Lisa J. Cary

Unexpected Stories: Life History and the Limits of Representation

The author first used life history as a research method in her master of education thesis at a Canadian university. She now believes that the issues and questions that arose from that experience were mired in a critical perspective that reflected realist assumptions. Increasing dissatisfaction with her efforts to work through the life history data gathered in 1995 has led her to problematize the methodological implications of studying research participants’ lives this way. Main points discussed include questions and issues with voice and collaborative methodologies, the epistemological assumptions that frame life history research, and a discussion of victory narratives within the redemptive culture of the human and social sciences. And, just what do we do with “unexpected stories”?

The Refusals of Citizenship: Normalizing Practices in Social Educational Discourses

Abstract The foundational assumptions of the framing discourses in social education have often been assumed to be neutral and natural. Utilizing a poststructural perspective in the analysis of the foundations of teacher education reform and multicultural education discourses this paper highlights the dangers of uninterrogated normalizing practices in social education. These discursive practices are illustrative of reductionist tendencies and governing mentalities that exclude through gendered and raced discourses. This reduction includes the legitimized (dominant) construction of the subject position of “good” teacher, citizen, and student. Talking differently about the challenges of critical and transformative efforts in social education suggests spaces for a more adequate knowing that complicates our assumptions of citizenship within social education by theorizing about the refusals of citizenship.

The Professional Development School Model: Unpacking Knowledge.

In response to Cochran‐Smith and Lytles (1998) call for Other ways of researching and thinking about educational research and the recent call by the US Secretary of Education to reform ‘teacher‐training’ programs (Schoicet 2002), this article presents a research study focusing on a reform effort in teacher education. The study moved beyond the ‘findings’ of a critical discourse analysis of the foundational humanist assumptions of the Professional Development School (PDS) model as manifested at a large mid‐west research university. The study uses an analysis of the ‘data/findings’ from Other theoretical perspectives. Using critical discourse analysis of interviews, archival texts and research texts, the contradictions, interruptions and technologies of power emerged. Data from this contested site highlighted multiple discourses concerning social education, educational reform, professionalization, and progress. The results revealed the historical and political discourses that inter and enclose the PDS model, such as reductive gendered notions of the ‘professional’, ‘good teaching’ and the valorization of ‘practice’. This article presents three different ways of analyzing the PDS data: as a psychoanalytic object of desire (Britzman 1998); as a dereferentialized term (Readings 1996); and a floating signifier (Anderson 1998). Thus, it presents ways of rethinking knowledge and power in leadership in education (Lincoln 1998, Popkewitz 1998a, Rapp 2002).

Cinematic Landscapes of Teaching: Lessons from a Narrative of Classic Film.

Abstract The purpose of this inquiry was to utilize the concept of “landscapes of teaching” in the analysis of a classic film about a venerated teacher, Goodbye, Mr. Chips (1939). First, the aim of the analysis is to provide insights into teacher development and to discuss the sacred and mystical dimensions of teaching (Craig, 1995). Second, the analysis of teaching as a profession portrayed in this vintage film and the role of teachers as guardians of a societys culture provides insights about the enduring value of the teaching profession. Considering the current criticism of teachers and teacher educators, this film analysis and discussion serves as a much needed and inspiring reminder of our role and responsibilities. The utilization of the work of Connelly and Clandinins (1996) notion of “landscapes” and of the suggested use of a teaching strategy of the film analysis offers a fine complement to the lecture approach often used in teacher education as well as a tool for those of us who use constructivist approaches.

Complicating the Case for Teacher Education: Asking Different Questions.

Abstract The purpose of this case study was to analyze the way the Professional Development School (PDS) model was institutionalized at a large research university in the mid-west. Data was gathered through interviews with key players (Professors, Administrators and Master teachers), document analysis and critical discourse analysis of the surrounding texts. Texts included research produced through the PDS, foundational literature such as Holmes Group documents and scholarly literature about PDS. This article presents the themes and foundational concepts that emerged from the data and suggests a number of interesting conclusions. Overall, it is clear that PDS is a very complicated reform model and that there is a tendency to valorize institutional efforts and results. Also, the origin of the reform model indicates a top-down implementation that involves an exclusivist gendered model of professionalization and suggests that only ‘good teachers’ were invited and that failure occurred but was not well documented.

Australian citizenship in interesting times:curriculum, culture and immigrants as contested terrain

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to understand, more deeply, what the field of citizenship education stands for, in both theory and practice, historically and currently, and especially, in relation to the new Australian Curriculum: Civics and Citizenship. The authors have drawn on the backgrounds in social studies/social education, multicultural education, democracy education and Indigenous studies, in order to more deeply and profoundly understand “civics and citizenship education” and what it represents today in Australia. Design/methodology/approach – Methodologically, the authors see epistemological spaces as discursive productions from post-structural/post-modern and critical perspectives. These positions draw upon the notion of discourse as an absent power that can validate/legitimize vs negate/de-legitimize. The authors employ a meta-level analysis that historicizes the spaces made possible/impossible for those in deviant subject positions through a critique of the current literature juxtapos...

Making Charter School Promises: What's Wrong with Home and Hope?

Abstract In 2002 I began a study of a charter school aimed at ‘Push-Out Recovery’ for high school students in Central Texas. The ethnographic study focused on an alterriative education setting, a Charter School, called Edge Works (pseudonym). The study was conducted over approximately 12–18 months at the Charter School. The Charter School provided educational services for young people 16–20 who wanted to get their GED and/or their high school certificate and there were 4 administrators, 16 teachers, and between 250–300 students. When I began this study I had hoped to hear the stories of the students regarding their experiences in the public school system. In short, I went looking for stories of exclusion. Instead, I found stories of success and redemption (Cary, 2001, Popkewitz, 1998).

Performing teaching, citizenship and criticality

In this chapter, we explore our work as teacher educators who examine the philosophies, meanings and enactments of citizenship in our personal and professional lives and as members of the various communities we inhabit. We do this autoethnographically via various critical analytical lenses in an attempt to self-reflect in a way that helps us to connect more deeply with our university students as we investigate the interconnected and power- and meaning-laden concepts of citizenship, belonging, identity, oppression and empowerment. We see epistemological spaces as discursive productions from post-structural/post-modern and critical perspectives. These positions draw upon the notion of discourse as an absent power that can validate/legitimize or negate/de-legitimize. We present and critique the current literature and juxtapose this with a presentation and analysis of three different “citizenship identity” ethnographic vignettes in an attempt to explore the realms of epistemology through the study of exclusion/inclusion. Specifically, the authors present snippets of their own narrative migration stories, in two instances, and an incident of cross-border identity exploration, in another.

Strategic Confrontation: Within and Against Conservative Refusals

Believe it or not, I am much more subtle in my pedagogical work these days. I have spent over a decade teaching in higher education around the topic of social justice and the social construction of knowledge in the total institution of education. One of my first publications came out of that topic as I discussed the refusals or exclusions of citizenship in Social Education (2001). It was rather oppositional work. Now I am trying to work out how to think differently regarding ‘refusals’ with respect to Critical Pedagogy. In this chapter I will give a brief outline of my theoretical journey and share some painful insights into a Pedagogy of Strategic Confrontation in conservative spaces!