What has education done for working-class women and girls?' This study looks at 'how working-class life is theorised , and 'how it is experienced'. I start by analysing historical, sociological and psychological interpretations of class and gender subordination in the context of working-class women's relation to education and success, focusing specifically on inferiority as a learned position. In adopting a multidisciplinary approach I confront dominant discourses and structures of academic knowledge evoking different sides of the conflictual relationship between 'able' working-class girls and formal education. 'Gaps' and 'absences' in theory are identified and interpretations questioned. Set alongside both mainstream and progressive accounts of education and related equality issues are the subjective accounts of educated working-class women. Using autobiography and biography I write analytically of personal experiences which demonstrate classism from an educated white, working-class. female perspective. I take as my subject childhood experiences of home-school conflict in examining in-depth the history of educated working-class women's Odi et amo relationship to education. 'How does family, peer group and schooling impact on identity, academic success and selfworth to the detriment of working-class girls?' The accounts are the testimonies of a group of educated working-class women - including myself - who aspired to obtain a formal education during the 50s; 60s and 70s and were 'educated out of their class'. I use the accounts to challenge and re-shape existing knowledge and theory. This Ph.D is also about its own construction, that is, educated working-class women's need for educational success, for inclusion and for validation of self worth.