Knowledge for the Masses: World Models and National Curricula, 1920-1986

Abstract

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.. American Sociological Association is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to American Sociological Review. Cultural knowledge is selected by educational authorities, organized into national school curricula, and transmitted to children in mass school systems. Despite national variation in political, economic, or social structures, primary school curricula are very similar throughout the world. This similarity is not predicted by existing theories. We argue that mass educational curricula are closely linked to the expansion of the nation-state system and the increasing dominance of standardized models of mass education. The nation-state and mass education -promoted by intellectuals and nationbuilders to achieve national progress and social equality -have generated strikingly similar national educational systems and school curricula. C lassical theorists in the sociology of knowledge such as Marx, Durkheim, Mannheim, and Scheler sought to establish that the content and validity of ideas are ultimately tied to the social and economic interests in society (Mannheim 1936; Durkheim [1912] 1954; for reviews, see Coser 1968; Kuklick 1983; Eisenstadt 1988). Subsequent research has focused on how sociohistorical conditions influence the production, validation, and justification of different types of knowledge. Few scholars have examined an important corollary: how knowledge is selected, organized, and transmitted by socialforces (see Wuthnow 1987). This neglect was forcefully stated by British sociologists of education (Young 1971). Sociologists, they argued, should treat "the knowledge ('transmitted' in education) as neither absolute, nor arbitrary, but as 'available sets of meanings' which in any context do not merely 'emerge' but are collectively 'given"' (Young 1971, p. 3). "How a society selects, classifies, distributes, transmits and evaluates the educational knowledge it considers to be public, reflects both the distribution of power and the principles of social control. From this point of view, differences within and change in the organization, transmission and evaluation of educational knowledge should be a major area of sociological interest" (Bernstein 1971, p. 47). National educational institutions -which presently enroll about one-fifth of the world's inhabitants (United Nations Educational Social and Cultural Organization 1987) -have become the most important mechanism for organizing and transmitting knowledge to the young. Although sociologists have shown great interest in the expansion, improvement, and equalization of educational opportunity, they have had little to say about the nature and social basis of the formal knowledge transmitted by the...

Determinants of Cognitive Maps of the World as Expressed in Sketch Maps

“…In addition to political and economic factors that help sustain dominant views of the world internationally, the educational systems of many countries also seem to play an important role. Worldwide elementary level curricula have been found to be very much alike (Benavot, Kamens, Meyer, Cha, & Wong, 1991).…”

Ei endra medborgaroppseding?

“…Utdanningspolitiske, pedagogiske og didaktiske modellar og grep har i mange høve opphavet sitt i transnasjonale diskursar eller institusjonaliseringsprosessar som slår ned i mange land (Benavot, Cha, Kamens, Meyer & Wong, 1991).…”

El Currículo Escolar y su Abordaje desde la Teoría de la Sociedad Mundial: Revisión y Prospectiva

“…Esta visión analiza la adopción de políticas como proceso de emulación o difusión, enfatizando las relaciones causales a nivel sistémico, totalmente externas a los actores. El desarrollo y las aplicaciones políticas de esta vertiente han sido examinados empíricamente con los casos de convergencia transnacional de políticas sobre gestión educativa y de estándares curriculares escolares (Meyer, Ramírez, Rubinson & Boli-Bennett, 1977;Benavot, Cha, Kamens, Meyer & Wong, 1991;Meyer, Ramírez & Soysal, 1992;Astiz, Wiseman & Baker, 2002, entre otros ejemplos).…”

“…Los estudios curriculares transnacionales considerados pioneros en este tema argumentaban que los mismos procesos mundiales que dieron impulso a la expansión masiva de la matrícula escolar fueron los que le dieron forma a los contenidos curriculares formales (Benavot, Cha, Kamens, Meyer & Wong, 1991;Meyer, Kamens, Benavot, Cha & Wong, 1992;Kamens, Meyer & Benavot, 1996). Al nivel de la enseñanza primaria, el hallazgo posiblemente más importante de uno de estos estudios fue el de la promoción mundial de un corpus de conocimiento estandarizado promovido por un grupo de materias troncales (lengua, matemática, ciencias sociales, ciencias naturales, artes, y educación física) comunes a todos los países incluidos en la muestra.…”