This paper examines the media coverage of the murder of a young Muslim girl in Mississauga, Ontario in December 2007. We examine how that coverage moved from concerns for a terrible family event to the use of the language of Samuel Huntington's "Clash of Civilizations." We explore the nature of this exaggeration that occurs in times of threat and…

This study provides a critical and close reading of "The Dreamkeepers" (1994), by Gloria Ladson-Billings. The paper focuses primarily on the gendered nature of "being a teacher" and "being a student" as revealed in the dreamkeeper text, while maintaining its engagement with race and culture as it is manifested in the United States context. It…

The new Social Studies curriculum recently introduced in Alberta proposes to encourage students to affirm their place as citizens in a democratic society. Grounded in Biesta's (2007) argument that regardless of a Program of Studies' best stated goals and intentions, if a school is not structured democratically the chances of the program being…

The purpose of this paper is to consider the continued saliency of the ideas of Harold O. Rugg, particularly for social studies education. Given the conservative political times in which we work, and the current educational emphases on academic standards, high-stakes standardized testing, and mastery of specified knowledge, and the impact of these…

The United Nations Decade of Education for Sustainable Development signals an unparalleled opportunity to link education with sustainability. But in the age of corporate globalization, will education bow to the external pressures that have always sought to subordinate it to vested interests, or will it reach beyond these narrow confines to the…

This paper addresses key themes in a new book of posthumously published writings by Paulo Freire, "Daring to Dream: Toward a Pedagogy of the Unfinished" (Paradigm Publishers, 2007). The paper comments on the structure and content of the book and places it in the context of Freire's wider corpus of published works. Particular attention is paid to…

The so-called Culture Wars have made the issue of religious tolerance in schools more confusing than ever. Where once free speech trumped nearly every concern in these wars in the public schools, there is now great concern about whether messages put out are politically correct. The preoccupation teachers now have with avoiding speech or themes…

This paper argues by way of analogy that the psychological descriptors of "masochist" and "sadist", a person who submits or dominates, respectively can aptly describe many aspects of the power relationships teachers and students experience within institutions of public education. Teachers operate in an often ethically contradictory position, torn…

There is an increasing interest in the role of emotions in education. The concept of "emotional intelligence" is an example. There are various discourses being developed in education about the importance of emotions. One such emerging discourse builds on the argument that greater emphasis on emotions under some circumstances and control over…

This study examines the impact of secondary school culture on the dual student outcomes of academic achievement and engagement with the institution attended. Elements of school culture were identified, specifically the roles played by administrators, the professional teaching staff, and the adolescent peer group. A mixed-method research design was…

This response to Mayo's book emphasizes its Gramscian aspects and explores two dimensions not addressed in the original. The first is Cornel West's attempt to racialize Gramsci and examine how his ideas might serve the interests of African-Americans. The second is Michael Newman and Ian Baptiste's exploration of the partisan, directive role of…

In this paper I explore different ways to understand the idea of community. Using the work of Alphonso Lingis, I make a distinction between the rational community and the community of those who have nothing in common. The latter community is the community in which we are all strangers for each other. I argue that the language of the latter…

Disciplinary and professional psychology have exercised considerable influence over the ways in which Western individuals and societies understand what it is to be a person. During the last half of the 20th century, educational psychologists advanced scientific and humanistic conceptions of the self that removed personhood from the historical,…