Critical Citizenship Education Research Articles

Investigating critical citizenship education within primary school art curriculum

Background: Visual art at school can create a learning environment where learners can learn, reflect and express opinions on critical citizenship and social justice issues as an informal modality that draws on different skills and allows for expression of thoughts and ideas in a medium other than words and numbers. A relevant issue in South Africa is the need to create a sense of citizenship to help South Africans to engage with and reflect on the country’s complex colonial and apartheid history.Aim: The aim of this study was to engage primary school learners in critical citizenship and social justice education to determine how this can deepen their conceptions and to communicate these through an art project.Setting: A primary school in the Western Cape.Methods: This participatory action research (PAR) study was designed for learners to engage with critical citizenship through project-based learning at a primary school in Cape Town, South Africa. Learners investigated critical citizenship by creating folktales as a narrative for their artwork.Results: Primary school learners’ conceptions of citizenship progressed from a general understanding of what citizenship means during the start of the PAR to a much deeper and personal experience of belonging, caring and connecting at the end of the PAR. The use of folktales, digital storytelling and visual art was effective in creating a message about citizenship that the learners practically experienced and valued.Conclusion: The creative process and artistic expression deepened the learners’ understanding and engagement of critical citizenship and social justice. The reflections on the individuals’ and the group’s learning experiences revealed that critical citizenship education could influence learners’ conceptions and interpretations of folktales with a socio-political message.Contribution: This research contributes to critical citizenship education and curriculum development.

The Role of Intangible Heritage in Critical Citizenship Education: An Action Research Case Study with Student Primary Education Teachers

Heritage plays a significant role in understanding historical societies, particularly intangible heritage, as a legacy kept “alive” solely by the action of communities. Therefore, it holds great education potential in the context of critical citizenship education. This action research aims to investigate the perceptions of primary education teachers about intangible heritage and its didactic potential in critical citizenship education. In addition, this paper analyses the changes and continuities that occur in student teachers’ perceptions after carrying out a didactic project focused on relevant social problems linked to the Way of Saint James. This case study is proposed for primary teachers in initial training at the University of A Coruña (Galicia, Spain). The study was conducted during three academic years (2020–2023), with the participation of 160 student teachers. The questionnaire, the interview, and the focus group were used as research instruments. Students learned to give more importance to understanding intangible heritage and reconsidered it as an educational resource for critical citizenship education. However, many aspects of a traditional heritage education remain, where what matters is to respect and care for what is inherited without questioning its current value or its suitability for transmission to future generations.

National curricula and citizenship education in populist times. The cases of Brazil and Spain

ABSTRACT Despite increasing attention to citizenship education since the turn of the 21st century, the recent spread of authoritarian populism worldwide has raised relatively little attention in educational policy and research. As a result, the possibilities and limitations that national curricula offer to educators to deal with this phenomenon are still rather uncertain. In this article, we develop an analytical framework based on the key features of authoritarian populism and critical citizenship education to compare the elements and scope for addressing populism in the national curricula of Brazil and Spain, two countries where national populism is particularly widespread. This paper examines the extent to which national curricula in these countries include goals and content that enable teachers to address the complexities of this phenomenon ranging from political polarisation through to the exaltation of national identities.

Primary students' learning about citizenship through data science.

Much of the mathematics that children experience in school neglect the skills increasingly needed for citizenship, particularly the power of complex data to investigate and make sense of the world. We draw on the relatively new field of data science as a multi-disciplinary approach to investigate problems through analysis of massive, non-standard, incongruous and/or messy data. Our exploratory qualitative study had as its research question: What can children learn about citizenship when they engage with data science? The case study in this paper illustrated ways that children's learning about citizenship were enriched through an age-appropriate data science investigation. The study analysed classroom video from a Year 4 classroom (aged 9-10) over six lessons that integrated curricula in digital technologies, health, and mathematics. In these lessons, the children generated and analysed non-standard data and debated social, well-being and privacy issues as they considered their activities in cyberspace. The video data were analysed using a framework based on critical citizenship education literature that examined dimensions of power, collective engagement, individual responsibility and action. Three key findings emerged. First, the case study highlighted skills in citizenship education developed through data science, positioning children as agents and advocates. Second, the study showed how a complex data investigation in citizenship education was achievable with primary children through meaningful curriculum integration. This is important given that problems that citizens address are typically interdisciplinary. Finally, the findings revealed a gap between data science skills and those developed in the mathematics curriculum, and recommend ways that the maths curriculum could be updated.

Do words matter?: Using inquiry and the politics of naming to promote critical global citizenship education

Purpose US president Donald J. Trump has referred to the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) as the “Chinese” virus. Trump's choice of terms (i.e. naming) provides an illustrative entry point concerning the politics of naming and how analysis of language used within historical and political contexts can be used to engage students with global education principles.Design/methodology/approach This work aims to extend Hanvey's (1976) notion of perspective consciousness to include critical elements (e.g. Andreotti, 2014) that aim to uncover power structures that ultimately shape worldviews and manifest in communicative signs/signals (e.g. language). Utilizing Dewey's invocation of language as the “tool of tools,” the authors provide a series of three classroom-ready inquiries that serve to foster critical global citizenship education.Findings Three classroom-ready inquiries informed by the inquiry design model are presented along with resources needed to teach them.Originality/value Research has suggested the concept “global” is understood by much of the world as an instrument of US hegemony that commonly normalizes Western supremacy myths (see Andreotti, 2014; Myers, 2006). Running parallel with these concerns are research findings that suggest practitioner avoidance of global citizenship education (see Cogan and Grossman, 2009; Merryfield and Kasai, 2010; Zong, 2009). With these concerns in mind, this work provides teachers with accessible tools that promote critical notions of global citizenship education in the classroom.

Young people confronting the challenge of reading and interpreting a digital world

Critical citizenship education must consider the global and digital context in which we live. Digital media and global processes have a decisive influence on people’s daily lives. However, digital literacy programs rarely go beyond teaching technological skills. Similarly, critical thinking approaches to education focus on developing cognitive skills, omitting the weight of values and emotions in decision making. This research analyses Spanish secondary school students’ narratives and reflections about two publications on Twitter that present biased information to encourage undemocratic attitudes. The results show that most students are far from being critical of the information they read on the internet, and they easily fall into the trap of defending undemocratic discourses.

From "knowing" to "not knowing": Critical global citizenship education for engineering partnerships

This article was part of a larger study that explored community participants’ perspectives in [Municipality, Country] about the long-term global service learning (GSL) partnership with [Name of university] University’s College of Engineering (Author, year). This article explores the question: From the community participants’ perspectives, what are their educational goals for the university engineering students in this partnership? While I intentionally centered this article on the community participants’ perspectives, I also explored areas of alignment and areas of difference between the different stakeholder groups’ perspectives about learning and knowledge. Although global citizenship surfaced in interviews with both community and university participants, the community participant perspectives push farther than the university administrators/ faculty and call for critical global citizenship education (Andreotti, 2006).

Global citizenship education as bounded self-formation in contemporary higher education internationalisation projects

ABSTRACT This paper explores the progressive possibilities of global citizenship education (GCE) and higher education internationalisation in the current milieu that is defined by the interwoven dominance of globalisation, neoliberalism, and English. Since current trends augur shifts in higher education internationalisation growth to nonWestern and nonAnglophone countries, the study focuses on a university in Japan where both GCE and internationalisation are explicitly promoted. Taking an approach based in critical educational studies and guided by scholarship on contemporary citizen formation, it investigates the complex interplay of agency and structure through student self-narratives regarding their own global citizen identity development. The paper argues that over time these students (re)constructed meanings and identities around the concept of global citizenship through myriad pathways in a multidirectional feedback loop that interconnected their self-identity, feelings, aspirations/desires, imaginations, actions, and experiences. After revealing specific factors that limited and facilitated this process of self-formation, and highlighting the paramount role of imagination, the paper concludes by asserting the viability of realizing global community and global citizenship through strategically targeted educational initiatives. This work provides both pragmatic guidance and reasoned optimism for scholars, policymakers, and practitioners who champion the projects of critical global citizenship education and critical higher education internationalisation.

English

In South Africa the task of decolonising the curriculum in higher education institutions falls upon researchers and lecturers. Within the case study of the Visual Communication Design curriculum at Stellenbosch University we noticed that students’ superstitious and religious beliefs and rituals surfaced in their responses to the coursework even though there was an attempt to steer away from traditional religious education. Students’ experiences included engagement with African religious rituals, the effects of omens, the use of rituals for academic success and the rejections of superstitious and religious beliefs. These experiences were interpreted from a post-colonial perspective. Critical citizenship education and appreciation of worldview diversity is suggested as tools for transformation toward decolonising the curriculum by recognising and legitimising different experiences and actions related to superstitious and religious beliefs in higher education classrooms.   Key words: Superstition, higher education, belief, South Africa, post-colonial.

An Expanded Understanding of Art as an Agent of Change in Higher Education

South African higher education institutions seek strategies to address belonging and decolonization. The student protest movement across South African university campuses during 2015–2016 further underlined this fact. We explored the capacity of interactive artworks to address belonging and active citizenship, both prioritized by university management. Art, in this sense, facilitates out-of-classroom education to aid the institutional decolonial vision of a university entrenched in colonial history and apartheid. Furthermore, the protests challenged the slow pace of institutional change at South African universities. This article examines responses to an interactive artwork placed on the Stellenbosch University campus. Our elastic understanding of art and education deviates from traditional art history and acts as a critical public intervention that aimed to stimulate conversation about belonging at Stellenbosch University. The employed research methods are informed by the decolonial framework which engages a crucial attentiveness of the power issues embedded in knowledge production, validation and dissemination. An interactive public artwork, titled “We Belong Here”, was placed on the main campus of Stellenbosch University in South Africa. We invited students on campus to make visual statements related to topics such as community, apathy, legacy, honour, protest, ethical conduct and creativity. Qualitative data was gathered from individual and group interviews with students, lecturers and staff members who were most likely to have encountered the artwork. Theories on critical citizenship education, and art education informed the research and discussion. The data suggests that art education in the expanded field has the potential to aid higher education institutions in bringing about personal and intellectual growth. Both accepting and dismissive opinions were raised by participants and welcomed by the researcher. Viewing their voice among many, led some to a sense of belonging in the university community, and their interaction led them to converse with others on the topic of citizenship. There was also criticism to the artwork text written in English, and concern that such a work could not create any relevant impact. Although the parameters of the artwork is limited within the field, the student protest movement was a forceful reminder of urgent matters in higher education and a reason to continue enquiry and interventions to decolonialize education.

Critical Citizenship Education as Praxis: A Contribution to Decolonize the Art Curriculum at a South African University

Critical Citizenship Education as Praxis: A Contribution to Decolonize the Art Curriculum at a South African University

Developing critical citizenship in LLB students: the role of a decolonised legal history course

Within the neoliberal ideals of society, social science subjects are battling for their rightful place in curriculums. As a result, legal history courses are being presented by increasingly less universities in South Africa. In the tendency towards a skills-based LLB, higher education institutions are neglecting to acknowledge the immense impact students’ ideologies and critical thinking will have on the future of South Africa. This contribution argues that it is not only possible to deliver competitive graduates, to retain social subjects and to heed the call for decolonisation, but that a transformative, decolonised legal history course is vital to these ideals. The contribution explores the role of such a course in the development of LLB graduates where it strives towards constitutional ideals and social justice. Furthermore, it takes a look at legal history as a form of critical citizenship education, where it is based on the holistic development of students within constant critical self-reflection and the promotion of a common set of shared values. The development of critical citizenship in students are explored by defining this concept, as well as by discussing the manner in which it can be taught and the importance to the so-called born-free LLB student. This study concludes with broad outlines of the manner in which a legal history course would have to be presented within a critical pedagogy to achieve the aims of critical citizenship.

Exploring shame and pedagogies of discomfort in critical citizenship education

Background: Social transformation in South Africa is a sensitive issue because of the historical realities of segregation and past injustices. Aim: To address transformation, Visual Communication Design students were asked to design an exhibition, event, sculpture or garden to memorialise the forced removals that took place on the site of the current Arts and Social Sciences Building of Stellenbosch University and to thereby contribute with their own ‘voices’ to an event or exhibition. Setting: The focus of the project was to memorialise the forced removals that occurred on the place known then as Die Vlakte. The aim was to investigate the reactions of students and community members to explore how a visual communication project prepared them or failed to prepare them for dealing with social injustice. Methods: A case study research design was applied, and inductive qualitative content analysis was used in processing and organising data. The theoretical framework included critical citizenship education, social justice, pedagogy of discomfort, shame and white shame. Results: Critical citizenship education may form part of pedagogies of discomfort, and shame may be used positively as we ask students to negotiate emotionally charged subjects through visual communication. Conclusion: As the case studies have shown, students are capable of identifying sources of discomfort and growing from them to perceive a local historic event in a more sensitive and inclusive way.

Data Activism: Reviving, Extending and Upgrading Critical Citizenship Education and Consumer Rights Movements

Considering the omnipresence, omniscience and omnipotence of big data as the upgraded big brother, any resistance appears to be in vain. However, pessimistic accounts usually revolve on a model of a citizen as an individual. This atomized version of citizenship underestimates the power of citizens’ social solidarity networks which can be as traditional as nuclear or extended families or as modern as professional organizations and rights movements. However, big data activism and these forms of resistance are rarely connected with each other. In this article, we discuss how to integrate already existing rights organizations with data activism. The following themes are explored for this purpose: Snowden revelations and evolution of state surveillance; digital activism and data activism; and data activism and critical citizenship education. The notion of ‘critical’ citizenship education rather than citizenship education is mobilized in our reflection, since the mainstream, official citizenship education agenda is far from addressing the negative effects of big data and associated double surveillance by the state and corporations. Contrary to a merely theoretical understanding of citizenship, data activism needs to unite its forces with already existing rights movements, including human rights and consumer rights movements as distinguishing components of a critical citizenship. The purpose of this article is to show in what ways citizenship education and consumer rights movements can be integrated and updated within the context of data activism. The introductory section provides the background for the main arguments of the article. The method of this work is critical reflection and a theoretical discussion supported by a survey of a set of relevant research papers. 

A pedagogical framework for the development of the critical tourism citizen

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are an international framework to improve global wellbeing, and SDG 4 Quality Education serves as a substructure to achieve sustainability. However, absent from the SDGs is explicit reference to critical thinking which is needed to contend with structures of power. Similarly, tertiary education systems globally are facing challenges due to appropriation by neoliberal agendas favouring capitalism over cogitation. Accordingly, the aim of this paper is to propose a framework for bringing criticality to sustainable tourism education to strengthen SDG 4 and empower future decision- makers as Critical Tourism Citizens (CTC). A definition of a CTC is presented to further critical citizenship scholarship in tourism. This paper examines the role of criticality in advancing sustainability in tourism. Supported by empirical qualitative data, we propose a pedagogical framework that aids critical examination of tourism systems to advance sustainability in relation to the SDGs. The framework is positioned within current scholarship on global citizenship and critical citizenship education to propel theory into praxis.

THE ETHNIC/LOCAL, THE NATIONAL AND THE GLOBAL: GLOBAL CITIZENSHIP EDUCATION IN SOUTH SUDAN

ABSTRACTThis article explores local, national and global aspects of the new national curriculum in South Sudan as reflected in the lived experiences of secondary school teachers. We draw on analyses of the curriculum, semi-structured interviews with 21 secondary school teachers, and classroom observations. We emphasize the need for critical global citizenship education addressing inequity and oppression at national and global levels. We argue that the curriculum rhetoric fostering global citizens is strongly disconnected from the lived experiences of the teachers, where ethnicity is at the centre of their identity and a main obstacle to a unifying national identity and citizenship.

Refreshing critical pedagogy and citizenship education through the lens of justice and complexity pedagogy

Maximal citizenship educators are committed to advancing an approach to citizenship learning with the following staple features: learner-centred; experiential; problem- and action-oriented; racialised, classed and gendered analysis of power; and strengthening the public sphere and democracy. This type of approach to education shares many similarities with the principles of critical pedagogy. However, there have been valid arguments that Frankfurt School Critical Theory inspired pedagogy still tends to focus on class, at the expense of gender and race, analyses. This article seeks ways to refresh and extend the language and theoretical frameworks used by critical pedagogues. To do so, it will deploy the terms justice pedagogy and complexity pedagogy. The adjective ‘justice’ does the same work as ‘critical’ in signalling the commitment to using education as a means to bring about a more socially just world. The recent rise in scholarship in complexity thinking lends itself to conceptualising critical pedagogy in necessarily fresh ways. This article draws attention to the kindred nature of guiding concepts in complexity thinking and critical pedagogy, including grassroots organising, distributed decision-making and emergent learning, before presenting a description of how such approaches might refresh critical pedagogy through a critical citizenship education programme using justice pedagogy. This example illustrates the way that justice pedagogy can inform decisions about appropriate teaching and learning strategies for children and young people today growing up in an increasingly globalised world.

Crafting a third space: Integrative strategies for implementing critical citizenship education in a standards-based classroom

In the transformative era of globalization, traditional conceptions of citizenship are challenged by a new idea of citizenship education in which students are empowered to get involved in civic actions designed to promote social justice. This single case study extends scholarship on critical citizenship education by illuminating the experience of a South Korean elementary teacher who effectively implemented the teaching of critical consciousness and social action skills in the standards-based social studies classroom by responding creatively to the mandated standards. The findings highlight three instructional strategies that the teacher created to deal with dilemmas recognized in the practice of critical citizenship education. Practical implications are provided to help teachers, teacher educators, and school leaders craft better opportunities for children to be engaged in critical citizens.

Exploring Western and non-Western epistemological influences in South Africa: theorising a critical democratic citizenship education

My decade-long research on democracy and schooling in a Xhosa township has led to an examination of epistemological influences on democratic citizenship from Western and non-Western (i.e. African) perspectives. While Max Weber advanced the notion of an autonomous citizen within Western democratic states, different philosophical and cultural assumptions operate in South Africa, where the individual is viewed as not separate from, but rather embedded in, the community into which one is born. This theoretical position – a person is a person through other people (isiXhosa proverb) – serves as a thoughtful starting point for theorising a critical democratic citizenship education. This article explores Western and non-Western influences through scholarly literature and practitioner perspectives. The goal is to consider the convergences and divergences between Western and indigenous knowledge with ubuntu (humanness), an African moral ethic, as its key construct.

The Critical Global Educator: Global Citizenship Education as Sustainable Development by Maureen Ellis. New York: Routledge, 2016. 246 pp. $163.00 (cloth). ISBN 978-1-138-88780-0.

<i>The Critical Global Educator: Global Citizenship Education as Sustainable Development</i> by Maureen Ellis. New York: Routledge, 2016. 246 pp. $163.00 (cloth). ISBN 978-1-138-88780-0.