‘Like aces in a game of cards’: embodied cultural capital, educational achievement and the social im/mobility of migrants

Bourdieu [1987. “What Makes a Social Class? On The Theoretical and Practical Existence of Groups.” Berkeley Journal of Sociology 32: 1–17. https://www.jstor.org/stable/41035356, 4] refers to the potential power of forms of capital as being ‘like aces in a game of cards’. Here the focus is on embodied cultural capital and its utility in examining class location, maintenance and mobility within contexts of migration; in particular, forms of embodied cultural capital that pertain to education and its role in the parenting of children of similar class–judged in terms of economic capital–but varying migrant backgrounds. Drawing on a study of the relation between migration and education in Sydney, Australia, the article examines the benefits of embodied cultural capital for the children of migrants who can acquire and successfully deploy it, and the implications for those who do not.