Habitus: A Lens to Explore Teachers’ Views on the Discourse of Tolerance

Abstract

This study is conducted a view to exploring how primary school teachers understand and perceive the values of tolerance, what factors may shape their understanding and perceptions of tolerance. I argue that teachers’ perception of the discourse of tolerance is shaped through their social interaction within a particular socio-cultural and historical context. We need to examine the way the values of tolerance in education have been understood, experienced, and perceived by teachers at the forefront of education. This position is pivotal as teachers’ ideological standpoints may also shape the way the values of tolerance would be passed on through pedagogical processes. Hence, Bourdieu’s notion of habitus will allow me to capture a more holistic picture of the complexities of their internal struggle that I wish to explore through this study.