‘Ballet it’s too whitey’: discursive hierarchies of high school dance spaces and the constitution of embodied feminine subjectivities

This article investigates (i) how the structuring practices and meanings associated with dance classes at an inner‐city American high school operated as institutional spaces (re)producing ‘dividing practices’ that supported racial and classed hierarchies; (ii) how these racist structures were created and maintained relative to dominant notions of embodiment, ‘race’, social class, femininity, and dance; and (iii) the way these dominant practices and hierarchies were managed by two ‘black’ young women at the high school in order to construct particular modes of self‐governance. The analysis suggests that educators be attuned to the role that spaces play in creating particular types of ‘docile’ bodies and the strategies enacted by young people to create alternative embodied practices and subjectivities.     

School leadership for the future: heroic or distributed? Translating international discourses in Norwegian policy documents

School leadership as a key for school reforms has become a dominant theme in education, as demonstrated by a growing body of research during the last 15 years. Still, little attention has been paid to how changing international discourses on school leadership are translated into national public policy documents during the last decade. As such, this study provides additional insight into this field by analysing how Norwegian policy documents translate international discourses and re-contextualise national constructs of school leadership. Inspired by a critical approach, the authors address this issue by identifying discursive shifts in ideas about school leadership roles and practices. Based on an examination of four recent white papers on Norwegian education and school leadership, the authors argue that the policy documents constructed a tension between an international ‘explicit’ principal and a national ‘docile’ principal in 2003–2004, while recent documents construct a consensus-oriented, distributed leadership role for principals through the term ‘facilitating school leaders’. This may lead to contested interpretations as to how to perform school leadership in practice.     

‘Doing identity’ in the Botswana classroom: negotiating gendered institutional identities

Drawing on post-structural and post-colonial conceptions of gender, this paper explores multiple student masculinities and femininities in the classrooms of four junior secondary schools in Botswana. These gendered identities, it is argued, are negotiated within broader institutional constraints that have been socio-historically produced. Such constraints include the colonial legacy of heavily authoritarian (and inherently gendered) teacher-student relations, which in turn are sustained (and resisted) through the practice of English as the medium of instruction, and a punitive disciplinary regime, which has corporal punishment at its core. Three similar gender performances are identified for both girls and boys: ‘good classroom students’, ‘classroom rebels’, and ‘docile bodies’, though these are discursively produced and interpreted differently, against the norms of masculinity and femininity, and within a pervasive and stereotypical binary gender ideology.     

We don’t play with gays,they’re not real boys … they can’t fight: Hegemonic masculinity and (homophobic) violence in the primary years of schooling

Whenever masculinity and school violence are considered in South African research, the focus is often on the high school. In this paper, we consider a different direction by drawing on Connell’s (1995) concept of hegemonic masculinity to understand the workings of power and violence amongst a group of South African primary school boys. Little is known about how forces of hegemonic masculinity operate to shape every day gender relations amongst younger boys. Against this background, this paper focuses on a particular group of boys, between 10 and 13 years old, who attend a ‘black’, working-class primary school in South Africa. In addition, they identify themselves as ‘real boys’, where being a ‘real boy’ is inextricably linked to violent ‘performances’ of hegemonic masculinity on the school playground during break time. The paper explores how these boys use forms of violence to claim control of the playground space and to exclude, marginalise and denigrate the other group of boys whom they construct as ‘unmasculine’ and ‘gay’. The findings raise implications for ways of curbing the violence, such as working with the boys to promote non-violent interpretations of performing, being and becoming a ‘real boy’.     

The 2014 special educational needs and disability code of practice: old ideology into new policy contexts?

This article reveals the Foucauldian docile body manufactured within the Department for Education’s special educational needs and disability code of practice 2014 through employment of a theoretical lens of embodiment and an analytical focus on only three words. In problematizing the concepts of support, employment and independence, we seek to upend this docile body juxtaposing such against the active ‘non-productive’ disabled body. We conclude that the Code is riven with ideological assumptions which act as a constraint to the location, form and function of the body. Everybody’s body is sorted and graded according to its ability to fulfil a Conservative work ethic and contribute positively to a society in which bodies are not equally valued. The authors suggest that critical discourse analysis, informed by the outlined conceptualisation of embodiment, could be usefully applied in the critiquing of many policy and guidance documents.     

Teaching in the age of accountability: restrained by school culture?

In this paper, we explore how ‘teaching communication’ in the classroom is connected to school culture. In the age of accountability, the outcome focus force to the forefront, a ‘blame game’ which either blames students’ achievements on the teachers and teacher education, or the students and their socio-economic background. We argue that to succeed with teaching and learning is dependent on the school culture more than the single teacher or the students’ backgrounds. School culture is understood as attitudes, communication, student focus and engagement. Teaching communication in this paper is studied as teachers’ and students’ talk about subject matter in whole-class teaching. We explore how different school cultures give students different opportunities to experience meaning from teaching communication. The perspective on meaning is derived from Bildung-centred didactics. By using qualitative comparative case method in Norwegian Lower Secondary schools, we find three different types of ‘teaching communication’ typical for different school cultures: ‘Dialogic teaching communication’, ‘storytelling teaching communication’ and ‘reproducing teaching communication’. The school culture with the ‘dialogic’ variant is characterized by trust and reciprocity, making students’ experiencing meaning a possibility.     

If these walls could speak: reading displays of primary children's work

The first thing a visitor notices when entering Hollytree primary school is the art-work displayed on every wall. This paper, based on a three-year ethnographic study of the school, mobilizes field notes and interview and photographic data to probe the meanings of this visual ‘display’. We argue that the walls (re)produce and promote normative meanings of ‘good work’, the ‘good student’, the ‘good teacher’ and the ‘good school’, which serve both internal and external purposes. They are also a means of promoting an inclusive culture which, while true of arts activities, may not always be the case in mainstream classes. In addition, the school walls support aspects of the school timetable of collective work, and also constitute resources for children to construct narratives about their collective and individual histories in the school.     

Foucault,Docile Bodies and Post-Compulsory Education in Australia

Australian post-compulsory education policies have been subjected to theoretical critiques which question assumptions behind the articulation of policy. One line of critique derives from Foucault's analysis of power, and makes particular use of the theme of ‘docile bodies’. A limitation of these critiques is the adoption of a ‘top-down’ model of policy which fails to test the model against empirical evidence. This article draws upon recent research evidence ‘at the extremities’ to test the applicability of Foucault's ideas within the Australian context. The research challenges the monolithic image that results from a Hop down’ analysis and counteracts untested assumptions about the inevitability of current policies. While it suggests ways in which Foucault's ideas might enables us to lay bare the disjunctures between policy and its plurality in practice, it also highlights the limitations of Foucault's imagery of power.     

Developing the characteristic spirit of publicly managed schools in a more secular and pluralist Ireland

This discussion paper considers the identification and definition of the ‘characteristic spirit’ of publicly managed schools in the Republic of Ireland. Some international approaches to values in publicly funded schools are introduced along with relevant contextual aspects of Irish education including the cultural diversity and secularisation of modern Irish society. The Irish Education Act (1998) gives ultimate responsibility for school values and ‘characteristic spirit’ to the school ‘patron’, a role legally separate from that of school ownership and school management. The underlying values of privately managed faith-based schools are well established. However, the ‘characteristic spirit’ of publicly managed Education and Training Board schools remains largely undeveloped. Appropriate responses to this challenge are identified and discussed.     

‘Wild’ girls? An exploration of ‘ladette’ cultures in secondary schools

‘Laddish’ attitudes and behaviours are central to current discourses on boys’ ‘underachievement’, as they are seen by many people to impede the progress of some boys in school. Whilst the vast majority of concern about ‘laddishness’ has, to date, focused upon boys, according to media reports there are now good reasons to worry about girls. Anecdotes from teachers and reports in the media suggest that some schoolgirls are now acting ‘laddishly’, that they are ‘ladettes’. This paper explores ‘ladette’ cultures in secondary schools, drawing upon interview data from100 pupils and 30 teachers. It tackles and discusses the following questions: (a) What does the term ‘ladette’ mean to pupils and teachers? (b) Do school‐aged ‘ladettes’ ‘exist’—and if so, what are they like inside and outside of school? (c) In what ways are ‘ladettes’ similar to, and different from, ‘lads’? (d) Are teachers concerned about ‘ladettes’? (e) Are ‘ladette’ behaviours on the increase?     

The evolution of school league tables in England 1992–2016: ‘Contextual value‐added’, ‘expected progress’ and ‘progress 8’

Since 1992, the UK Government has published so‐called ‘school league tables’ summarising the average General Certificate of Secondary Education (GCSE) ‘attainment’ and ‘progress’ made by pupils in each state‐funded secondary school in England. While the headline measure of school attainment has remained the percentage of pupils achieving five or more good GCSEs, the headline measure of school progress has changed from ‘value‐added’ (2002–2005) to ‘contextual value‐added’ (2006–2010) to ‘expected progress’ (2011–2015) to ‘progress 8’ (2016–). This paper charts this evolution with a critical eye. First, we describe the headline measures of school progress. Second, we question the Government's justifications for scrapping contextual value‐added. Third, we argue that the current expected progress measure suffers from fundamental design flaws. Fourth, we examine the stability of school rankings across contextual value‐added and expected progress. Fifth, we discuss the extent to which progress 8 will address the weaknesses of expected progress. We conclude that all these progress measures and school league tables more generally should be viewed with far more scepticism and interpreted far more cautiously than they have often been to date.     

Complementing the Australian primary school Health and Physical Education (HPE) curriculum: exploring children's HPE learning experiences within varying school ground equipment contexts

This paper unearths how primary school children experience and can complement the Australian HPE curriculum within three unique school ground equipment scenarios that include an ‘empty’, ‘loose parts’ and a ‘traditional’ school ground context. Using direct observation, 490 scans were undertaken of the school grounds over five days. Field note observations recorded children's HPE learning experiences according to the curriculum, and predominant physical activity types and intensities were recorded. Implementing a variety of school ground equipment provisions was revealed to be important compared to the ‘empty’ school ground context for primary school children to meet HPE curriculum objectives.     

‘Ye've got to ‘ave balls to play this game sir!’ Boys,peers and fears: the negative influence of school‐based ‘cultural accomplices’ in constructing hegemonic masculinities

The ongoing moral panic surrounding adolescent boys continues to cause concern, proving pivotal in popular discourses centring on the ‘problem of youth’. Drawing on ethnographic data from a large co‐educational secondary school, this paper illustrates how school outcomes are adversely affected by working class boys' investments in peer regulated ‘hegemonic’ masculinity. Echoing traditional working class masculine identities formed in relation to the physical requirements of industrial labour, these performances reject associations with activities constructed as ‘feminine’, leading to disaffection with schoolwork. The paper argues that, in a school culture of pervasive homophobia, some teachers paradoxically acted as ‘cultural accomplices’, naturalizing compulsory heterosexuality in engaging alienated and disruptive young men. Moreover, evidence suggests that this is an emerging response to managerialist pressures to ‘continuously improve’ grades by adopting ‘boy friendly’ approaches. This renders questionable strategies predicated on naturalizing assumptions about boys and makes problematic calls for more ‘role models’ without investigating how gendered pedagogies affect schooling for girls and boys.     

Contesting knowledge,constructing legitimacy: knowledge making in mother-tongue education schools in Nepal

Scholars in education have drawn our attention to the ways in which social power and control manifests in the process of knowledge production in education institutions especially through school curriculum. In this paper, I analyse school textbooks along with classroom instruction events and everyday practices in a mother-tongue school in Nepal. Drawing on the concept of ‘legitimate knowledge’, this paper discusses mother-tongue education as a struggle over symbolic resources, whereby familiarity with ‘daily life in the locality’ is discursively drawn upon to articulate mother tongue as an effective pedagogy and legitimate knowledge. The paper argues that the introduction of mother tongue in the school curriculum is, therefore, more than an addition of new language. It is a process of negotiating what it means to ‘know’ things in school. In doing so, this paper illustrates a dynamic process of re-signification of local languages, knowledge and identities that is underway.     

‘The world must stop when I’m talking’: gender and power relations in primary teachers’ classroom talk

The present paper examines male and female teachers’ language practices in relation to ‘censuring’ talk in the primary classroom, in the context of the debate around boys’ ‘underachievement’ and the ‘feminisation’ of primary school culture. Through an analysis of classroom observations with 51 men and women teachers, it looks to see whether gender differences could be found in the ways individual men and women teachers communicated in terms of their ‘censuring’ comments of pupils’ work or behaviour. Secondly, the paper takes issue with the notion that teachers operate within a ‘feminised’ educational culture, by looking at the ways in which teachers’ classroom talk can be seen to be constrained by two contrasting discourses relating to the power relation between teacher and pupil: a ‘traditional’ disciplinarian discourse, and a more ‘progressive’ liberal discourse. Both discourses have complex gendered and class dimensions, challenging the conception of a ‘feminised’ primary school culture.     

The ‘nature of science’ in the school curriculum: the great survivor

This paper explores the ways in which the ‘nature of science’ (NoS) has been interpreted, accommodated and justified within school curricula since science was first schooled in the mid-nineteenth century. It explores how different interpretations of ‘the NoS’ have been invoked by those seeking to reform school science education in response to wider political, economic or social concerns such as the demand to ‘humanise’ school science teaching, to increase the supply of qualified scientists or to promote scientific literacy. It offers some comments upon the implications of these interpretations for current attempts to promote the ‘NoS’ in school science education. The focus of attention is England and, to a lesser extent, the USA but the issues raised are of contemporary relevance to many other parts of the world.     

'Poisoned history': a comparative study of nationalism,propaganda and the treatment of war and peace in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century school curriculum

This paper investigates the educational philosophy and practices of Achimota School, which was established in the Gold Coast Colony (the southern part of today’s Ghana) in 1927 as the governmental model school for leadership education. Achimota’s education aimed to develop leaders who were ‘Western in intellectual attitude’, ‘African in sympathy’. To fulfil this objective, Achimota attempted to develop a curriculum that took into account the sociocultural background of African students while trying to provide an education on a par with that available at English public schools. The paper first examines the discourse surrounding the establishment of a model secondary school for African leadership, which involved diverse groups of people – colonial officials, missionaries, European educationists, traditional chiefs and African nationalists – and then reviews the relevant educational philosophies of the twentieth century. Finally, the paper describes the Achimota education as experienced by students, a mixed product of English public school tradition and ‘African tradition’. Regardless of the efforts to balance the two ‘traditions’, what was actually created was a new Achimota culture that selected essences from different ‘traditions’ and remoulded them for a novel purpose.     

Back to the future on gender and anti‐school boys: a response to Jeffrey Smith

This article examines recent claims by Jeffrey Smith that: (1) ‘hegemonic masculinity’ is an expression of working class counter‐school culture; (2) some teachers are ‘cultural accomplices’ in constructing ‘hegemonic masculinities’ of anti‐school working class boys, thereby contributing to their underachievement; and (3) these ‘cultural accomplices’ are an emerging response to recent moral panics and neo‐liberal managerialism concerned with ‘failing boys’ at school. It is suggested that ‘hegemonic masculinity’ is not necessarily associated with anti‐school values in working class culture. Many working class boys might subscribe to ‘hegemonic masculinity’ without rejecting learning. Contrary to Smith’s emphasis on how working class culture generates anti‐school ‘hegemonic masculinity’, there is the possibility that ‘hegemonic masculinity’ is fused with anti‐school values produced by organisational differentiation. The continuing commonalities between working class anti‐school boys and the ‘gender regime’ of some secondary schools for over 20 years implies something more enduring at work than recent moral panics.     

On ‘Politics,Markets, and American Schools‘

This paper traces the trajectory of New Labour education policy since the formation of the first New Labour government in 1997. During that time the policy discourse has moved from a position of individualized school improvement through competition, to one where there is an emphasis on ‘partnership’ and ‘collaboration’ as key mechanisms for improvement. We note, however, that ‘specialism’, ‘diversity’ and ‘choice’ are still key components of policy and that ‘partnership’ often denotes a deficit model, with more successful schools supporting (or in some cases taking over) less successful ones. Although there are the beginnings of a recognition that social class and social deprivation are factors which make achievement at school more problematic, generally New Labour policy has not attempted to alleviate the tendency to social polarization which has emerged as a result of school choice policies.     

Sexual assemblages: mobile phones/young people/school

This paper asks, what more can we think in relation to debates around young people's use of mobile phones at school? Rather than attempting to answer the question of whether mobile phones are ‘good’ or ‘bad’ for young people, this paper recasts the debate's ontological underpinnings. To do this feminist appropriations of the Deleuzian concept of assemblage and a relational materialist notion of ‘more-than-human’ are drawn on. By recognising sexuality-as-assemblage, it is possible to see more-than-human elements (such as mobile phones) as implicated in the becoming of sexuality at school. This conceptualisation implies new texture and dimensionality to the wider project of (re)producing sexual meanings and identities at school. It also necessitates acknowledging an ontologically different understanding of the human-non-human divide, that decentres young people and/or phones as to ‘to blame’ for ‘negative’ practices like sexting. Instead, agency manifests via the intra-activity that occurs when mobile phones and young people are in-relation.