Chinese education scholars Cesan Wang and Qiquan Zhong led a debate over knowledge centredness versus student centredness in China's ongoing pre-collegiate curriculum reform. The debate was considered the most influential academic event in the past 30 years in the field of education in China. Employing a Critical Discourse Analysis approach, this…

This article explores decision makers' responses of surprise or amazement to Students of Color engaged in youth participatory action research (YPAR). To address this topic, I draw upon data collected from a yearlong qualitative study of a YPAR group, applying the theoretical aspects of critical discourse analysis. The findings indicate that the…

Today's high school students will face a host of economic problems such as the demise of the social safety net, mounting college student debt, and costly health care plans, as stated in the rationale for financial literacy provided by the Council for Economic Education's National Standards for Financial Literacy. These problems are compounded by…

This paper considers the policy "roles" adopted by teachers enacting policy in a department. It draws on a longitudinal study of two secondary mathematics departments endeavouring to make deep change aligned with a demanding curriculum policy. The study validates aspects of an existing typology, demonstrates the existence of a variety of…

Data collection methods constitute a major area of concern in interlanguage pragmatics (ILP) research, since there is no easy way to collect the type of data that is relatively 'naturalistic' while at the same time allowing for researcher control. Further, current ILP research also suffers from the shortage of studies making use of self-report…

Teachers' decisions about pedagogy are informed by a range of educational discourses. These discourses constitute particular kinds of teaching practices and teacher-student relationships in ways that are not immediately obvious. When a particular pedagogy becomes accepted as best practice and it produces desired learning outcomes for the majority…

Education reform continues around the globe, though questioned and critiqued in relation to goals of democratizing educational decision-making. Newspapers are one site of contestation and negotiation where struggles over global reform discourses are contextualized in "obvious" and "natural" local language. In this article, I…

Background: Limited research has been conducted on student voice with students in physical education. Accessing and responding to student voice are relevant for researchers and physical education teachers to develop physical education programs that are meaningful and have a sense of purpose to the students themselves. It is through listening to…

Explores, from a feminist perspective, the discourses of choice regarding how women make their choices as consumers in the education marketplace. It argues that mothers as parents are not free to choose but act within a range of constraints, i.e., their choices are limited by structural and moral possibilities in a patriarchal and racist society.…

Analyzes Fisher Ames' fiery speech of 1796 on the Jay Treaty. Demonstrates the influence of Scottish enlightenment thinkers (particularly in moral sense philosophy and faculty psychology) on Ames and his rhetoric. Demonstrates how Ames made a compelling case to shift the standard of political judgment from reason to passion. (SR)

Proposes that different versions of moral decision making emerged in the narrative patterns of Ferraro and members of the Catholic church during the 1984 Presidential Campaign. Discusses these visions of morality using Kenneth Burke's terms and examines them as illustrative of differences in feminine and masculine constructions of reality. (JD)

This collection of abstracts is part of a continuing series providing information on recent doctoral dissertations. The 18 titles deal with the following topics: (1) the rhetorical theory and practice of Walter Lippmann; (2) communication, "root-metaphor" orientation, and decision making; (3) teaching as rhetoric; (4) the conditions and…