Disciplines have contrasting substance and syntax, ways of organizing themselves and of defining rules for making arguments and claims that others will warrant. They have different ways of talking about themselves and about the problems, topics, and issues that constitute their subject matters. The evolution of a discipline begins with knowledge…

In this dissertation, I examine STEM fields' academic and occupational contexts in relation to the post-baccalaureate trajectories of US college graduates. In three empirical chapters focusing on STEM doctorate fields, STEM occupational fields, and these fields' changes over time, respectively, I pay particular attention to three demographic…

In recent decades, adult and community education has emerged as a distinctive discipline in its own right, based on scholarship in the quest for real equality and social justice. This distinctive discipline is already characterised by "really useful practice", that is, critical, creative pedagogy, heavily influenced by women's studies…

This article presents a perspective on the relationship between adult education and human resource development of the past two decades and the subsequent emergence of workforce development. The lesson taken from the article should be more than simply a recounting of events related to these fields of study. Instead, the more general lesson may be…

As an academic discipline, the philosophy of sport has been in existence for a relatively short period. Although the philosophy of sport as an academic endeavour is relatively young, the philosophical view of sport itself is not new. Although sport was a major activity according to the Greeks and Romans, it lost its importance during the Middle…

Inaugurated in 2013, this collective research programme aims to construct an international mapping of the history of education that accounts for recent developments in the field. Our goal is to create a current and retrospective assessment of the discipline's institutional grounding and of the knowledge produced by its practitioners,…

We review the ontological and pedagogical origins of International Development graduate education in the context of increasing pressures to "professionalise" graduate curricula. We apply Giroux's concept of "vocationalisation" to argue that professionalisation risks undermining the field's intellectual foundations in an elusive…

This article takes as its starting point the commonplace that Rousseau's "Emile" enabled his contemporaries to discover not only childhood but physical education. Focused on what the pedestal erected for Jean-Jacques somewhat overshadows, a brief historiographic overview and a survey of some major writings on education before Rousseau (by the…

Educational phenomena and child development fascinate many disciplines for which they offer a tremendous field of experimentation and application. More than a hundred years ago, when educational sciences adopted the main institutional emblems of an academic discipline (chairs, diploma, laboratories, scientific network etc.), they obviously…

Taking the measure of an individual as a professional and trying to place that individual within a discipline's changing historical context is never an easy endeavour. This is especially true within the helping professions where there has been so much growth over the past 40 years. In the case of Martin J. Ball, however, the task is a bit easier.…

July 7, 2011, marks the centennial of counselor education as a formal discipline. In recognition of its 100th birthday, the author of this article describes the origins of the discipline, beginning with its prehistory in the work of Frank Parsons to establish the practice of vocational guidance, describing the 1st course in counselor education at…

What are the relational dimensions of politics? Does the way that people and organizations are connected to each other matter? Are our opinions affected by the people with whom we talk? Are legislators affected by lobbyists? Is the capacity of social movements to mobilize affected by the structure of societal networks? Powerful evidence in the…

This paper examines the decisions and motivations of graduate students in cultural anthropology when defining the field sites and topics of their final projects. The decisions among students at the Universidad de los Andes in Colombia are contrasted with those at the University of Pittsburgh in the United States. A review of recent final projects…

Dr. Richard J. Whelan is a distinguished professor emeritus at the University of Kansas. His earliest professional experiences were at the Children's Hospital (Southard School) of the Menninger Clinic, where he served as a recreational therapist, teacher, and director of education. During his career at the University of Kansas and the KU Medical…

This article examines the topicality of Library and Information Science (LIS) dissertations written between 1930 and 2009 at schools with American Library Association (ALA)--accredited university programs in North America. Dissertation titles and abstracts were examined for the presence of library-related keywords drawn from the core curricula of…