John Ogbu observed the fact that the children of involuntary minorities ones that originally became Americans

through slavery or conquest (Native Americans, many Hispanics, and African Americans, for example) tend perform poorly in school. Involuntary minorities often feel that they are and have been oppresses by the dominant culture. Their children reject the dominant culture (the culture valued in the schools in any society) because they feel that to adopt that culture is to betray their people. Ogbu argued that they define themselves in part as not the other, that is, not teachers and what teachers represent. Ogbu contrasted involuntary minorities with what he called immigrant minorities. Immigrants from Europe, Asia, Africa, and the Middle east, for example, who may have come here to escape oppression or poverty, but they have no grudge against the American establishment. They send their children to learn what it takes to prosper here, and they preserve their traditions in their own communities.

Ogbu, J. (1991). Cultural diversity and school experience. In C. E. Walsh (Ed.) Literacy as Praxis: Culture language and pedagogy. Norwood New Jersey: Ablex Publishing Corporation.

Paul Willis and Lois Weis observed working-class oppositional identity in the working-class high schools they studied. It arises from the feeling among many working-class people that they are looked down upon and treated unfairly by more powerful middle- and elite-class people.

Weis, L. (1990). Working class without work: High school students in a de-industrializing economy. New York: Routledge. Willis, P. E. (1977). Learning to Labor: How Working Class Kids Get Working Class Jobs. Westmead, England: Saxon House, 1977.