Labelling/ Subcultures:
Many Afro Caribbean girls are likely to join subcultures, which is often due to the negative effects of labelling, as mentioned above teachers often have racial stereotypes of Afro Caribbean girls. They often label them as disruptive and loud. Due to this Lacey (1970) explains how pupil subcultures often develop. Firstly the teacher will often judge and rank a pupil in terms of academic ability and behaviour, because of this ethnic groups-one being Afro Caribbean girls-are placed in lower streams. They are labelled by teachers and are given an inferior status by being placed in lower streams; again simply by given label many Afro Caribbean girls feel at a disadvantage in terms of educational achievement and consequently underachieve. Once this process occurs polarisation then occurs, this is the way in which pupils respond to streaming by moving to one of two opposite ‘poles’. Many Afro Caribbean girls move towards anti school subcultures this is because the teacher would often label these pupils as ‘less able’ and often suffer from loss of self esteem .To Adjust their status as failures they start to rebel against the schools norms and values. They reject school and what it stands for as they see education to be against them, affecting their educational achievement. (Graham, 2011) carried out a report in South London and explained Afro Caribbean girls develop subcultures because they see school as hostile and do not feel accepted, she also emphasises ‘some girls have learning disabilities and may hide behind the subculture as a strategy for survival’ (Graham, 2011), emphasising why some girls join subcultures. Fuller (1984) also carried out a study on Afro Caribbean girls in a London comprehensive school; she found in some cases Afro Caribbean were able to reject negative labels and that educational success became a part of their resistance teacher labels. Also known as the self negative prophecy. The study reinforces there is evidence of negative labelling within the classroom, which in some cases can have the opposite effect and can lead to underachievement amongst Afro Caribbean girls.