Cathryn Teasley

Ambiguous Legacy: Instituting Student Diversity at a Spanish Secondary School

Critical ethnographic inquiry guides this examination of the ways in which a group of experienced teachers at an urban secondary school in Spain have responded to a series of new regulations of their practice in the context of markedly increased student diversity at the school. The analysis centers on the ideological stances represented and produced through the educators’ discourse and actions and on the implications for the education of the school’s Roma/Gypsy students as members of possibly the most disenfranchised ethnic group of Spain. The article concludes with the exploration of some alternative means, especially through action research, for producing professional commitments that are more conducive to socially just and culturally responsive educational processes.

The Culture of Discourse on Educational Reform in Spain.

Where the education of subaltern multicultural student collectives is concerned, the case of contemporary developments in the discourse of reform in Spain is particularly poignant. A critical engagement with that discourse and its greater sociocultural context reveals some of the subtle ways in which cultural alterity comes to be represented. And because the implications for immigrant and Gypsy/Roma groups are serious and complex, such representations can and must be challenged on multiple fronts, some of which are pursued in this essay. Before embarking on that task, however, it should be pointed out that the main focus here is on the production of policy discourse as opposed to the actual pedagogies occurring in schools. This focus has been chosen even as it becomes clear that, in Western educational systems, inequality persists despite the ebb and flow of most ‘‘top-down’’ reform efforts—as researchers from analytical camps both radical (Apple, 1996; Martı́nez Bonafé, 1998) and postmodern (Popkewitz, 1991; Varela & Álvarez Urı́a, 1991) have observed. Given this reality, why then engage the discursive realm of reforms? Official narratives on education are called into question here for the same reason that the gap between theory and practice must be bridged, for, policy discourse—as a cultural construct—is in fact generated at various points along the theorypractice continuum. But the power it exerts on educational phenomena is highly relative and heavily conditioned along the way. In this Foucauldian sense, official pedagogical knowledge, as relayed through the discourse of reform, is not only historically contingent, but coexists and competes with other regimes of truth. These include ‘‘common sense’’ versions of professional knowledge, or ‘‘the wisdom of experience’’ in teaching (Popkewitz, 1998), as well as teachers’ reliance on the security of routine and The Review of Education, Pedagogy, and Cultural Studies, 26:249–275, 2004 Copyright # Taylor & Francis Inc. ISSN: 1071-4413 print DOI: 10.1080/10714410490905302

Postcolonial Perspective, Social Integration and Cultural Diversity vis-à-vis Neoliberal Policies and Practices in Galizan Schooling

The authors base this article on findings from two qualitative studies conducted in Galiza (northwest Spain), in the province of A Coruña: an action research project in an early childhood education classroom; and a composite of ethnographic enquiries focusing on secondary education and vocational training programmes. Both studies sought to contribute to a fundamental transformation of schooling toward a more just, integrative and democratic intercultural institution. This effort includes denouncing the processes of social exclusion operating in those contexts, which are closely related to (neo)colonial and neoliberal practices.

Evolving Criticality for a Transnational Public Pedagogy

Having fortunately discoered Joe L. Kincheloe’s work early in my teaching career, I learned to deconstruct sooner rather than later certain dominant orientations towards education that had informed my professional preparation. Joe’s writings quickly became a faithful companion in my evolving quest to establish the link between the messages of critical pedagogy and transformative teaching practice in diverse educational contexts—such as those within which I worked, first in California and then in Spain. One of the most important messages I gleaned from Joe’s books and articles was the need for educators to constantly question authority by asking ourselves, our students, and the school communities we serve: Whose interests does the curriculum actually serve? Whose interests does it least serve, leave out, or even harm, and why? And a related, crucial question: How might we make our pedagogies “go public,” in the sense of serving the needs of the many, not the few, in a globalizing world?