Towards the end of the 19th century there was a revival of the struggle for democracy throughout the world. The formation of Australia as a federation embodied this commitment, a commitment subsequently abandoned. The impetus for public education in Australia came from its commitment to democracy, inspired by the British Idealists. If the people…

At the heart of this paper is an exploration of belonging and how this is assumed to connect with a set of values represented as national. There is a particular interest in the relationship between these values and education. Because the significance of the learning that occurs through the public domain outside educational institutions such as…

Although macro-level analysis helps to identify patterns of development, the shortcoming of this macro-level overview is that marginal and alternative education systems and practices do not receive appropriate attention. The purpose of the present study is to demonstrate an alternative to the macro system. It examines the use of patriotic…

The beauty of American public education is that the potential of every individual is acknowledged with the clear expectation that each person should receive a high-quality, academically focused education. The challenge, then, is how to achieve that goal when students come with a variety of backgrounds, talents, interests, limitations, and…

Studies of the image of Muslims or "the Other" in general have been done to a certain extent by Western scholars showing that stereotyped images have been prevalent. In the case of Islamic studies, the long tradition of Orientalist scholarship is a clear example of this, but, as researchers have shown, generalisations and stereotypes are still…

Scholars from multiple disciplines have commented on the divided nature of childhood as a historical construction: a period of life to be valued in itself as well as a means to adulthood. In this essay, James Stillwaggon considers George Orwell's "Such, Such Were the Joys," an autobiographical account of his childhood education, as a site of…

When hopelessness and helplessness become recurring themes in teacher education scholarship, this signals a conceptual problem with the question of autonomy in the profession. In this essay, Alice Pitt argues that breakdowns of professional life belong to what is most subjective in the profession. Pitt opens her analysis of this conundrum by…

This article reports the interim findings of historical research, funded by the British Academy (2007), which is exploring the possibilities of prosopography (the study of biographies linked through a common purpose, philosophy or practice) in researching the relationship between educational thought and school design since World War Two. Through…

The thesis of this article is that "Intellectual Entrepreneurship (IE)" provides an intellectually authentic philosophical foundation capable of sustaining cross-campus entrepreneurship education. Drawing upon initiatives begun at The University of Texas at Austin, we document how IE educates "citizen-scholars." Specifically,…

What professional musicians say and do affects the attitudes and actions of music educators in the classroom. One example comes from influential conductor/composer, Gunther Schuller, who, in his controversial 1997 book, "The Compleat Conductor", defines, espouses, and recommends his own "philosophy of conducting." An examination of his ideas and,…

An overarching aim of education is the promotion of children's personal well-being. Liberal educationalists also support the promotion of children's personal autonomy as a central educational aim. On some views, such as John White's, these two goals--furthering well-being and cultivating autonomy--can come apart. Our primary aim in this paper is…

This essay focuses of an arts-informed inquiry performed by sixteen pre-service teachers who created sculptures to explore their teaching philosophies. Through this creative process changes occurred in their assumptions and expectations about what is of value in teaching and relationships between themselves, their students, and the community. The…

Freud saw the dream as occupying a very important position in his theoretical model. If there were to be problems with his theoretical account of the dream then this would impinge upon proposed therapy and, of course, education as the right balance between the instincts and the institution of culture. Wittgenstein, whilst stating that Freud was…

An aesthetic distinction between good music and the good in music is crucial for a philosophy of music education. Ultimately, it is not the music's fault, as it were, that someone may view it as being "not good" in either a social or aesthetic context. Regardless of how music is colored it remains an entity unto itself and thus untouched by our…

Following a brief introduction to complexity theory, this paper considers how various themes in the field relate to the philosophical study of education. Issues and questions introduced include the challenge of complexity theory for the philosophy of education--and, conversely, some critical challenges for complexity theory from educational…