Constructions of mathematicians in popular culture and learners’ narratives: a study of mathematical and non‐mathematical subjectivities

In this paper, based on a project funded by the UK Economic and Social Research Council considering how people position themselves in relation to popular representations of mathematics and mathematicians, we explore constructions of mathematicians in popular culture and the ways learners make meanings from these. Drawing on an analysis of popular cultural texts, we argue that popular discourses overwhelmingly construct mathematicians as white, heterosexual, middle‐class men, yet also construct them as ‘other’ through systems of binary oppositions between those doing and those not doing mathematics. Turning to the analysis of a corpus of 27 focus groups with school and university students in England and Wales, we explore how such images are deployed by learners. We argue that while learners’ views of mathematicians parallel in key ways popular discourses, they are not passively absorbing these as they are simultaneously aware of the clichéd nature of popular cultural images.     

Parental education and the socialization of the child: Internality, valorization and self-positioning

Contemporary western society is characterised by an individualistic model of the person. Conceptions of socialization insist more on self expression and development than on the individual’s submission to social requirements. Values concerned with individual responsibility and self-realization guide educative actions. The article analyses the influence of parental education on internality and self-esteem in the child with particular attention to how parents lead the child to become responsible (commitment). Two hundred parents (from contrasting social backgrounds) answered a questionnaire on internality and a question on self-esteem. According to their social background, the parents adopt educative practices which induce more or less responsibility in the child. Leading the child to accept responsibility in daily life encourages the learning of internality, but family education has little influence on self-esteem. How subjects “positioned” themselves, i.e., how they placed themselves a variety of measures was examined. Some preferred to position themselves in the centre of the scales while others placed themselves on the extremes. There was a correlation between the positioning of the parents and that of the children.     

Poststructural feminism in education: An overview

Feminists in education increasingly use poststructuralism to trouble both discursive and material structures that limit the ways we think about our work. This overview of poststructural feminism presents several key philosophical concepts ? language; discourse; rationality; power, resistance, and freedom; knowledge and truth; and the subject ? as they are typically understood in humanism and then as they have been reinscribed in poststructuralism, paying special attention to how they have been used in education.     

CONSUMERISM AND THE AGING

The need for consumer health education for the aged has been expressed by a variety of authors. This paper focuses on the rationale, development, implementation, and evaluation of a consumer health education program for the aged.     

谈欧洲教育史研究方法

本文围绕近年欧洲教育史研究方法的变化这一主题,首先指出在国家众多、国情各异的欧洲,教育史学家在研究方法方面的差异和其文化专业背景及工作环境等不同有关;然后通过四个案例具体介绍欧洲教育史工作者如何运用新的史学研究方法来发掘新资料、提出新问题和拓展研究领域的;最后概要叙述史学方法最新的两大变革走向及教育史研究工作者在这种变革中应注意的问题。     

Les expéditions militaires contre Chypre (1424–1426) d’après ṢāliḤ b. YāḤya: Quelques remarques sur la marine mamelouke

Le texte rédigé par Sālih b.Yahyā constitue une source primordiale pour létude des expéditions militaires mameloukes contre Chypre entre 1424 et 1426 car l’auteur a joué un rôle principal dans la deuxième et la troisième attaque. Â la différence d'autres chroniqueurs arabes, Sālih b.Yahyā fournit des informations importantes qui permettent de reconstruire les événements et de comprendre le fonctionnement de la marine mamelouke.     

Utiliser la Dimension Europe´enne Pour Faire Sortir l'Ecole de ses Murs ou 'Extra Muros'

Five European Institutions devoted to head teacher training developed the Comenius Project 'Extra Muros' between 1996 and 1999. The general objectives were, on the one hand, understanding the importance of the educative action outside the school premises if we wanted to offer equality of opportunity to everybody, and, on the other hand, promoting the school to spread into its local area and to discover Europe. Thus, the integration of school in its territory is favoured, and the interaction of students with their peers is facilitated. The article describes in detail the organisation, development and evaluation of the project, and also the impact it caused in teachers and pupils.