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eBook details
- Title: Unsafe Waters, Stolen Sisters, And Social Studies: Troubling Democracy and the Meta-Narrative of Universal Citizenship (Viewpoint Essay)
- Author : Teacher Education Quarterly
- Release Date : January 01, 2009
- Genre: Education,Books,Professional & Technical,
- Pages : * pages
- Size : 243 KB
Description
There is a propensity, when considering the meaning(s) of citizenship, to think in terms of universality and equality rather than difference and inequity (Arnot, 2006; Hall, 2000). In a North American context, citizenship often operates as a taken for granted status with the requisite rights and responsibilities associated with membership in a nation. In education, how citizenship is embedded in curricular discourses and how it is taken up by both teachers and students is influenced by a discourse of universality (Miller, 2000). Most often, citizenship is linked to democracy and informed by an overwhelming acceptance that democracy does indeed exist. Social studies, perhaps more than any other subject, is complicit in advancing this commonsense understanding of citizenship and democracy, and it is one that requires disruption to its very core. But where do we situate this disruption given the proclivity for standardization, accountability, and content coverage that is pervasive in social studies education? And where might we situate this disruption given the preoccupation of many educators with technique rather than interrogation? In this discussion I attempt to do two things. First in questioning what is democratic about our (and here I am referring to Canada and the United States) current state of "democracy," I attempt to dispel (as I have previously--see for example Tupper, 2005; Tupper, 2006; Tupper, 2007 ) the veracity of citizenship as universal (essentialist notions of universal citizenship) that seems to permeate social studies curriculum documents, glossing over or rendering non-existent, historical and contemporary realities of individuals who have not experienced citizenship in equitable and just ways. This is what I refer to as the meta-narrative of universal citizenship contingent upon the 'truth' rather than the falsity of democracy, the 'truth' rather than the falsity of equality. Second, I argue that if we hope to move toward a more genuinely democratic reality in North America, we need to consider the role that teacher education can play, the principles and practices that guide our teacher education programs and how we might work with our students to interrogate their very understandings of citizenship and democracy, the cornerstones of what many believe education to be serving. 'Universal' citizenship must always be used as a category of analysis not only in social studies classrooms, but in teacher education contexts as well, because as Cherryholmes (2006) reminds us, "teachers choose a way of life for themselves and their students when they plan and teach" (p.11).
 "Unsafe Waters, Stolen Sisters, And Social Studies: Troubling Democracy and the Meta-Narrative of Universal Citizenship (Viewpoint Essay)" by Teacher Education Quarterly # Book PDF Kindle ePub Free){kind=link}