Afterword: Contesting Culture: Identity and Curriculum Dilemmas in the Age of Globalization, Postcolonialism, and Multiplicity

Abstract

In this closing article, Cameron McCarthy, Michael Giardina, Susan Harewood, and Jin-Kyung Park draw on the preceding articles of this Special Issue to develop the argument that educators need to pay special attention to developments associated with human immigration, cultural globalization, and the rapid migration of cultural and economic capital and electronically mediated images. In the plurality of social and cultural sites of practice reflected in these articles, McCarthy et al. find implications for pedagogical practice and the educational preparation of school youth. They specifically address questions concerning the reproduction of culture, identity, and community as they relate to contemporary educational debates. Given this range of cultural practices, how should we address the topic of culture and identity in the organization of school knowledge? McCarthy et al. suggest that pedagogical interventions that privilege popular culture as a site of legitimate critique can open up new avenues of exploration and investigation to a radical, progressive democracy premised on the basic values of love, care, and equality for all humanity.

A Christian family in a “provisional culture”

“…Thus an anti-life mentality is born, as can be seen in many current issues: one thinks, for example, of a certain panic deriving from the studies of ecologists and futurologists on population growth, which sometimes exaggerate the danger of demographic increase to the quality of life". 22 and giving life and upbringing to children 25 . A provisional culture has a negative effect on the youth and new generations as well as their personal aspirations and life goals.…”

Shifting selves: The emergence of new identities in South African schools

“…Interrogating the concept of race has been and still is a problematic transnational discourse (McCarthy et al, 2003;Winant, 2000;Nieto, 2000;McCarthy and Crichlow, 1993). During the early years of the 20th century, Du Bois and Boas proposed a revolutionary interpretation of race, debunking the traditional theory of race as an essential biological "truth" (Winant, 2000).…”

“…During the early years of the 20th century, Du Bois and Boas proposed a revolutionary interpretation of race, debunking the traditional theory of race as an essential biological "truth" (Winant, 2000). Rather, race as an inconstant socio-historical construct dictated by economic variables, was proposed and is now a widely accepted view (McCarthy et al, 2003;[Dolby, 2000] and [Dolby, 2001]; Winant, 2000;Nieto, 2000;Carrim, 1998;McCarthy and Crichlow, 1993;Morrison, 1993). Hence, any study seeking to insert "race" as an analytic category in the social process needs to problematise race as socially, historically and ideologically constructed, rather than accept it as a biological or physical fact.…”

“…Reliant on each other for their interpretations (McCarthy et al, 2003), whiteness and blackness are constantly shifting connotations of the political and social context in which they are situated (McCarthy et al, 2003;[Dolby, 2001] and [Dolby, 2002]; Morrison, 1993). However, the simplistic polarisation of these constructs has served to entrench views of homogeneity rather than dispel them, and in its wake has left race and racial experience being recast as static and essentialised (Hall, 1996a).…”

“…(Nieto, 2000:35) The polarities of whiteness and blackness can further be embodied as first-and thirdworld constructs, respectively. However, the contestation between the first and third world, whiteness and blackness (Dolby, 2002), has been problematised by the advent of globalisation (McCarthy et al, 2003). With the accompanying escalation of cultural and human transborder migration, race has taken on a new identity (McCarthy et al, 2003).…”