent is also quite distinct from Rita's non-standard
Liverpudlian speech. Yet another source of conflict is gender, which is also made evident
through speech.
To begin my analysis, I will look at the clashes caused by cultural differences
between the two characters. In Richard Hoggart's seminal The Uses of Literacy ( 1959), the
idea is put forward that members of the working class are defined to a great extent by the
cultural products which they consume such as tabloids, magazines, pulp literature, and the
other artifacts of popular leisure like the juke-box and the radio. The references to "pop"
culture, especially television, which was in its infancy when The Uses of Literacy was
24 BARRY PENNOCK SPECK
pubiished. are numerous in Educaring Rira. These references are used by the author. Willy
Russell, to highlight the cultural divide between Rita and Frank and to create a number of
comic situations. At the beginning of the play. for instance, Rita's efforts to describe an
erotic picture hanging in Frank's office wall leads her to liken the portrait to one of the
many soft-porn magazines on the market: fr's sorr of like Men On!Y. isn't it?(:\)' The
comparison. although made in an off-the-cuff way, comes as quite a shock to Frank and
starts the assault on what he considers to be "authentic" culture. The challenge continues
with the references to television, which are found frequently at the beginning of the play.
One of the first comes when Rita asks Frank if he was named after anyone to which he
responds negatively:
RITA: Maybe y' parents named y' ufter the quality. !She si;s in the chair by the desk)
FRANK:
RITA:
(pttls do1rn R11byfhri1 Jungle.)
y know Frnnk. Frnnk Ness, Elliot's brother
FRANK: What''
RITA: I'm sorry- it was a joke. y know. Frank ness. Elliot's bro1her.
FRANK: (/Je11111sedl Ah.
RITA: You've no1 go1 it. have y, Elliot Ness -y know. the famous Chicago copper
who caught Al Capone. (91
Frank obviously does not watch the commercial channels or he would have known that Rita
was not talking about T. S. Eliot but about The Untouchables, a television series. Rita sums
up the distance in cultural terms between them very neatly when she almost immediately
classes Frank as a BBC man: "You wouldn't watch ITV though, would y''7 It's all BBC
with you, isn't it?" (I I). The simple fact that they watch different television channels gives
ground for more communication problems. Rita is immersed in the world of the private
channels and television commercials such as the one for Florn margarine. She can see,
nevertheless, that Frank would never dream of eating a cheaper brand:
RITA: It's all right I know. Soon as I walked in here I said to meself. "Y' can tell he's
a Flora man.
FRANK: A what''
RITA: A Flora man.
FRANK: Flora. Flowers0
RITA: (Comi11i; back to the desk): No. Flora the bleedin' margarine. no cholesterol:
it's for people like you who eat pebble-dashed bread./ know the bread with
the tittle hard bits in it.just like pebble dashin. (11)
Through Rita's remarks we can catch a glimpse of the thinly veiled contempt for
certain middle-class people and their fads and her animosity to highbrow culture in general.
It also illustrotes how "cultural differences'' means more than the cultural artifacts people
consume, it includes food. housing, social habits. At the same time. her attitude is
ambivalent as she too would like to watch the same programmes as Frank and to be able to
understand and appreciate them as he does:
RITA: I'll have to learn about it all. won't JO Yeh. It's like y' sit there. don't y'
watchin' the ballet or lhe opera on telly an' -an y' call it rubbish cos that's
what ir looks like 1 'Cos y don't understand. So y' switch it off an' say. that's
THE POWER STRUGGLE IN DUCA TiNC RITA 25
fuckin' rnbbish. 161
At the beginning of the play, it seems as if it is Rita who is teaching Frank: after all.
she is talking about the culture which surrounds her and which she is well acquainted with.
At this point Frank is caught in a terrain about which he knows practically nothing.
However, Rita is soon on the defensive when she strays into Frank's territory and refers
mistakenly to Eliot's poem as "The Lovesong of J. Arthur Prufrock." confusing the title of
the poem with the name of a production company behind many popular British films. I.
Arthur Rank. Rita drops other literary clangers such as taking Frank's reference to the poet
Yeats as a reference to Year's Wine Lodge. the name of a popular chain of pubs in the north
of Emrland (8). It becomes increasingly clear in many sections of the play that an important
issue is whether what Rita reads and watches can be classed as culture at all. She has no
doubts with regard to this question:
RITA: Well. we've gor no cut1ure
FRANK: Of course you have.
RITA: Whu1 do you mean like thnr working-class culture thing0
FRANK: Mm.
RITA: Yeh, I've read about that. I've never seen ii 1hough.
FRANK: Well. look around you.
RITA: I do. But I don'1 see any. y' know. culture. I jusl see everyone pissed. or on the
Yalium. trying to get fr om on day to the next. y daren't say that round our
wuy like, cos they're proud. They' tell y' they've gor culture as they sit there
drinkin' their keg beer out of plas1ic glasses. (}9-301
Her comments do not mean that she is absolutely sure about the superiority of highbrow
culture and why. for instance. she has to abandon the down-market novel Rub,1fruit Jungle
and embrace Hoirnrd's End. Curiously. her doubts run parallel to those of many cultural
theorists. Easthope ( l 991: 4) offers a typical example of the questioning of the inherent
superiority of highbrow literature in the following remarks:
I. The great literary 1ext was just there. in itself. to be read by the sympathetic reader who set
aside all questions of use. interest or purpose (the text was its own purpose).
2. The grent literary text was intrinsically great. containing within itself its own perfection and
not dependent on anything outside ii.
Litera1ure is not popular cuHure.
What Rita objects to in several passages in the play, although not so articulately. is the
legitimacy of the literary canon defended by people like Frank, which is basically an
arbitrary list of literary works that has been accepted without question -what Fairclough
( l 989: l 933) calls "naturalisation". A case in point are Rita's comments on the double
standard used for popular literature on the one hand, and serious literature on the other,
when Frank warns her against mentioning Harold Robbins in an essay on E.M. Forster:
FRANK: Read it, by all means read it. Bur don't mention it in an exam.
RITA: Aha. You mean it's all right to go out an have a bit of slap un' tikle with the
lads us tong as you don't go home an tell your munl''
FRANK: Erm - wet!. yes. that's probably what I do mean. 1261
26 BARRY PENNOCK SPECK
Rita's observation is actually an example of "denaturalisation", in the form of an
attack on the legitimacy of "serious literature". As such it is a major threat to Frank whose
conception of culture has probably never been challenged in such explicit tem1s. This does
not mean that Rita is not prepared to accept that Frank knows more about literature than her
-at one point she actually orders him point-blank to teach her. However, the excerpt above
and the one below do show how she questions the assumption, which shapes to a great
extent the discourse that goes on in all kinds of institutionalised settings (Fairclough 1989),
that teachers and others in authority know best -another example of "naturalisation":
FRANK: Oh. Well-there's a Yeats poem. called The Wild Swans at Coole'. In it he
rhymes the word 'swan' with the word 'stone. There. you see. an example of
assonance.
RITA: Oh. It means gening the rhyme wrong.
FRANK: (/ookini ar her and la11ihi11i) I've never really looked at it like that. But yes. yes you
could say it means getting the rhyme wrong: but purposefully. in order to achieve a
certain effect. (8)
Apart from the obvious imbalance of power in any student's relationships with
lecturers, one of the greatest disadvantages for students, especially those from a working
class background, is the language used in the writing of "serious literature" and literary
criticism. In this respect the term "anti-language" is a useful concept. Originally coined to
refer to the language of the criminal underworld or non-standard social varieties, Hodge &
Kress (1988: 88) use it to refer to the language of the ruling classes and their culture:
'high' languages have the typical qualities of an antilanguage. They are oriented towards the
semiosic plane rather than the mimetic, they are full of complex transformations that obscure
referential meanings while signifying kinds of power and solidatity, and they function to exclude
those outside the high-status language community. Similarly, 'high' art, 'high' music, and 'high'
culture are themselves characteristically difficult, with mimetic meanings usually made
inaccessible.
The difficulties highlighted above are precisely what cause Rita to abandon her attempts to
read E.M. Forster's Howard's End: "I can't do it. Honest, I just can't understand what he's
on about.. .. He's got me licked, I don't know what he's on about" (26). This illustrates very
clearly the problems that she, and other members of her class, are faced with. The language
of high literature is not their language and is perceived by them as just another way the
upper class have of keeping the working-class away from their elitist culture. Rita states
this in even clearer terms when she doubts whether Frank will like a book of poetry by
Roger Mc Gough as "It's the son of poetry you can understand" (5).
To be accepted means Rita has to speak a different language and to assimilate
different cultural assumptions; it is basically a process of acculturation. Although this term
has mainly been used to describe the acquisition of a foreign culture by immigrants there is
an obvious parallel between both situations. The vast majority of immigrant workers
acquiring a new language and culture are poorer, less educated citizens of developing
countries. Likewise those of the working-classes who wish to be accepted by middle-class
neighbours or colleagues also have to acquire a different "language" which inevitably
THE POWER STRUGGLE IN EDUCATING RITA 27
means acquiring the dominant culture. And, as in any such process, acquiring one set of
cultural values may mean losing pan of one s own. In this sense, for people like Rita the
schizophrenic nature of Standard English is a fact of life. As Fairclough (I 989: 57) states
Standard English "aspires to be ... a national language belonging to all classes and sections
of the society, and yet remains in many respects a class dialect."
The difference between the social varieties of English that Rita and Frank speak is
crucial not only in tem1s of content but because of the iconic role of language. As Fishman
(1998: 27) points out:
[language] is not merely a rnrrier of content. whether latent or manifest. Language itself "
content. a referent for loyalties and animosities. an indicator of social statuses and personal
relationships. a marker of situations and topics as well as of the societal goals and the large-scale
value-laden arenas of interaction that typify every speech community.
Willy Russell certainly makes an effort to make Rita's variety of English as
"phonetically" realistic as possible, i.e., "meself' (33), "Y've (38), "goffa" (39), "gonna"
(54). The contrast between Rita's and Frank's English becomes an essential pan of the
play, especially as she is trying to become an accepted member of academe. That means she
may even have to change her pronunciation like so many before her. Crowley (1991: 227)
points out in quite dramatic terms that learning to speak standard English is fraught with
dangers: "one single pronunciation, word or phrase will suffice to brand an apparent U
speaker as originally non-U." As many non-U speakers who have acquired received
pronunciation have discovered, it so easy to betray one's origins and in the process to lose
face, perhaps for ever. Thus, there is still a feeling, shared by all social classes, but probably
more so by the working class themselves, that the only language we can talk about high
culture in is Standard English with an RP accent. At one point in the play, Rita briefly
succumbs to this pressure and begins to speak like her middle-class flat mate: "As Trish
says there is not a lot of point in discussing beautiful literature in an ugly voice" (56).
Although it is very difficult to completely separate class and gender (Cameron et al.
1993: 155), it is clear that as a woman, Rita's discourse is also a challenge to the way
women are supposed to act as she unashamedly uses a strong non-standard accent, which
has been proved in several studies to be more characteristic of working-class men. As
Hodge & Kress (1988: 52) point out, women generally speak hypercorrectly and use
"plummier vowels than speakers from a higher social group." With regard to the use of
expletives, Rita is also unusual. Apart from the swear words we have already seen, there are
numerous other examples: 'Tm really fucked" (6), "he doesn't half get on tits" (24),
"friggin' Forster'' (31), "bugger the bursar" (70), "a wanker" (72). According to Trudgill
(1974: 93) women tend to use fewer swear words than men because they are traditionally
rated on image and not for what they do and so it is "more necessary for women to secure
and signal their social status linguistically and in other ways." Aggressive discourse
(Trudgill 1974: 93) is considered to be a pan of the roughness and toughness of working
class life, which are "desirable masculine attributes" while the prefeffed attributes of
women are "refinement and sophistication". In pragmatic terms, Ecken (l 997: 215) states
that if we equate politeness with standard speech, i.e., a non-regional variety of English
lacking in expletives, "women's conservative linguistic behavior" reflects the basic power
28 BARRY PENNOCK SPECK
relations in society. So women use standard language as a face-saving mechanism in
situ:nions in which they are powerless. Although Ri1a uses considerably fewer expletiws
towards the end of the play -possibly a sign that she is adopting established discourse
patterns- she seems to deliberately use swear-words in order to flout yet another set of
double standards in society:
RITA: I woul<ln"t mincl but it"s the aristocracy that swears more than anyone else. isn"t
ir' They're eftin an' blindin" all d:1y long. lt"s all "Pass me 1he.fi1cki11" grouse
with them. isn1 it"' [my italics] (561
With regard to female roles on the British stage, Rita. in the more dramatic
moments of the play, constitutes an innovation. As Page (1984: 54) stated -four
years before Educating Rita was first performed- "'it is still unthinkable that a
heroine should speak in a manner associated ptimarily with comic effects.'' He was, of
course. referring to the use of regional and non-standard varieties of English. The
success or the play might, therefore, be a sign of the gradual acceptance of regional
varit:ties of English and the changing roles of women in British society.
Rita's attitude is combative and uncompromising but, at the same time, she is
successful in her efforts to become "educated". learning finally to write essays and
pass exams just like what she calls "proper". that is. full-time students. She does not
confon11 to the stereotypical roles that society has in store for her in other ways, such
as refusing to have a baby which leads to her husband leaving her and estrangement
between her and the rest of her family. Her attitude is retlected through her discourse
which challenges the roles normally assigned to working-class women. She also
appears to question Frank's and the establishment's academic myths without
apparently sacrificing her allegiance to her class. her culture and her idiolect
completely.
From a wider perspective, however, the picture is slightly different. Although
Rita constitutes a small threat to Frank. a member of academe, she is inevitably
changed by the institution in which she has studied: becoming an outcast from her
own class and, at least at first, a marginal member of the establishment. Moreover, the
struggle between Rita and Frank seems to exist in a kind of vacuum, separate from the
rest of society. highlighting the extremely personal nature of her struggle. The Open
University was, and still is for most who study in it. a highly individual enterprise
where most of the onus is on working on your own. and on individual merit. It
becomes evident that Rita does not want to change things for the class she has come
from but for herself. Thus. her challenge to society, if it exists, turns out to be, in a
way, a side effect. She is an individualist, not a social reformer and so it is highly
improbable that she, or people like her. can contribute to sweeping changes in society.
As a consequence, the situation in terms of education for large sectors of society
remains basically the same at the present time. Middle-class kids and a small sector of
the working class enjoy a University Education while the majority settle, or are made
to settle, for quite a lot less. Paradoxically, the fact that Rita does not adopt an RP
accent, which could be construed as a challenge to the establishment. serves to create
the illusion that the status quo has been changed when the establishment has actually
THE POV/ER STRUGGLE IN EDUCAT!r!G R!TA 29
been strengthened. This makes one wonder whether the small number from the
working class or from minority ethnic groups who make it to institutions of higher
education are there simply to make the system look a little less exclusive and elitist.
The British University system still remains a closed shop for the vast majority while
the Open University may have served simply as a safety valve to allow an escape
route for a small, but potentio.lly dangerous minority. In the words of Fairclough
( 1989: 40):
education. along wiril all the olher social institutions. has as its. 'hidden agnda' the
reproduction of class relations and other higher-level social structures. in addition to its oven
educational agend::i
In this sense. Rita's challenge would seem rather empty-an appeal to join the
educated elite. rather than an attempt to knock down the walls of academe to let the
"people" in. And what of those who do not go to University at all'l The majority of
youngsters from the working classes are still "factory fodder'' as Willy Russell refers
to himself and others from his background (ivJ. In retrospect. Educating Rita is a
personal success story and one of hope. at least at the time it was written. However, it
is clear that the good intentions of educational planners, educators. some politicians,
and the individual efforts of many people who had previously been denied a
University education has failed to produce equal educational opportunities for all.
Notes
I. The numbers in parentheses r ekr 10 the I 991 Longman edition of Ed11rn1i11g Riw.
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