Educational Expansion and the Mediation of Discontent: The cultural politics of schooling in the Arab states

This paper probes the socioeconomic and political processes underlying the expansion of schooling in the Arab states. The paper, which does not report new data but rather critically reviews studies published so far, argues that both development and modernisation approaches, as well as class reproduction theories remain largely unable to account for the complex web of factors affecting educational expansion in the Arab states. These theories fail to point to the articulation of multi-level processes ultimately shaping the social and cultural underpinnings of educational expansion. Moreover, these theoretical approaches, beyond their paradigmatic differences, have confined Arab civil societies essentially to the structural outcome of state policies. Consequently, processes of civil dissent and resistance and their effects on educational expansion are naively conceptualised in terms of 'forces of tradition' versus 'forces of change'. The community-based, and conflict-laden power conjunctures shaping educational expansion in the Arab states have been largely left outside the analysis and the voices they represent often discarded. To probe the argument, first, the paper outlines the major macro-structural and historical factors affecting levels of literacy and access to educational resources in different Arab states. Secondly, published fieldwork research undertaken by others into community-based settings is examined in order to explore points of articulation between state policies, civil society processes and their sociopolitical and cultural effects on patterns of educational expansion. Thirdly, within the frame of a concluding discussion, the major implications are discussed and possible research paths are pointed to.     

The politics of Britishness: multiculturalism,schooling and social cohesion

This paper is set against a backdrop of contemporary concerns about Britishness. It explores the dominant view that unprecedented levels of cultural diversity within western contexts such as the UK are undermining social cohesion and are attributable to minority groups’ failure to connect or assimilate with mainstream ‘British’ (read White Anglo) culture. The paper focuses on how these issues play out for several of the key teachers at ‘Hamilton Court’, a large English comprehensive multicultural school. Despite the school being a socially cohesive space, these teachers were concerned with students’ lack of affiliation with ‘British’ culture. The paper examines these concerns through critical lenses that problematise reductionist and racialised understandings of Britishness and assumptions that associate an affiliation with Britishness with generating social cohesion. Against this backdrop, the paper provides further warrant for continued critical discussion about issues of Britishness, multiculturalism and schooling.     

A queer politics of emotion: reimagining sexualities and schooling

This paper draws together [Hochschild's (1979) Emotion Work, Feeling Rules and Social Structure.” American Journal of Sociology 85: 551–575; (1983) The Managed Heart: Commercialisation of Human Feeling. London: University of California Press] concepts of emotional labour and feeling rules with Ahmed's affective economies [(2004a) The Cultural Politics of Emotion. New York: Routledge; (2004b) “Affective Economies.” Social Text 22 (2): 117–139; (2008) “Sociable Happiness.” Emotion, Space and Society 1: 10–13; (2010) The Promise of Happiness. Durham: Duke University Press] and queer phenomenology [(2006a) Queer Phenomenology: Orientations, Objects, Others. London: Duke University Press; (2006b) “Orientations: Towards a Queer Phenomenology.” GLQ: A Journal of Gay and Lesbian Studies 12 (4): 543–574] as a way to address wider questions about sexuality and schooling. It highlights the value of the everyday politics of emotion for elucidating and clarifying the specificities, pertinence and complementarities of Hochschild's and Ahmed's work for reimagining the relationship between sexualities and schooling. The combination of their approaches allows for a focus on the individual, bodily management of emotions while demonstrating the connectedness of bodies and spaces. It enables disruption of ‘inclusive’ and ‘progressive’ educational approaches that leave heterosexuality uninterrupted and provides insight into how power works in and across the bodies, discourses, practices, relations and spaces of schools to maintain a collective orientation towards heterosexuality. It also counters linear narratives of progressive change, elucidating how change is a hopeful but messy process of simultaneous constraint, transgression and transformation. Key moments from a three-year study with lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer (LGBT-Q) teachers entering into civil partnerships in Ireland serve as exploratory examples of the theoretical ideas put forward in this paper.     

宋元时期的家庭教育

家庭是古人学习知识和技能的主要场所。宋元时期的家教形式以私塾为主,有小家庭自己办的,更多的是由家族组织的。随着家教的增多启蒙作也多了起来,学习内容除了识字和计算,还有生活常识、人情世故和道德观念。     

Books and baths and run all the way: The cultural formation of female primary teachers in the early twentieth century

Abstract

This paper discusses the role of female primary teachers in the development of a national system of education. Their preparation at the various training colleges as well as the academic and cultural environment of these institutions is examined. More specifically, the role of extra‐curricular activities, particularly sporting endeavours, in the formation of female primary teachers is assessed. The paper suggests that the traditional picture of restrictions on females in the sporting arena may have to be modified. Finally, the importance of teachers in passing on cultural and sporting traditions is discussed.     

Gender inequalities in primary schooling: The roles of poverty and adverse cultural practice

This paper suggests a simple model for the relationships between poverty, schooling and gender inequality. It argues that poverty—at both national and household levels—is associated with an under-enrolment of school-age children, but that the gendered outcomes of such under-enrolment are the product of cultural practice, rather than of poverty per se. Using detailed case study material from two African countries, evidence is presented to show the variety and extent of adverse cultural practice which impede the attendance and performance of girls at school, relative to boys. It follows that gender inequalities in schooling outcomes, measured in both qualitative and quantitative terms, will not necessarily be reduced as incomes rise.     

Democracy,inclusive schooling and the politics of education

Drawing on a variety of social and political theories about the nature and future of democracy, this paper develops athesis about the politics of inclusive education. It concludes with a brief preliminary evaluation of the potential of the UK Labour Government's Education Action Zones policy for the development and governance of inclusive schools.     

约翰·霍尔特家庭学校教育思想新探

家庭学校教育作为基础教育领域的一种新的教育理念和模式,20世纪60年代在美国兴起,20世纪80年代以来得到了蓬勃发展。这种教育理念和模式也渗透到了世界上的很多国家以及我国的台湾、香港地区。约翰·霍尔特是美国家庭学校教育运动的积极倡导者和推动者,对于指导和推动美国家庭学校教育运动的发展起了非常重要的作用。     

The cultural formation of teachers' class consciousness: teachers in the inner city

Currently the job of teaching is being reconstructed through a technicist and managerial account which bleaches out the ‘authentic’ voice of the teacher. This paper is an attempt to recover the commitments which a particular group of teachers (urban teachers) bring to their work and explore the way their perspectives are infused with their class histories, class consciousness and their teaching experiences. The paper is divided into two main sections. The first part briefly examines the contested classed position of teachers and argues that there is a need to distinguish between economic and subjective class identities. The second part draws on a small data set of interviews conducted with seven experienced and long-stay inner-city teachers and argues that (these) teachers do what they do because of their classed identities and subjectivities. While these sorts of teachers may always have been in a minority (Grace 1978), nevertheless they are still out there teaching in the city. Through their perceptions, values and sometimes their actions, they are contesting normalizing discourses of what it is to be a teacher.     

Social difference and the politics of schooling in Africa: a Ghanaian case study

This paper examines the implications of ‘social difference’ for schooling in African contexts. It highlights theoretical and philosophical engagements with ‘difference’ that could help explore and search for viable educational options in Africa. The paper engages voices of university students interviewed in a longitudinal ethnographic research study on schooling done in Ghana. Issues and questions about knowledge production, identity development and representation in pluralistic schooling contexts are raised. Insights about local knowledges, individual agency and resistance as they relate to possibilities for rethinking schooling and education in Africa are also explored. The students' narratives reveal how dialogues about school and educators' practices about difference and diversity are [not] addressed with respect to the students' schooling. Lessons on the possibilities of inclusive schooling environments are offered.     

Empowerment and cultural conflict: Navajo parents and the schooling of their children

This article is about contemporary Navajo parents caught between the traditional Navajo world of their elders and the dominant world of their Anglo neighbors. Ethnohistorical and current sociocultural factors influencing the attitudes of Navajo parents toward their children's schools are viewed in light of current arguments suggesting that one means of changing the school failure rates of some minority groups is through parent and student “empowerment.” Differences between Navajos and Anglos are particularly evident in interactions over schoolrelated issues and parenting. Through an analysis of power and cultural differences, the current practices are seen to be ineffective, indeed, “disabling” rather than “empowering” these parents.     

The cultural and emotional politics of teacher–parent interactions

This article seeks to explore the ways in which the culture and organization of teaching influences the experiences and emotions teachers report in their interactions with parents. Hargreaves’ framework, based on the emotional politics of teaching, is used here to analyze fifty-three primary and secondary teachers’ interview responses in which they described interactions with parents that elicited negative and positive emotions. Parent–teacher interactions are explored as emotional practices that are inseparable from teachers’ moral purposes, shaped by influences of culture and relationship, and inextricably interconnected elements of status and power. Data suggest that the culture and organization of teaching influence the values, discourses and senses of purpose teachers hold and thus the experiences and emotions they report in their interactions with parents. The article closes with suggestions for further research and policy considerations.