Author Archives: E Wayne Ross

Critical Education Special Issue – Call for Submissions – CRITICAL HUMANISM AND PROBLEMS OF CHANGE

Critical Education Special Issue – Call for Submissions

CRITICAL HUMANISM AND PROBLEMS OF CHANGE

Deadline for Submissions: December 15, 2023

Submission Types: Empirical and theoretical papers; interviews; practitioner field reports, experiential descriptions, or teaching examples

Review Process: All submissions of scholarly articles will be peer-reviewed. Interviews and field reports will be reviewed “in-house.”

Philosophical Overview/Perspective: Institutions once designed to ensure democratic participation by limiting governing power are instead used to manipulate the commons while attacking group solidarity marginalizing the most vulnerable in societies. Capitalist austerity measures and identity politics built into bad-faith legislation ensure antagonisms distract from democratic educational possibility (Ross & Vinson, 2013; Sondel, 2015). The results are populations divided, which secures worker subservience to existing structures of power or domination. Resultant social tensions keep society distracted, precluding democratizing agency. Schooling and schooling experiences reflect the acceptance of cultural narratives where societies live out the capitalist status quo and a vertically aligned social hierarchy (Rodriguez, 2008). The miseducation of students becomes a means to, at best, maintain hierarchy, but more insidiously, becomes an ideological lever for actively legitimizing dehumanization. However, critical educators fight against these alienating conditions as students and teachers direct knowledge, exchanges, and personal agency toward more democratic civic participation to secure human freedom and dignity (Freire, 2018; hooks, 2014; West, 2004).

In this special issue, we seek empirical and theoretical papers, interviews (with organic intellectuals, activist students or teachers, education workers committed to their community, and community members striving for more equitable schools and societies), practitioner field reports, and book reviews that take a critical humanist approach to education and the social world. By critical humanism, we are referring to ideas, research, and approaches that can help students and educators take pragmatic approaches toward promoting human liberation from conditions that enslave individuals and ensure the conditions for democracy. This may mean demonstrating more complex connections between the classroom to society, or ways critical educators create the conditions for a more just world. We are interested in scholarship that describes teacher and student agency within the current political climate and perspectives that serve as a counterpoint to vertical social hierarchies. Examples may include, but are not limited to social, historical, and political analyses; class relations in society, conflict resolution, dismantling censorship mechanisms that regulate human possibility and experience; teacher work within and as part of their communities; student, teacher, and community solidarity responding to oppressive conditions and/or legislation; analysis of artifacts, discourse, and culture; or research on, transformational civic practices or engagement; applications of critical or cultural frameworks to educational phenomena; anti-fascist, decolonial, and anti-oppressive approaches; innovations that help facilitate opportunities for emancipatory social transformation through critical education and praxis. Contributions related to activist communities transforming ideology, social conditions, and teaching conditions, among LGBTQ+, Indigenous, feminist, racialized, and other minorized groups are encouraged.

Submission may also relate to the different aspects of schooling as a historical activity system or the greater educational ecology which might include reimagining classroom mediation; use of disciplinary tools; equitable divisions of classroom labor; and/or classroom labor directed toward social transformation (Engeström, 2015; Sanino et. al, 2009). We would like to illuminate the many ways teachers, students, and educational and other community stakeholders work in solidarity to transform the oppressive social conditions that situate education and society (Magill & Rodriguez, 2021).

Manuscripts due: December 15, 2023

For details on manuscript submission see: Critical Education Information for Authors.

When submitting your manuscript please choose the journal section “Critical Analysis and the Problems of Change” from the drop-down menu.

Additional questions can be directed to: Kevin R. Magill (Kevin_Magill@Baylor.edu)

References

Engeström, Y. (2015). Learning by expanding. Cambridge University Press.

Evans, M. (2009). Citizenship education, pedagogy and school contexts. Education for citizenship and democracy, 519-532.

Freire, P. (2018). Pedagogy of the oppressed. Bloomsbury USA.

hooks, B. (2014). Teaching to transgress. Routledge.

Magill & Rodriguez. (Forthcoming) Structures of American Education. Roman & Littlefield.

Magill, K. R. & Rodriguez, A. (2021). Teaching as intellectual solidarity. Critical Education, 12(1), 1-21. http://ojs.library.ubc.ca/index.php/criticaled/article/view/186451

Ross, E. W. (2015). Teaching for change: Social education and critical knowledge of everyday life. The importance of teaching social issues: Our pedagogical creeds, 141-147.

Ross, E. W., & Vinson, K. D. (2013). Resisting neoliberal education reform: Insurrectionist pedagogies and the pursuit of dangerous citizenship. Cultural Logic: A Journal of       Marxist Theory & Practice20, 17-45.

Sannino, A. E., Daniels, H. E., & Gutiérrez, K. D. (2009). Learning and expanding with activity theory. Cambridge University Press.

 Sondel, B. (2015). Raising citizens or raising test scores? Teach for America, “no excuses” charters, and the development of the neoliberal citizen. Theory & Research in Social Education43(3), 289-313.

West, C. (2004). Democracy matters, winning the fight against imperialism. New York: Penguin.

Faculty members at South Asian University suspended for supporting student rights.

Four faculty members at South Asian University (New Delhi, India)  have been suspended pending investigation for asking the university not to call police inside the campus while student protests were going on and to resolve matters amicably.

Faculty also asked administration to withdraw punishment meted to students because due process of rules and regulations were not followed.  Ravi Kumar, one of the suspended professors said, “This is unprecedented in the academic history where four faculty members have been suspended for suggesting measures in a constructive spirit.”

Brief chronology of incidents at South Asian University (SAU), New Delhi

  1. On October 14, 2022, faculty members wrote to the university administration against the act of calling police into the campus to disperse protesting students and to resolve internal issues.
  1. On November 4, 2022, the university administration issued office orders announcing expulsion, rustication or suspension of 5 students. On November 5, 2022, several faculty members wrote an email to the university community expressing their deep concern regarding these arbitrary actions of the university administration that were taken without following any due process and in gross violation of rules, regulations, and bye-laws, and were in contravention of principles of natural justice.
  1. Students began a mass indefinite hunger strike from November 7, 2022. Quite a few students had to be admitted to hospital on emergency basis to revive their physical condition. One of the five students who were expelled/rusticated/suspended, Ammar Ahmad (MA Sociology, Ist semester), collapsed on the night of November 22, 2022 and had to be admitted to the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) of a hospital. Till date Ammar’s speech remains severely affected, he cannot walk on his own, and remains fully dependent on care-givers for his daily functioning.
  1. On December 30, 2022, five faculty members received notices from the university administration asking them to respond to several charges, including: writing letters to the university community regarding certain administrative decisions in relation to the student protests (as noted above in points 1 and 2 above). The faculty members include: Dr. Snehashish Bhattacharya (Faculty of Economics), Dr. Srinivas Burra (Faculty of Legal Studies), Irfanullah Farooqi (Department of Sociology, Faculty of Social Sciences), and Dr. Ravi Kumar (Department of Sociology, Faculty of Social Sciences). These faculty members individually responded to the notice on January 16, 2023.
  1. The four faculty members were called to appear before a Fact Finding Committee (FFC) on Friday, May 19, 2023 for an interaction. During the interaction, the faculty members were asked to provide answers to between 132 and 246 questions in writing by the end of the working day, using pen and paper and sitting in front of the committee members. They were told that their responses might be used as evidence to decide on further proceedings against them. The questions included fresh (though unsubstantiated) allegations and accusations that were not part of the communication from the administration dated December 30, 2022, or the responses submitted on January 16, 2023.
  1. The four faculty members submitted a written request to the committee to send the questions electronically and to provide more time too. They also wrote to the Acting President on May 25, 2023, regarding this issue and seeking appointment. However, they have not heard back from the committee or from the Acting President yet in this regard.
  1. On June 16, 2023, office orders were issued placing the four faculty members under suspension with immediate effect, stating that “there are allegations of misconduct” and violation of the code of conduct of the University, “which need to be investigated.” The faculty members have been directed not to leave station without permission, vacate their offices, return their office computers and identity cards, and register their attendance on all working days in the offices of their respective deans.
  1. The faculty members responded to the Acting President in writing on June 19, 2023, terming the actions patently illegal as they have been taken in contravention of the rules and regulations of the university. They have called upon him to withdraw the orders at the earliest.

Action requested

The suspension of the faculty members should be revoked as it is a violation of the university rules, regulations and byelaws. The faculty members have been only requesting that the university to resolve matters within university and amicably.

*****

Jawaharlal Nehru University Teachers Association
New Delhi-110067

JNUTA Statement on arbitrary suspension of four faculty at South Asian University

The JNUTA strongly condemns the arbitrary suspension of four faculty by the South Asian University administration. The JNUTA sees this act as unacceptable, unjust, and an attempt to intimidate and spread fear among the teaching community.

The suspension notice issued to the faculty by the SAU administration on 16.06.2023 came after a spate of humiliation of the four faculty members by the Fact Finding Committee that on May 19, 2023, asked them to provide handwritten answers to over a hundred questions sitting in front of the committee members. The faculty raised objections to this process and wrote to the FFC and the SAU administration, but they received no reply. On the contrary, they were served with suspension orders that justified it by accusing the faculty of ‘inciting and leading students and outsiders’, and ‘anti-social acts’, among other things; without following due process of investigation. This illegal and unacceptable suspension notice has directed them not to leave the station without permission, vacate their offices, return their office computers and identity cards, and register their attendance on all working days in the offices of their respective deans.

The JNUTA strongly condemns this unprecedented harassment, coercion, and intimidation of the SAU faculty by the administration. There are several news reports that the University served notices and expelled/suspended/rusticated several students protesting against the reduction of monthly stipends without following the due process. Several faculty in SAU have also raised their concerns regarding the arbitrary actions of the university administration against the students. These notices of expulsion and rustication have put the students under tremendous stress, both mentally and physically.

The suspension order served to four faculty members by the SAU administration is an attempt to intimidate and silence the faculty and the students who raise their voice against the arbitrary and authoritarian actions of the administration. The JNUTA stands in complete solidarity with the faculty of SAU in defending their rights to speak truth to power. It also stands in support of the students of the SAU who have been protesting against the gross act of injustice of the SAU administration. The JNUTA demands that the suspension orders of SAU faculty and rustication/expulsion order of SAU students be immediately revoked and the administration start a dialogue to discuss the demands for an agreeable resolution at the earliest.

Sd/-

D K Lobiyal                                                                                                        Avinash Kumar

President, JNUTA                                                                                       Secretary, JNUTA

 

*****

Janhastakshep: a campaign against fascist designs
Press release
24 June, 2023

Contact: drvikasbajpai@gmail.com; (M): 9717820427

Subject: Suspension of four faculty members at South Asian University, an extension of the continuing attacks on institutions of higher learning.

Janhastakshep unequivocally condemns the suspension of four faculty members – Dr Snehashish Bhattacharya (Faculty of Economics), Dr Srinivas Burra (Faculty of Legal Studies), Dr Irfanullah Farooqi (Department of Sociology) and Dr Ravi Kumar, also of the department of Sociology, at New Delhi’s South Asian University by the university administration and demands unconditional revocation of the suspension orders of all suspended faculty members with immediate effect.

The events leading up to the suspension, the manner of suspension and the subsequent conduct of the ‘Fact Finding Committee’ constituted by the university to conduct a sort of inquiry against the suspended faculty members reek of utterly cavalier attitude calculated to please the powers that be in the political circumstances obtaining in the country as of date.

The present suspension of faculty members is rooted in the events related to the agitation by the university’s students in November last on their legitimate democratic demands impacting on their immediate wellbeing. That agitation was handled with a heavy hand by the university authorities resulting in rustication and expulsion of the students. It led to serious consequences to the health of one student Ammar Ahmad and later to another Phd scholar Apoorva in the Faculty of Legal Studies.

The suspended faculty members were first handed notices on 30 December 2022 on charges such as – writing letters to university community questioning certain administrative decisions in relation to the student protests; instigating students to protest and association with a “Marxist” study circle among other allegations. In levelling these charges against the faculty, those sitting in top administrative positions at the University have exhibited regrettable lack of comprehension of a university’s function, the nature of the learning / teaching process and the responsibilities of the students, teachers and administration at institutions of higher learning towards each other.

No education, let alone new knowledge generation can be transacted if the students are not supported by their teachers and the administration in availing of amenities, including financial support, that facilitate their endeavors in this direction. A teacher and more so the administration shall be failing in their duty if such support and understanding were to be substituted with a ‘coercive disciplinary’ approach which unfortunately has been the dominant trend forced upon all manner of publicly funded institutions of higher learning in the country in last 9 years. It is nothing but a poor parody that the suspended faculty members have been accused of associating / encouraging a ‘Marxist Study Circle’ in a university space that is supposed to lend itself to a free contestation of ideas. This certainly sits at odds with the eulogy of ‘Indian Democracy’ proffered by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Washington D C.

Even as Janhastakshep calls upon the different bodies of academicians and intellectuals at large to support the faculty and students of SAU in this hour of need, we also appeal that this suspension of faculty members should be seen as part of the larger thrust by the Modi led government to further curb the space for ideas which militate for Democratization of society, challenge authoritarianism, uphold economic and social justice. These suspensions are part of the efforts to terrorize and stultify the intelligentsia into submission.

Apart from revoking the suspension of the faculty members and continuing rustication of the students, the bunch of ‘Actors’ (Acting President, Acting Vice-President and Acting Registrar) complicit in ‘over-acting’, who are presently ruling the roost at SAU should be replaced with academics of repute and integrity capable of steering the university towards achieving its cherished goals.

– sd –

(Dr Vikas Bajpai)                                                                                    (Anil Dubey)

Convener                                                                                              Co-convener

Prof JNU                                                                                            Senior journalist

*****

Links to some of the press coverage:

Wayne Au: A Pedagogy of Insurgency in Troubling Times

 

Dr. Au is a former public high school social studies teacher and is now Dean and Professor in the School of Educational Studies at the University of Washington Bothell. He is a longtime editor for the social justice teaching magazine, Rethinking scholarship about high-stakes testing, neoliberal education policy, teaching for social justice, critical pedagogy, and antiracist education. Author or editor of over 100 publications, his recent co-edited books include Insurgent Social Studies: Scholar- Educators Disrupting Erasure and Marginality (2022), Rethinking Ethnic Studies (2019) and Teaching for Black Lives (2018). His most recent authored books include the second edition of Unequal By Design: High-Stakes Testing and the Standardization of Inequality (2022) and A Marxist Education (2018).
Abtract
Teachers are on the frontline of ongoing social, economic, and community health crises. Using the organizing for racial justice done by teachers in Seattle, WA, in this talk Dr. Wayne Au will discuss how teacher actions represent a kind of pedagogy of insurgency that is required when social contradictions reach a particular level. While not all-powerful, it is important to recognize that this kind of pedagogy can have significant local impact as well as offer symbolic inspiration for teacher organizing at the national and international levels.

EDCP Seminar | Jan 2023 | A Pedagogy of Insurgency in Troubling Times | Dr. Wayne Au

Mark your calendar for UBC Department of Curriculum and Pedagogy Seminar with Dr. Wayne Au (University of Washington, Bothell).

Dr. Au will be speaking on “A Pedagogy of Insurgency in Troubling Times” on January 27, 2023, 12:30PM – 2:00PM via Zoom.

For Zoom details, please email edcp.educ@ubc.ca

Dr. Au’s seminar talk is titled “A Pedagogy of Insurgency in Troubling Times: The Imperative of Teaching and Organizing for Educational and Social Justice”. Teachers are on the frontline of ongoing social, economic, and community health crises. Using the organizing for racial justice done by teachers in Seattle, WA, in this talk Dr. Wayne Au will discuss how teacher actions represent a kind of pedagogy of insurgency that is required when social contradictions reach a particular level. While not all-powerful, it is important to recognize that this kind of pedagogy can have significant local impact as well as offer symbolic inspiration for teacher organizing at the national and international levels.

Dr. Au is a former public high school social studies teacher and is now Dean and Professor in the School of Educational Studies at the University of Washington Bothell. He is a long-time editor for the social justice teaching magazine, Rethinking Schools, and his work focuses on both academic and public scholarship about high-stakes testing, neoliberal education policy, teaching for social justice, critical pedagogy, and anti-racist education.

Author or editor of over 100 publications, his recent co-edited books include Insurgent Social Studies: Scholar-Educators Disrupting Erasure and Marginality (2022), Rethinking Ethnic Studies (2019) and Teaching for Black Lives (2018). His most recent authored books include the second edition of Unequal By Design: High-Stakes Testing and the Standardization of Inequality (2022) and A Marxist Education (2018).

Dr. Au was honored with the UWB Distinguished Teaching Award in 2015, presented the William H. Watkins award for scholar activism from the Society of Professors of Education in 2017, and recognized with the Distinguished K-12 Educational Leader Award from the Evergreen State College MiT program in 2019.

 

Rethinking Schools’ recent recommendations for social justice resources

Rethinking Schools‘ recent picks social justice resources includes a wide variety of resources including picture books, novels, films, and education policy and practice.

I’m proud to have contributed to one the recommended resources, Insurgent Social Studies: Scholar Educators Disrupting Erasure and Marginality (Myers Education Press, 2022), edited by Natasha Hakimali Merchant, Sarah B. Shear and Wayne Au. Rethinking Schools says:

“In the introduction to Insurgent Social Studies, the editors’ opening line is “Social studies education in the United States is a problem.” The problem is that the field of social studies has historically been dominated by white men, and this book serves as an intervention to that problem. Chapters in this collection offer perspectives and analyses of social studies from a variety of groups that have typically been marginalized, including the need for anticolonial social studies, Black Lives Matter in the social studies, the necessity of teaching about Palestine as part of social studies curriculum, challenging whiteness in social studies education, and queering world history, among others. This is an important collection for learning about social studies research and practices that are not typically included in the field.”

Introduction
We Won’t Wait Any Longer: An Introduction and Invitation to Insurgency for Social Studies
Natasha Hakimali Merchant, Sarah B. Shear, and Wayne Au

Chapter 1
Insurgence Must Be Red: Connecting Indigenous Studies and Social Studies Education for Anticolonial Praxis
The Turtle Island Social Studies Collective

Chapter 2
Solidarity Is a Verb: What the Black Lives Matter Movement Can Teach Social Studies About the Intersectional Fight Against Anti-Black Racism
Tiffany Mitchell Patterson

Chapter 3
The Audacity of Equality: Disrupting the Distortion of Asian America in Social Studies
Noreen Naseem Rodríguez and Esther June Kim

Chapter 4
“Existence is Resistance”: Palestine and Palestinians in Social Studies Education
H. Shatara

Chapter 5
Insurgente: A Familia in Conversation About Latinxs Voices in the Field of Social Studies
La Familia Aponte-Safe Tirado Díaz Beltrán Ender Busey Christ 

Chapter 6

Unsatisfied: The Conceptual Terrain of De-Essentializing Islam in Social Studies
Natasha Hakimali Merchant

Chapter 7
Queer Worlding as Historical Inquiry for Insurgent Freedom-Dreaming
Tadashi Dozono

Chapter 8
Democracy Is Interdisciplinary: The Case for Radical Civic Innovation Across Content Areas

Antero Garcia, Nicole Mirra, and Mark Gomez

Chapter 9
Cultural Bombs and Dangerous Classes: Social Studies Education as State Apparatus in the War on Terror
Jennice McCafferty-Wright

Chapter 10
Whiteness and White Responsibility in Social Studies
Andrea M. Hawkman

Afterword
Insurgent Social Studies and Dangerous Citizenship
E. Wayne Ross

About the Authors

Index

 

New online cohort: MEd in Social Studies Education at University of British Columbia

New online cohort: MEd in Social Studies Education at University of British Columbia | Curriculum, Historical inquiry, & Pedagogy (CHiP)

Issues of equity, diversity, and social justice serve as foundational lenses for interrogating social studies curriculum and pedagogy.

Application deadline January 30, 2023.

This graduate program delves into key aspects of social studies curricula with connections to historical thinking, historical consciousness, visual culture, anti-oppressive and anti-racism education, gender studies, moral education, and the history and politics of curriculum.

The cohort-based model invites you to work through the program in a collaborative community of practice. Students in this program will construct strong, foundational knowledge about teaching and learning in social studies. Building on that base, you will investigate the ways in which inquiry, inter-culturalism, and 21st century teaching and learning are central to social studies education.

By the end of the 26-month program, students will have a wealth of knowledge to share. During the first semester of the program, incoming students will have a chance to learn from graduating students though a mini conference where they will share what they have learned and consider how it can help other Social Studies teachers in their contexts.

This program is offered by the Department of Curriculum & Pedagogy.

Objectives

Through the program, students will consider theories, principles, and practices in social studies education related to:

  • Critical analysis of dominant and alternative theories of learning, teaching, and assessment in Social Studies,
  • Improvement of practice through the study of educational theory, philosophy, and practice in Social Studies,
  • Analysis of different approaches to curriculum development and implementation and their impact on social studies teaching and learning,
  • The place of curriculum and pedagogy for social studies education in historical context, understanding the social, political, economic, and cultural factors that direct past, present, and future decision making, and
  • Using an inquiry stance toward your professional practice as an educator in a variety of settings.

Additionally, students will continually reflect on what they are learning and consider how it can help them understand the aims and purposes underlying social studies curricula in their contexts. This knowledge can then be used to inform new practices in their educational contexts.

Information sessions (via Zoom).

How to apply.

More information.

International Conference on Education in Historical and Democratic Memory

EDUCATION IN HISTORICAL AND DEMOCRATIC MEMORY

TRIBUTE TO PROFESSOR ERNESTO GÓMEZ

Faculty of Educational Sciences

University of Malaga, Spain

October 26-28, 2022

Desde febrero de 2020, en la Facultad de Ciencias de la Educación de la Universidad de Málaga, EDUSOC (Grupo de Investigación HUM 856 Educación Social y Ciudadana) organiza las Jornadas Memoria y Olvido en la Enseñanza de la Historia, junto a la asociación INCIDE (Inclusión, Ciudadanía, Diversidad y Educación), con el apoyo del Consejo Social de la universidad y la Asociación contra el Silencio y el Olvido y por la Recuperación de la Memoria Histórica de Málaga. De esta forma desarrollamos y visibilizamos prácticas formativas y docentes en torno a Lugares de la Memoria Democrática relevantes para la historiografía, pero desconocidos para la práctica educativa. Abordamos el fenómeno de la Desbandá o la huida de población civil de las tropas sublevadas que la bombardea por tierra, mar y aire, dando lugar al que es reconocido como el episodio más cruento de la Guerra Civil, con una cifra indeterminada de 3000 a 5000 víctimas. Cuenta con un especial tratamiento el antiguo Cementerio de San Rafael, la mayor fosa común en Europa Occidental, al haber sido escenario de la represión ejercida por los bandos contendientes y hasta los años 50, durante la Dictadura Franquista. El trabajo arqueológico ha descubierto 9 fosas comunes, 4300 víctimas identificadas, 2800 cuerpos recuperados, entre ellos 300 infantiles, muertos en la Cárcel de Mujeres.

En esta ocasión, con ayuda de la Secretaría de Estado de Memoria Democrática, celebraremos el I Congreso Internacional sobre Educación en Memoria Histórica y Democrática para participar en el debate público abierto, a causa de la tramitación parlamentaria y aprobación de la Ley de Memoria Democrática. Un evento científico de estas características puede aportar elementos de discusión vinculados con el Cap. IV Del deber de Memoria Democrática, en concreto relacionados con el artículo 56 Cumplir la importante misión educativa y de trasmisión de valores. A ello se suma la aprobación de los Reales Decretos de la LOMLOE, que siguiendo el artículo 45 de la anterior ley, recoge medidas en materia educativa como la actualización de contenidos curriculares y formación del profesorado.

Con todo ello queremos contribuir a visibilizar prácticas educativas, pero sobre todo a impulsar una investigación que aborde los desafíos éticos del futuro, la construcción de conciencia histórica y ciudadanía democrática. Esa tarea no podemos abordarla sin reflexionar e investigar de forma sistemática sobre cómo y por qué se abordan en el aula pasados en conflicto. El profesorado y el alumnado se debate en ese contexto, entre problemas pedagógicos y políticos, pero también a reacciones afectivas, a frustraciones y confusiones que necesitamos conocer para avanzar en el conocimiento didáctico.

+++++

Since February 2020, at the Faculty of Educational Sciences of the University of Malaga, EDUSOC (Research Group HUM 856 Social and Citizen Education) organizes the Memory and Forgetfulness Conference in the Teaching of History, together with the INCIDE association (Inclusion, Citizenship, Diversity and Education), with the support of the Social Council of the university and the Association against Silence and Oblivion and for the Recovery of the Historical Memory of Malaga. In this way we develop and make visible training and teaching practices around Places of Democratic Memory relevant to historiography, but unknown to educational practice. We address the phenomenon of the Desbandá or the flight of the civilian population from the rebel troops that bombard it by land, sea and air, giving rise to what is recognized as the bloodiest episode of the Civil War, with an undetermined figure of 3,000 to 5,000 victims. The old San Rafael Cemetery, the largest mass grave in Western Europe, has received special treatment, as it was the scene of the repression exerted by the contending sides and until the 1950s, during the Franco dictatorship. Archaeological work has discovered 9 mass graves, 4,300 victims identified, 2,800 bodies recovered, including 300 children, who died in the Women’s Prison. during the Franco dictatorship. Archaeological work has discovered 9 mass graves, 4,300 victims identified, 2,800 bodies recovered, including 300 children, who died in the Women’s Prison. during the Franco dictatorship. Archaeological work has discovered 9 mass graves, 4,300 victims identified, 2,800 bodies recovered, including 300 children, who died in the Women’s Prison.

On this occasion, with the help of the Secretary of State for Democratic Memory, we will celebrate the I International Congress on Education in Historical and Democratic Memory to participate in the open public debate, due to the parliamentary processing and approval of the Democratic Memory Law. A scientific event of these characteristics can contribute elements of discussion linked to Chap. IV Of the duty of Democratic Memory, specifically related to article 56 Comply with the important educational mission and transmission of values. Added to this is the approval of the Royal Decrees of the LOMLOE, which, following article 45 of the previous law, includes measures in educational matters such as updating curricular content and teacher training.

With all this we want to contribute to making educational practices visible, but above all to promote research that addresses the ethical challenges of the future, the construction of historical awareness and democratic citizenship. We cannot tackle this task without systematically reflecting and investigating how and why conflicting pasts are addressed in the classroom. Teachers and students debate in this context, between pedagogical and political problems, but also affective reactions, frustrations and confusions that we need to know to advance in didactic knowledge.

Conference web stite

Program

#edusocmemoria

Book Cover Social Studies in Latin America

New book: Social Studies in Latin America: Critical Perspectives from the Global South

I’m very pleased to announce the publication of Social Studies in Latin America: Critical Perspectives from the Global South. Published by Routledge and co-edited by Sebastián Plá and me, this the first book in a new series titled Social Studies and Citizenship Education in the Global South.

Social Studies in Latin America offers a path forward, for the growing collaboration in social studies education between Global North and South educators, practitioners, and researchers. In this volume, leading critical social studies education researchers from Latin America explore the constant presence of colonialism, capitalism, patriarchy, and state violence.  Chapter contributors represent a large part of the continent, and offer perspectives on a wide range of topics, including; recent history and memory, cultural dimensions of social studies education, and comparative studies among Latin American countries.

By bringing together this critical work in one volume, the book fosters conversation across geographic regions to transcend the national contexts for which these analyses are generally produced. This collection provides insights into issues of curriculum, teaching, teacher education and research in the region and will be of interest to readers both familiar with and new to research on social studies, history, citizenship, and geography education in Latin America.

Citation:

Plá, S., & Ross, E. W. (Eds.). (2023). Social studies education in Latin America: Critical perspectives from the Global South. Routledge. (Published August 30, 2022)

Reviews

Social Studies Education in Latin America is an achievement and an opportunity to facilitate a better exchange of ideas and more equal academic discussion. Written by leading researchers in Latin America and edited by key authorities in the field, it opens access to Latin American social studies research in their own words. The book is an essential read for social studies academics and practitioners who are open to being challenged and engaging in more ethical constructions of knowledge.

Edda Sant, Reader in Education, Manchester Metropolitan University, UK

There is an essential uniqueness toSocial Studies Education in Latin America that could truly benefit social studies education in North America. We are in urgent need of a global len s and vital dialogue that examines the political, economic, and social histories inherent to Central and South America. Like none before, this book will bring to our classrooms perspectives on power and a wonderful opportunity to shift our practices.

Cinthia Salinas, Ruben E. Hinojosa Regents Professor in Education, University of Texas at Austin, USA

The collection of critical research on social studies in Latin America, in dialogue with global issues, makes Social Studies Education in Latin America an indispensable contribution to the renewal of critical social studies education.

Antoni Santisteban Fernández, Professor & Director of the Department of Didactics of Language and Literature, and Social Sciences, Autonomous University of Barcelona, Spain

Social Studies Education in Latin America offers readers vital insights into critical teaching and learning. The chapters call upon educators to account for the classed, gendered, and racialized nature of systems born in Empire and inequality and for the capacities of communities to learn themselves into a more just co-existence.

Kent den Heyer, Professor, Department of Secondary Education, University of Alberta, Canada

Language has become a barrier to knowledge and exchange between research carried out in countries whose language is of Latin origin, in our case Spanish and Portuguese. It is important to promote and discuss the knowledge created in Latin America, which makes Social Studies Education in Latin America relevant.

Ángel Díaz-Barriga, Institute for Research on the University and Education, National Autonomous University of Mexico, Mexico

Table of Contents

Preface

1. The New Social Studies Research in Latin America: An Introduction
Sebastián Plá & E. Wayne Ross

2. Educational Trajectories in an Adverse Political Context: The Social Sciences and History in the Colombian School
Sandra Patricia Rodríguez Ávila

3. Education, History, and Memory in the Chilean School: A Perspective on Chile’s Recent History from the Narratives of High School Students
Fabián González Calderón & Graciela Rubio Soto

4. Interculturalism in the Training of History Teachers: Persistence of the Disciplinary Code
Omar Turra Díaz & Juan Salcedo-Parada

5. Decolonial Pedagogy: Intersections and Resistances of Memory and History, in Mapuche Communities of Southern Chile
Carolina Huenchullán Arrué

6. Afrodescendant in Latin America and Social Studies: A Perspective from Mexico
Gabriela Iturralde Nieto

7. When Gender and Sexuality Intersect with History Teaching: Brazil is Burning
Fernando Seffner

8. Crossroads of History Teaching and Learning and Political Science in Latin America: TheResidenteProject
Luis Fernando Cerri

9. Disciplinary Codex in History Education
María Paula González

10. On the History We Teach Every Day: Historics, Historiography and Philosophy of History
Ana Zavala

11. The Critical Reading of the Southern Geographical Reality: The Challenge of School Geography
José Armando Santiago Rivera

12. The Panorama of Social Studies in Latin America Curricula
Sebastián Plá

Insurgent Social Studies

 

Insurgent Social Studies: Scholar-Educators Disrupting Erasure and Marginality has just been published by Myers Education Press.

The collection brings together contributions from a “new(er)” generation of social studies scholar-educators who take as one of their starting points a social studies curriculum that is “designed to erase or otherwise marginalize voices, bodies, and experiences not accepted by or created for the benefit of white supremacist society.”

The project was inspired by Wayne Au’s conception of pedagogy of insurgency. Au describes this kind of pedagogy as requiring:

  • Bravery and risk, as rebellious educators take the step of fighting back against social and educational injustice in public and visible ways.
  • Allies, accomplices, and solidarity, as educators and community members come together across different identities in order to build a more broad-based and effective movement for educational justice. This, in turn, also helps to mitigate risk.
  • Understanding organizing, protest, and demonstrations as a valuable and worthwhile form of pedagogy and curriculum in itself.
  • Using critical analyses of power as a central approach for teaching and learning about social and educational injustice.
  • Developing a curriculum of insurgency for educators, students, and the community to engage in critical analyses of power in schools and society.
  • Embracing schools as sites of both oppression and liberation, and in the process also reimagining the role that schools can play in broader social change.
  • Connecting to broader social movements, as educators, students, and community see and understand that their own struggles for justice and liberation are part of broader, historic traditions in the fight for change.

The editors, Natasha Hakimali Merchant, Sarah B. Shear and Wayne Au, argue that “taken as a whole, a pedagogy of insurgency seeks to understand and at least partially explain the ways that teachers have the power – through pedagogy, curriculum, and community activism – to actively resist injustice while also working towards a more radically just world.

This is a path-breaking work in social studies education and anyone who is engaged and the political/pedagogical struggles for social justice in schools and the larger society will benefit from reading this collection.

I want to thank the editor for inviting me to write a brief Afterword.

Table of Contents

Introduction – We Won’t Wait Any Longer: An Introduction and Invitation to Insurgency for Social Studies
Natasha Hakimali Merchant, Sarah B. Shear, and Wayne Au

1. Insurgence Must Be Red: Connecting Indigenous Studies and Social Studies Education for Anticolonial Praxis
The Turtle Island Social Studies Collective

2. Solidarity Is a Verb: What the Black Lives Matter Movement Can Teach Social Studies About the Intersectional Fight Against Anti-Black Racism
Tiffany Mitchell Patterson

3. The Audacity of Equality: Disrupting the Distortion of Asian America in Social Studies
Noreen Naseem Rodríguez and Esther June Kim

4. “Existence Is Resistance”: Palestine and Palestinians in Social Studies Education
Hanadi Shatara

5. Insurgente: A Familia in Conversation About Latinxs Voices in the Field of Social Studies
La Familia Aponte-Safe Tirado Díaz Beltrán Ender Busey Christ

6. Unsatisfied: The Conceptual Terrain of De-Essentializing Islam in Social Studies
Natasha Hakimali Merchant

7. Queer Worlding as Historical Inquiry for Insurgent Freedom-Dreaming
Tadashi Dozono

8. Democracy Is Interdisciplinary: The Case for Radical Civic Innovation Across Content Areas
Antero Garcia, Nicole Mirra, and Mark Gomez

9. Cultural Bombs and Dangerous Classes: Social Studies Education as State Apparatus in the War on Terror
Jennice McCafferty-Wright

10. Whiteness and White Responsibility in Social Studies
Andrea M. Hawkman

Afterword – Insurgent Social Studies and Dangerous Citizenship
E. Wayne Ross