Nigeria as a nation came into being in the year 1914 through the amalgamation of the Southern and Northern Protectorates by Sir Frederick Lugard. After this amalgamation, and prior to independence, there was no education policy clearly defined by the colonial government; instead, several educational ordinances were promulgated. However, the 1920 Phelps-Stokes Commission awakened the colonial government to the need for improvement. The 1951 regionalisation of education laws that later emerged and their implementation also focused on mass literacy and theoretical education. The exposure to higher education by few Nigerians, however, led to the agitation for independence, which was eventually granted on October 1, 1960. The independence invested Nigerians with the right to take their destiny into their own hands, including the formulation of education policies for the total emancipation of the citizenry. Hence, the 6-3-3-4 system emerged, and the first National Policy on Education (NPE) was officially published in 1977. Unfortunately, the lack of proper implementation of these education policies has continued to «de-emancipate» the citizens of Nigeria. Although the present administration is encouraging patronage of ‘Made in Nigeria’ goods, much still needs to be done to improve education policies, especially in the conceptual framework of functional education. This research is historical, and a historical method was therefore adopted, using both primary and secondary sources of information. Several recommendations are made, including that there is the need for a total overhaul of the Nigeria education system to accommodate effective implementation of policies and monitoring mechanisms for more dynamic and functional education.

Global history responds both to the overcoming of borders through transnational studies and to the possibility of avoiding visions biased toward Western civilization that reduce the complexity of the problems of historical foundation. In this special issue, devoted to the study in historical perspective of the relationship among elites, society and education, we claim that global history has not to neglect the local to the extent that it can take as reference specific aspects of well-defined contexts widens them at national, continental or transoceanic level. Case studies are also included in order to analyze the actions of historical agents whose behavior also responds to global phenomena. The special issue constains two central strands: a) Education and processes of civilization of the Basque and Navarrese elites in the Spanish monarchy (XVIII - XIX) b) Transnational challenges of Jesuit education: Italian accommodation - British adaptation - European integration (XVIII / XIX - XX). Furthermore, two articles dealing with differentiated historiographical perspectives and diverse contexts have been included to delve into the theme of elites and education.

Annie Besant was an Irish political activist, free-thinker and Fabian socialist. After embracing Theosophy under the tutelage of Helena Petrovna Blavatsky, a Russian mystic, Besant embarked on her mission of propagating theosophical ideals, and reached the shores of India in 1893. However, in India Hinduism fascinated her to such an extent that she devoted herself to promoting Hinduism. She toured the length and breadth of India, and lectured intensely on the lofty ideals of Hinduism. However, Besant was of the opinion that absence of religious education in government schools and colleges and teaching of Christianity in missionary educational institutions was responsible for religious neutrality and scepticism among Hindu youth, and hence the fallen state of Hinduism. To remedy this state, she emphasised the need for its revival, and propagated the idea that religious education of Hindu youths should become an integral part of their education. In order to concretise these ideas, Besant established a college and school for the religious education of Hindu youth in the holy city of Benares, in the then North Western Provinces of British India, in 1898. Besant is widely known in India for her political activities as founder of Home Rule Movement and as the first women President of Indian National Congress, the chief political party involved in the struggle for national freedom. Although Besant’s political career in India has been extensively researched, little is known about her educational ideas and activities. This paper analyses Besant’s ideas on education, and show how, rather than being a promoter of modernity, she supported, upheld and institutionalised caste hierarchy.

Since their re-establishment in the early decades of the nineteenth century the Jesuits have successfully maintained a position at the pinnacle of Catholic elite education. In this article I propose to discuss Irish education in the context of global trends in cosmopolitan and elite forms of education. All across Europe we find the Jesuits competing for regional elites and sub elites in this period, and the Irish Jesuits are part of this transnational pattern. I will then focus on the two most important nineteenth century foundations –Tullabeg (1818-86) and Clongowes (1814-)– as the exemplary «elite» Jesuit boarding schools in Ireland. I will then briefly discuss two less socially ascendant but nevertheless important day schools, Belvedere College (1841-) and Gonzaga (1899-), both in Dublin. The educational product was intentionally politically muted, informed by a desire for Catholic advancement in all aspects of life, including imperial service, religious leadership, gaining a foothold in the prestigious professions, and –where possible– advocating for general Catholic advancement. As with Jesuit education elsewhere in this period it was an explicitly elitist project at the beginning of the nineteenth century, with greater market segmentation evident later in the century with the advent of the prestigious urban day-schools.

This study aims to analyse, from a descriptive perspective, the evolution in publication thematics, the most relevant audits, and the typology of published articles in the Revista de la Institucion Teresiana , between 1944 and 1963. The Institucion Teresiana was a Catholic association founded in 1911 by the priest Pedro Poveda, which in its early days used the bulletin, and later the journal, as a method of communication among the Academies spread throughout the Spanish territory. A total 228 editions, 2,067 articles and 111 authors were included in this analysis, which focused in particular on the publications by women or aimed at the role of women in the society of time. This sheds light on the changes in the Spanish society, mainly in the field of women’s education, over the 19 years covered by this research, despite the fact that, belonging to a religious institution, the journal was not ostensibly devoted to supporting education for women.

During the 18 th century, the Bourbon dynasty promoted and created an array of educational institutions that would serve its own reformist project by training its military and political agents. This paper approaches this educational system through four of its most important centres: the Naval Officer’s Royal Academy, the Noble’s Royal Seminary, the Royal Academy of Artillery and the Royal Patriotic Seminary of Vergara. The prosopographical analysis of the pupils is the empirical foundation and the core of our work. For the sake of detail, we focus on the Basque and Navarrese students that attended these institutions, who were part of a broader elite closely linked to the Spanish state-building process. Many of the region’s most important families, the ones controlling the regional political space, sent their children to these academies while they took important careers in the imperial political structures. Moreover, our work shows these families’ role in transmitting reformist ideas in their local communities. Therefore, our approach stresses the need to analyse education not in an isolated way, but in close relation with the other elements of the system.

This article discusses the changes in the role and function of Japanese schools in Brazil before and after WWII vis-a-vis the host country’s social and political environment, with emphasis on the pressure from nationalism on Japanese immigrants’ education exerted by the Vargas administration. The impact of the policy was both significant and turbulent. It had become one of the main causes of the drastic changes in the national identity and character of Japanese primary schools after the Pacific War, with tragic consequences for the Japanese immigrants. Before WWII, Japanese immigrants had gradually advanced their status from contracted labourers to independent farmers, forming Japanese colonias (settlements) on government-allocated uncultivated land. They were eager to give their children elementary level education, and in remote areas, they had no choice but to provide this education principally in the Japanese language. These schools therefore became targets of the anti-Japanese movement that began in the 1920s, peaked in the 1930’s, and was phased out in the 1940s. Just before WWII, however, President Getulio Vargas developed a nationalistic policy which encompassed education; foreign schools were oppressed, and in 1938, most Japanese primary schools were closed. In addition, there was a ban on holding meetings and public gatherings, and Japanese newspapers were abolished. This was a traumatic situation that made Japanese-Brazilians pessimistic about the future, and their despair pushed them closer to supporting the goals of their Japanese homeland. The conflict between Brazilian and Japanese nationalism took place in primary education, which saw a tragic confrontation among immigrant groups, and resulted in a radical change of public opinion, as well as in the primary schools themselves.

Learning languages is a fundamental part of today’s education. Was it so in the past? In this paper, we try to present a context to better understand language learning among certain Basque elites during the Early Modern period in Spain. These educational dynamics will be examined within a broader European and Hispanic milieu, with a perspective inspired by the Social History of Language. As a first approach to the topic, the aim of this study will be to examine the issue within its own terms, providing a context proposal that may help to avoid ongoing controversies and could foster further studies on the linguistic education of Basque elites or other sectors of society in Early Modern times. Bearing this objective in mind, we will sketch different aspects that, although may seem disconnected with each other, are linked by this general background. Testimonies of linguistic shifts, the social meaning of different accents, the identity of the creators of the Language Academies, some regional language uses in written or literary texts and, particularly some educative texts in Basque language will be analysed. Content: 1. Introduction: for a diachronic approach to (linguistic) education. 2. Lingua regalis: the adoption of Castilian language in the Hispanic Monarchy. 3. Who speaks what language? The adoption of Spanish by the peripheral elites. 4. Conclusions.

The exile of Spanish jesuits (1767-1815) produced several cultural, social and economic effects on the Italian society. Some Iberian, American and Philippine fathers began to be appreciated by the Italian elites , especially in the North Center region of Italy: such a new period started since 1773, when Clement XIV suppressed the Society of Jesus. They tried to enter the education sphere, mainly as private tutors of aristocratic and patrician young scions. This success originated from numerous reasons. First of all, they offered a education which joined a traditional outlook with a modern one, linked with Enlightenment culture; in other words, their «educational supply» met a specific «demand» coming from the italian elites . In addition, to be foreigners gave a cosmopolitan dimension to their teaching. At last, several Spanish Jesuits who cohabited with or attended the italian aristocracy ’ s houses often held (or shared out) a plurality of offices: they were not only tutors, but also librarians, secretaries, administrators and spiritual directors, so much so that some of them complained to be exploited by their employers.

The reforms in recruiting policies within the ruling elites that the Bourbons carried out in the 18th century, accomplished through the launching of new strategies in the selection and formative systems, contributed to the transformation of the educational procedures followed by those families seeking to be part of the new political and military establishment. In this essay, I summarize the educational trajectories of the Basque and Navarrese elite families that participated intensively in this changing processes. In the first place, in this essay I explore the social foundation of the educational system: the contrast between belonging and globalization; and the social networks that guaranteed the educational trajectories of these families, all of it in global scale. Next, I disclose the different stages and levels that conformed the education of these elites: the teaching of Spanish and the first writing lessons; the secondary education in schools and Latin or grammar schools; and the partial decline of the university system after the initiation of these new recruiting policies that the Bourbons have sponsored, evidence of which is the prominence attained by institutions such as the royal seminaries, the military academies and the «Secretarias del Despacho». This part of the essay is completed with a study on how these families would seek to furnish their sons and daughters with a formation in good manners, usually by enrolling them in the royal seminaries or schooling them in France. In conclusion, I believe that these essay offers a revealing insight into the creation of a new elite of cosmopolitan, civilized and reformist enlightened families. But at the same time, it also exposes the cultural breach between these new «civilized» elites and those who remained loyal to the traditional paradigm.