Many sentences of modal discourse are "inconstant": "Paris Hilton could have been a politician", for example, seems to be true in some contexts, false in others. In this dissertation, I explore this topic, which we can call the "inconstancy of de re modal attributions". My goal is to develop, motivate, and defend a…

In the early 1970s, Thomas Colwell argued for an "ecological basis [for] human community." He suggested that "naturalistic transactionalism" was being put forward by some ecologists and some philosophers of education, but independently of each other. He suspected that ecologists were working on their own versions of naturalistic transactionalism…

The integration of the Christian faith with human learning was addressed by the earliest Christian apologists and continues to be an important question for the church up to the present day. Such lengthy conversations are complicated by variations in nomenclature, attitudes, and theological assumptions. This paper attempts to clarify portions of…

Discourse markers play significant roles in any spoken interaction. This research examines the functions of the discourse markers (DMs) well, now and and used as turn-initial interruptive devices in a Malaysian radio discourse. Using Schegloff's (2002) framework of what constitutes an interruption in turn-taking and previous studies on the…

In educational discourse dialogue tends to be viewed as being (morally) superior to monologue. When we look at them as basic forms of communication, we find that dialogue is a two-way, one-to-one form and monologue is a one-way, one-to-many form. In this paper I revisit the alleged (moral) superiority of dialogue. First, I problematize certain…

Many of us are intentional in considering the environment when performing our daily tasks. But how many of us really know the true impacts of our "green" behaviors on the environment? Indeed, is it possible that engaging in green efforts can actually be counterproductive or detrimental to the environment? In his book, "Ecological…

Conversation Analysis (CA) and Discursive Psychology (DP) reject the view that assumptions about cognitive processes should be used to account for discursive phenomena. Instead, cognitive issues are respecified as discursive phenomena. Discursive psychologists do this by studying discursive practices of talking about mental phenomena and using…

Reconceptualist and post-reconceptualist curriculum scholars have drawn upon the notion of a complicated curriculum conversation as a means to describe the imbricated, pluralist, and eclectic character of curriculum theorizing. Insofar as this curriculum conversation is accomplished via language however, it remains wed to a particular…

Much has been written on Michel Foucault's reluctance to clearly delineate a research method, particularly with respect to genealogy (Harwood, 2000; Meadmore, Hatcher & McWilliam, 2000; Tamboukou, 1999). Foucault (1994, p. 288) himself disliked prescription stating, "I take care not to dictate how things should be" and wrote provocatively to…

Although researchers conducting qualitative descriptive studies, ethnographies, phenomenologies, grounded theory, and narrative inquiries commonly use computer-assisted qualitative data analysis software (CAQDAS) to manage their projects and analyses, investigators conducting discursive methodologies such as discourse or conversation analysis seem…

The purpose of this case study was to explore a previously theorized construct, Collective Classroom Efficacy, through student voices. We interviewed nine former sixth-graders a decade after their classroom experience as they articulated at a reunion the importance of their former cohesive classroom community. To provide data triangulation we…

This qualitative multiple case study focused on eleven non-traditional, bilingual, Latinas within a teacher education program. The study explored various factors that influenced participants' desire to pursue and ability to persist as pre-service teachers. The overarching theme identified among participant discourse was personal agency inspired by…

The ways in which the language of reformers intersects with and informs reform implementation is important to our understanding of how education policy impacts practice. To explore this issue, we employed critical discourse analysis (CDA) to analyze the language used by a 21st century skills-focused reform organization to promote its program…

This paper contextualizes contemporary urban teachers' online dissent in public discussions of education reform in relation to past educational crisis narratives to interpret recent shifts in the structure of education reform dialogue in the United States. It does so by examining the form and content of compositions in which teachers respond to…

Crude and dangerous ideas about the genetic heritability of intelligence, and a supposed biological basis for the Black/White achievement gap, are alive and well inside the education policy process but taking new and more subtle forms. Drawing on Critical Race Theory, the paper analyses recent hereditarian writing, in the UK and the USA, and…