An Immanent Critique of Critical Pedagogy

In this essay, Quentin Wheeler‐Bell aims to reframe recent attempts to rethink the core principles of critical pedagogy. He argues that these attempts have been unsuccessful because they reproduce a deeper problem — specifically, an identity crisis — within critical pedagogy. The source of this problem, he contends, is that those working in this tradition have, over time, become more distant from and forgetful of its roots in critical theory; as a result, critical pedagogy is now in a state of dilution and fragmentation in which critical pedagogues are unable to bring the plurality of critical education approaches together theoretically around a set of shared principles. In order to address this problem and begin to reframe the core principles of critical pedagogy, Wheeler‐Bell first briefly sketches the debates around Max Horkheimer's classic essay “Critical Theory and Traditional Theory,” focusing on why critical theory grew into an interdisciplinary tradition situated between philosophy and social science. Then he explains why the recent attempts to rethink critical pedagogy rely upon a problematic, albeit dominant, narrative of the critical education tradition — a narrative that only tacitly recognizes a connection between critical education and critical theory. This dominant narrative contributes to the identity crisis within critical education because it supports a collective memory loss regarding the importance of both philosophy and social science to critical theory. Finally, Wheeler‐Bell attempts to develop a thin definition of critical education: one that connects critical education back to its roots in critical theory, while respecting the plurality of critical education approaches.     

Pedagogy in Common: Democratic education in the global era

In the context of the increasingly transnational organization of society, culture, and communication, this article develops a conceptualization of the global common as a basic condition of interrelation and shared experience, and describes contemporary political efforts to fully democratize this condition. The article demonstrates the implications for curriculum and teaching of this project, describing in particular the importance of fundamentally challenging the interpellation of students as subjects of the nation, and the necessity for new and radically collaborative forms of political and pedagogical authority that can more powerfully realize the imaginative potential of educators and students alike as global democratic actors. In this effort, familiar progressive educational ideas (e.g. the importance of the continuity of the curriculum, and the meaning and purpose of experimentalism) are interrogated and rearticulated. The article concludes with a discussion of the unique ways in which education can contribute to constructing a democratic society in the global era, and how the central aspects of such a pedagogy in common can also suggest essential principles for the organization of social movements in this context.     

Learning to work in the creative and cultural sector: new spaces,pedagogies and expertise

The paper questions the link that policy‐makers assume exists between qualifications and access to employment in the creative and cultural (C&C) sector. It identifies how labour market conditions in the C&C sector undermine this assumption and how the UK’s policy formation process inhibits education and training (E&T) actors from countering these labour market conditions. It demonstrates how non‐government agencies (‘intermediary organizations’) are creating new spaces to assist aspiring entrants to develop the requisite forms of ‘vocational practice’, ‘social capital’ and ‘moebius strip’ (i.e., entrepreneurial) expertise to enter and succeed in the sector. It concludes by identifying a number of: (a) new principles for the governance of E&T at the national level; (b) pedagogic strategies to facilitate ‘horizontal’ transitions into and within the C&C sector; and (c) skill formation issues for all E&T stakeholders to address.     

Critical thinking in criminology: critical reflections on learning and teaching

Fostering critical thinking abilities amongst students is one component of preparing them to navigate uncertain and complex social lives and employment circumstances. One conceptualisation of critical thinking, valuable in higher education, draws from critical theory to promote social justice and redress power inequities. This study explored how students’ critical thinking developed in a discrete core unit of criminology. Second and third year students were invited to participate in the research. Participants wrote critical reflections on how their thinking about crime and criminal justice had developed throughout the unit. Analysis of responses indicated that certain topics were salient to students, offering a way to engage them in deeper thinking. Students’ critical reflections showed evidence of personally relevant meaning-making, including the development of more nuanced thinking about crime and justice, and more compassionate rationales for aspiring to careers within the field. Implications for learning and teaching critical thinking in criminology are discussed.     

Turbulence in St. Louis County: School Transfers,Opportunity Hoarding,and the Legacy of Brown

ABSTRACT

In the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education case, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled segregated schools unconstitutional, and the process of school desegregation fell mostly to Black children. For over 35 years, Black families in St. Louis City have been using school transfers to cross boundaries in order to send their children to higher performing, predominately White schools in suburban St. Louis County in search of “a better education.” Relying on turbulence theory and Critical Race Theory (CRT), this study uses a media framing analysis to examine how newspaper articles described school transfers to the broader public between 2007 and 2017. Findings indicate that the articles described Black and White school districts as being affected by varying levels of turbulence and conflict. Findings also outline examples of opportunity hoarding by White schools and districts. The original focus of the Brown case was the lack of equitable resources in Black schools, and this study reignites questions about exclusion, privilege, and the choices made by Black families to receive educational equity.     

Leaping Out of Our Skins: Postmodern considerations in use of an electronic whiteboard to foster critical engagement in early literacy lessons

Postmodern theory is used to consider literacy instruction with and without an electronic whiteboard to investigate what it means to move beyond using technology to replicate older models of classroom structure that may be historically situated but that also limit or at least, do not support engagement in ways that may be possible through use of new technologies. Using postmodern theory in this regard is a way in which to consider again the thoughts and practices that tend to construct identities and ideologies in ways that work against true engagement in literacy tasks, lead to subjection and demonstration of acquiescence in place of engagement that leads to participation and critical engagement. Critical engagement as opposed to gaining and maintaining student attention to task are considered in this paper. Thinking about use of the electronic whiteboard from a postmodern perspective cautions us about careful use of this technology to avoid sending messages to students about them and their role in literacy development, the classroom, and in society.     

Information Is Forever in Formation;

No abstract available for this article.     

Inadequacies in the concept of neutrality 1

While the need for humanising education is pressing in neoliberal societies, the conditions for its possibility in formal institutions have become particularly cramped. A constellation of factors – the strength of neoliberal ideologies, the corporatisation of universities, the conflation of human freedom with consumer satisfaction and a wider crisis of hope in the possibility or desirability of social change – make it difficult to apply classical theories of subject-transformation to new work in critical pedagogy. In particular, the growth of interest in pedagogies of comfort (as illustrated in certain forms of ‘therapeutic’ education and concerns about student ‘satisfaction’ in universities) and resistance to critical pedagogies suggest that subjectivty has become a primary site of political struggle in education. However, it can no longer be assumed that educators can (or should) liberate students' repressed desires for humanisation by politicising curricula, pedagogy or institutions. Rather, we must work to understand the new meanings and affective conditions of critical subjectivity itself. Bringing critical theories of subject transformation together with new work on ‘pedagogies of discomfort’, I suggest we can create new ways of opening up possibilities for critical education that respond to neoliberal subjectivities without corresponding to or affirming them.     

教学论课程中批判性思维能力的培养

新课程强调学生创新思维的培养,而批判性思维是创新思维的基础。在"教学论"中注重培养学生批判性思维能力,有助于他们掌握主动学习的思维方法,不断提高创新思维能力。     

Education policy: explaining,framing and forming

This paper presents a new heuristic device for the analysis of educational policy. Through an examination of the Evaluative State and the work of Brian Fay, the paper considers the way in which educational policy is subject to rational and linear forms of policy action and implementation. To counter this, positioning theory is deployed to consider the way in which we are produced both by discourse and the language of the ‘moment’ in discursive acts. Using the work of Gee, the paper contends that policy texts and policy Discourse ‘themselves form policy, that is, they position policy-explanation and policy-framing within the bounds of the institution and so give policy form’. Problematically, such mechanisms may succumb to the ‘death of subject’ and accordingly I offer a third method by which we might conceive of education policy: the discursively produced position call. Subsequently, I propose a tri-partite theory for the examination and understanding of policy: policy-explaining, the production of policy texts; policy-framing, the ways in which all can be positioned by texts and Discourse to produce the meanings imbued upon policy; and, policy-forming, the impact of moment-by-moment conversational acts for their production of the policy text itself, that is, the ways in which policy is locally formed rather than locally mediated.     

马克思哲学唯物主义的批判意蕴

马克思的哲学唯物主义 ,不仅是对社会历史生活的科学分析 ,更是对社会生活过程的批判。马克思对旧唯物主义的批判 ,使他的唯物主义与辩证法相一致 ,使唯物主义具有了批判意蕴 ,并将自己的批判理论与伦理道德式的批判理论区别开来。因此 ,将马克思哲学形而上学化 ,以求获得新的理论批判张力 ,是对马克思哲学唯物主义的误读。     

略论法兰克福学派的社会批判理论

本文通过对法兰克福学派社会批判理论的四个代表人物的思想的阐述,从而得出其社会批判理论的精髓即对工具理性的批判、对发达工业社会的批判和对历史唯物主义的批判。     

略论欧美教育平等研究的主要范式

20世纪50年代以来，教育平等成为欧美教育社会学和教育哲学研究的主题之一，出现了五种独具特色的研究范式，分别是方法论经验主义、分析哲学、解释论、冲突论和批判理论。随着欧美教育社会学主流范式的变迁以及教育不平等问题的复杂化，这些范式之间的界限正逐渐淡化，融合多种范式的综合研究将会成为未来欧美教育平等研究的主导性趋向。     

Racism as Policy: A Critical Race Analysis of Education Reforms in the United States and England

Abstract

Critical race theory (CRT) views education as one of the principal means by which white supremacy is maintained and presented as normal in society. The article applies CRT to two real-world case studies: changes to education statutes in the state of Arizona (USA) and the introduction of a new measure of educational success in England, the English baccalaureate. The analysis highlights the globalized nature of neoliberal education reform and its fundamentally raced and racist character.     

论霍克海默批判理论中的宗教观念

霍克海默是批判理论的创始人。作为早期法兰克福学派的核心人物,他的思想中始终存在着隐晦的犹太教思想,并坚持辩证地理解马克思主义的宗教观,最终把否定神学作为批判理论的新基础。由此,神学构成了霍克海默批判理论不断发展的隐蔽推动力。     

Thinking whimsically: queering the study of educational policy-making and politics

This paper discusses employing queer theory (QT) and queer legal theory (QLT) for critical policy analysis as applied to education. In doing so, the authors will highlight how both QT and QLT can empower analyses to look beyond the identity politics of a particular time period or space and toward potential reforms in curriculum, pedagogy, and institutional supports for students, teachers, and staff. A central point is that understanding the institutional and cultural practices that frame orientation, class, race, and sex/gender can lead to policy changes that benefit all students, teachers, and staff. The paper concludes with a discussion of venues in need of both QT and QLT-informed research.     

国际关系法兰克福学派批判理论的思想来源及研究理路

法兰克福学派国际关系批判理论最直接的思想来源是法兰克福批判社会理论.20世纪80年代初国际关系"批判转向"的主要理论家都深受其影响.如今该学派虽不再代表国际关系理论中对正统观点的最主要挑战,但仍然是后实证主义理论中极具影响的流派之一.迄今为止,该流派研究议题十分宽泛.本文从规范的、社会学和人类行为学三大维度对该流派的发展进行梳理.保持普世主义特征,围绕排斥、对话、差异、苦难和伤害等主题尝试重建现代性方案和探究政治共同体新形式是该流派的总体研究理路.     

种族批判法学的后现代性分析

美国的种族批判法学是20世纪80年代后期从批判法律研究运动中分离出来的一股新的法学思潮。种族批判法学的后现代性主要体现在其法律实体观和法学方法论两个方面。具体说来，体现在种族批判法学概念的多元性、种族批判法学对法律中立性的质疑以及种族批判法学的方法论等几个方面。     

A limited,apolitical, and open Paulo Freire

Paulo Freire’s work is often characterized and used in terms that seek to produce widespread political and economic changes across societies. Peter Roberts, however, in his book Paulo Freire in the twenty-first Century, offers readers a much different way of approaching Freire’s work. Throughout his book, Roberts presents Freire as recognizing the limitations of educational initiatives, as not seeking specific macro-political objectives, and as emphasizing openness to alternative discourses. These themes weave throughout each chapter of the book, in which Roberts examines a wide range of topics, from Freire and Dostoevsky to reason and emotion to political correctness to Freire and the Tao Te Ching. In this review essay, I engage a number of purposes. I elucidate and trace these three themes as they weave throughout and support the various topics that Roberts examines in his book. I illustrate how Roberts’s treatment of these themes challenges many of the interpretations of Freire’s work found within the critical literature, and, through this critique, it offers readers new ways of thinking about Freire’s thinking. Lastly, I discuss how Roberts’s thoughts suggest new ways that Freire’s work, and critical education in general, might begin to make more meaningful and practical inroads into public education and might develop new avenues of scholarship on Freire’s work.     

Let’s be critically honest: towards a messier counterstory in critical race theory

This paper utilizes tools of critical race theory to interrogate the racial politics of the everyday. The authors contend that this type of critical policy analysis can yield understandings of/about the world that are too often silenced or ignored altogether. This paper argues that critical race theory does not aim to tell a “truer” account of reality, but a more honest one. Therefore, critical race scholars need not ask permission – nor seek forgiveness – for their counterstories, but hold themselves accountable to communicate stories and narratives that are not only honestly critical, but critically honest.