This paper draws on interviews of a mother and daughter concerning their experiences of working in higher education. It uses narrative research and its focus on temporality, sociality and place, to expose subject positionings, critical events, and the scope for 'activism' in the recent past and present. It is argued that the relationship between…

This article provides an overview and analysis of the relationship between gender, educational policy, and governance in Scotland and Sweden and the two countries' response to European Union and global legislative and policy change. In Scotland, gender is mainly invisible in recent policies on inclusion, achievement beyond academic attainment, and…

This paper considers Olive Banks' work on charting the history and development of British feminism, and particularly her use of collective biography as a research and analytic tool. It is argued that while this has been seen as the least "fashionable" aspect of her work, it took forward C. Wright Mills' contention for one definition of…

The aim of this article is to start a debate about the inclusiveness/exclusiveness of the field of gender and education, and what change might be possible. While we focus on the field of gender and education as a whole (including its journals and academic practices), our main sources of evidence are our own experiences as gender researchers on…

This paper explores the factors that are at present reconstructing teacher education in Sweden and in other European countries, including professionalization, inherited traditions, feminization and globalization. The authors use as a basis for the paper: documentary analysis and nearly 60 qualitative semi-structured interviews with management and…

Proposes a social justice approach to the evaluation of educational programs that would illuminate the impact on subordinated and underrepresented groups, such as women and ethnic minorities. (DM)

This paper explores the difficulty of claims to truth in the analysis of the life of the Victorian feminist, reformer, educationist, and celebrity, Harriet Martineau (1802-76). She was widely known as a truthful person. For example, her contemporary, the poet Elizabeth Barrett Browning, wrote in 1845 that "her love of the truth is proverbial…

Explores the development of teacher research on gender. Suggests that teacher research has proved important for feminist teachers by affording them the opportunity to explore the social as well as the educational context of schooling and by providing them with the means to challenge inequalities from inside the profession. (KO)

Explores differences and similarities in various European national histories, politics, and traditions regarding gender relationships within and outside teacher education that affect school and college practice, discussing: the feminization of teaching and teacher education; the European Union's impact; the extent to which gender is a discourse in…

Critical action research emphasises participation, democracy and social critique, and thus has had considerable potential for feminist scholarship and action. Feminist action research, in turn, has gained a foothold in education, for example, through the work of Hollingsworth, Miller, Lather and others, although much action research might still be…

Presents the results of a historical survey of the contemporaries of Harriet Martineau who were born in the United Kingdom between 1792 and 1812. Focuses on the length of life, marital status, number of children, women's occupations, husbands' occupations (of married women), and fathers' occupations (of unmarried women). (CMK)

This paper seeks to understand recent changes in the professional status of teachers and teacher educators in Europe, discussing the contribution of women to teaching and teacher education and noting that the proportion of women in education professions is not regarded as disadvantageous or problematic. The paper discusses gendered concepts of…

This paper is the sum of the author's experience when she moved from England to Sweden four years ago. Sweden's international reputation for gender equality is unparalleled and therefore she expected to be part of a different gender order than that in the United Kingdom. However, she finds that at the level of everyday experience, gender relations…