Japanese politics and the history textbook controversy, 1982–2001

In recent years, there has been a good deal of media and academic interest in the ways in which Japanese history textbooks represent Japan's wartime past. However, the discussion has tended to revolve primarily around a number of symbolic textbook issues, such as government censorship of the term ‘aggression,’ without much consideration of divisions and conflict within the state and the ruling bloc itself. Consequently, no real analysis has emerged concerning the ways in which right-wing nationalist elements have exploited the textbook issue with the aim of reinforcing their political and cultural dominance over contemporary Japan.This article presents the Japanese history textbook controversy as an ongoing cultural and political struggle. It attempts to understand the process of the textbook struggle historically, and the relations between political parties and actors, the state bureaucracy, and right-wing nationalists. In particular, the study examines the ways in which the power of right-wing nationalism has been appropriated and negotiated by the leaders and members of the Liberal Democratic Party and bureaucrats in the Ministry of Education. It also looks at the ways in which such power has been resisted by textbook authors, educators, and certain segments of public opinion.     

Political partisanship,bureaucratic pragmatism and Acadian nationalism: New Brunswick,Canada’s 1920 history textbook controversy

During a time of post-war sensitivity to Canadian nationalism and patriotism, public feeling was aroused in 1920 New Brunswick regarding a world history textbook with a new chapter about the First World War. The American author made no reference to Canada’s war efforts. The subsequent public discussion focused on issues of patriotism, citizenship, history education and schooling, but it eventually dissolved into longstanding conflicts over language and religion. This case study investigates how questions about history education were interpreted through the lens of the political partisanship of the newspaper editor, the bureaucratic rationality of the educational administrator, and the Acadian nationalism of the Roman Catholic Bishop. The controversy depicts a loosening but not breaking of postcolonial ties, and uncovers the political nature of public memory, along with the complex intertwining of religion and language rights within schooling, history education and citizenship in post-war Canada and New Brunswick.     

The Norden Associations and international efforts to change history education, 1919–1970: international organisations,education, and hegemonic nationalism

During the interwar period, a number of organisations started to look into education as part of an attempt to understand how nationalism was fuelled through education and to what extent it had forced the outbreak of the Great War. In response to nationalism and a perceived need for reformation of national narratives, the school subjects of history and geography became the primary suspects as advocates of chauvinism and militarism. In 1919, associations for the promotion of understanding and cooperation between the Scandinavian countries – the Norden Associations [föreningarna Norden] – began investigating history textbooks. This revision of textbooks was expanded in the 1930s to explore, assess, and develop the entire teaching of history in the Nordic countries. The Norden Associations converged on many levels with the disparate international movements for educational change. This article presents the Norden Associations as part of a process of hegemonic isomorphism in which cultural hegemony set the institutional boundaries within which the organisations could work in order to attain legitimacy. The article demonstrates how an organisation with a specific political agenda, and with only limited international objectives came to be – not only a part of – but, to some extent, an organisational role model for loftier efforts aimed at global and cosmopolitan history teachings.     

Globalizing critical studies of ‘official’ knowledge: lessons from the Japanese history textbook controversy over ‘comfort women’

This paper discusses the Japanese history textbook controversy over ‘comfort women’ to tease out insights that help globalize the existing theoretical discussion of politics of school knowledge. I begin by documenting how the domestic struggles over Japanese history textbooks are empowered and disempowered by the regional and international power relations. Using the Japanese case, I first problematize the use of hegemony in critical scholarship wherein struggles over school knowledge have been defined within the framework of a nation‐state. Second, I call for situating the discussion of counter‐hegemonic strategies in the increasingly internationalized politics of education witnessed around the world. In sum, this study calls for broadening the application of the notions of hegemony and counter‐hegemony in critical education scholarship to take full account of the complex political dynamics of globalizations.     

War,education and state formation: problems of territorial and political integration in the United States, 1848–1912

Abstract

After the Civil War (1861–1865), the United States faced a problem of “reconstruction” similar to that confronted by other nations at the time and familiar to the US since at least the Mexican–American War (1846–1848). The problem was one of territorial and political (re)integration: how to take territories that had only recently been operating under “foreign” governance and integrate them into an expanded nation-state on common structural terms. This paper considers the significance of education in that process of state (re)formation after the Civil War, with particular attention to its role in federal territories of the US West. Specifically, this paper analyses the role that education-based restrictions on citizenship, voting rights and office-holding played in constructing formal state power in the cases of five western territories: Hawaii, Indian Territory, Oklahoma, Arizona and New Mexico. A focus on the significance of education in these cases both advances and challenges literature on the “hidden” and decentralised structure of national policy-making in the US. It adds to that literature by illuminating how education served as an indirect tool of national policy in the West, effectively shaping the structure of power in other policy domains. At the same time, by focusing on the US West, the present analysis challenges the idea that national governance in the US was particularly “decentralised” or “hidden”. It highlights instead: (1) the role of colonial racialism in shaping national responsibility and authority for education in the US; and (2) the significance of education as both an alternative and a corollary to war in establishing US colonial power.     

Soldier education in the British army, 1920–2007

This article surveys the history of compulsory education for soldiers’ career advancement in the British army. It begins with an examination of the organisational context before analysing the rationale, syllabus, teaching and assessment of soldier education. It concludes that for members of the army education organisation their self‐perception as soldiers and educators is of crucial importance; that the justifications for soldier education have been debated constantly between the ‘liberal’ and ‘utilitarian’ groupings within the organisation; and finally that significant work remains to be done in this nexus between British military and educational history.     

Analyzing the use of history in mathematics education: issues and challenges around Balacheff’s cKȼ model

Part of the international reflection on the use of history in mathematics teaching consists in a quest of frameworks and models suitable for empirical studies. Following this demand, this paper explores the way Balacheff’s cK? model, a model taken from the didactics of mathematics, can be used in the analysis of learning at student level. In the first part of this paper, Balacheff’s cK? model (conceptions, knowledge, ?oncepts) is shortly presented, and in the second part, the relationship between the epistemological background of the model and the use of the history of mathematics is explored in order to show a possible suitableness. The third part addresses an example of a school activity (about ancient Indian geometry) in which the model is applied and the historical issues clarified. Questioning the role of problems both in the cK? model and in the use of history, the last part shows how a study at the students’ conception level enlightens the way in which historical elements can interact with contemporary mathematical learning.     

Social foundations of public–private partnerships in education: the historical cases of post-war Singapore and Hong Kong

This paper compares public–private partnerships (PPPs) in education in post-war Singapore and Hong Kong. After the Second World War the Singapore government shied away from PPPs, while the state in Hong Kong collaborated extensively with the non-state sector in education. Singapore was a small city-state flanked by two Muslim nations, and its post-war regime faced challenges from the Malayan Communist Party. These pressures curbed the state’s involvement with missionary and Chinese bodies in education. Hong Kong, however, was a mono-racial society without any anti-Chinese neighbours, and its authorities were seldom challenged by a militant antagonist. Thus, its government was freer to involve non-state agents in education. This study reveals that PPPs are viable only when suitable non-state partners exist and when the state does not believe that such undertakings would expose the school system to an antagonist. It also urges scholars in future to explore the socio-political preconditions for PPPs.     

From education for peace to education in conflict: changes in UNESCO discourse, 1945–2015

Since the turn of the twenty-first century, the global education community has focused significant attention on the promotion of education in fragile and conflict-affected contexts, embodied in the growth of a new sub-field called Education in Emergencies. This article points out the surprising distinction of this new sub-field from the more established and closely related field of peace education. It examines United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) documents for insight into the changing global ideas that have facilitated the shift in focus from peace to conflict. Empirically, we draw on a quantitative content analysis of more than 450 UNESCO documents published between 1945 and 2015. We find that education for peace remains a constant, if evolving, concern in these texts, but that a powerful emphasis on individual rights has shifted the discursive focus away from inter-state relations and towards the educational needs of young people. In the documents, conflict is now theorised as a threat to education and peace is re-envisioned not just as the desirable outcome of education, but also as its pre-condition. We show how this ideational transformation has re-cast an expansive array of conflicts, natural disasters, and other emergencies as threats to education.     

Mathematics in English education 1860–1914: Some questions and explanations in curriculum history

Sherlock Holmes. Look at those big isolated clumps of buildings rising up above the slates, like brick islands in a lead coloured sea.

Watson. The Board Schools.

Holmes. Lighthouses, my boy! Beacons of the future! Capsules, with hundreds of bright little seeds in each out of which will spring the wiser, better England of the future.

     

The history of education in non‐education periodicals, 1939–1967: A bibliography

Abstract

Children with special educational needs form a substantial minority of the school population. The mechanisms and associated resources in the 1981 Education Act were oriented towards children with statements of special educational needs and neglected children with special needs but without statements. This paper examines the recent shift in policy emphasis away from the former, and towards the latter, group. The precursors to this position, notably the unmanageable rise (for LEAs) in numbers of children with statements and the broadening of the basis on which children were given statements, are examined. Both the 1994 Code of Practice concerning children with special needs and the proposed changes to the National Curriculum can be seen in part as, by redefining non statemented special needs provision, mechanisms to tackle the inexorable increase in statements. Four major repercussions of this shift are discussed. Finally some longer term implications are examined.     

Peer-assessment in higher education – twenty-first century practices,challenges and the way forward

Peer assessment in higher education has been studied for decades. Despite the substantial amount of research carried out, peer assessment has yet to make significant advances. This review identifies themes of recent research and highlights the challenges that have hampered its advance. Most of these challenges arise from the manual nature of peer assessment practices, which prove intractable as the number of students involved increases. Practitioners of the discipline are urged to forge affiliations with closely related fields and other disciplines, such as computer science, in order to overcome these challenges.     

Changing the Subject: English in London, 1945–1967

Two recent books, English Teachers in a Postwar Democracy: Emerging Choice in London Schools, 1945–1965 and The London Association for the Teaching of English, 1947–67: A History, explore an important period in the development of English as a school subject and in the remaking of the professional identity of English teachers in London.     

Picturing ‘our’ heritage in the pedagogic text: layout and illustrations in an Australian and a Swedish history textbook

This paper is about re-representing the lifeworlds experienced by different participants in the 'same' physics classrooms; dissatisfied with the monolithic accounts that dominate the educational literature, we offer here an attempt to w/ri(gh)te classroom research. This paper, therefore, has a dual purpose: We exemplify how authors might want to represent different perspectives on the 'same' classroom and we build on this example to argue for w/ri(gh)ting research by drawing on literary forms that differ from traditional master narratives. W/ri(gh)ting requires reading in new ways; by skipping text, readers risk missing out on the reflexivity of our argument.     

Academic media ranking and the configurations of values in higher education: a sociotechnical history of a co-production in France between the media,state and higher education (1976–1989)

Before the 2000s and the buzz surrounding global rankings, many countries witnessed the emergence and development, starting in the 1970s, of academic media rankings produced primarily by press organisations. This domestic, media-based production, despite the relative lack of attention paid by the social sciences, has been progressively integrated into the functioning of higher education institutions. Examining the emergence and production of academic media rankings in two French magazines between 1976 and 1989, this paper analyses how the media has become a legitimate producer of academic rankings. A micro, sociotechnical history of this production, inspired by the theory of academic capitalism, by communication and media studies and by valuation studies, highlights three principal ideas: First, the production of academic media rankings in France relies on the ability of media organisations to involve the state and the academic institutions themselves. Second, a multidimensional market is instituted by the production of academic media rankings. Third, the concept of “configuration of values” is proposed, with three configurations identified: the configuration of value of opinion, the configuration of value of productivity and the configuration of value of activity.