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233How can universities promote academic freedom? Insights from the front line of the gender warsImpact 2022 (27): 2-61. 2022.The UK Government's Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Bill is currently progressing through Parliament. The bill is designed to strengthen free speech and academic freedom in higher education, in response to what former Education Secretary Gavin Williamson describes as ‘the rise of intolerance and cancel culture upon our campuses’. But is there really a crisis of academic freedom in British universities?To see that there is, say Judith Suissa and Alice Sullivan, we need only look at the conte…Read more
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222The Gender Wars, Academic Freedom and EducationJournal of Philosophy of Education 55 (1): 55-82. 2021.Philosophical arguments regarding academic freedom can sometimes appear removed from the real conflicts playing out in contemporary universities. This paper focusses on a set of issues at the front line of these conflicts, namely, questions regarding sex, gender and gender identity. We document the ways in which the work of academics has been affected by political activism around these questions and, drawing on our respective disciplinary expertise as a sociologist and a philosopher, elucidate t…Read more
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124Tiger Mothers and Praise Junkies: Children, Praise and the Reactive AttitudesJournal of Philosophy of Education 47 (1): 1-19. 2013.In this article, I look at some discussions of praising children in contemporary parenting advice. In exploring what is problematic about these discussions, I turn to some philosophical work on moral praise and blame which, I argue, indicates the need for a more nuanced response to questions about the significance of praise. A further analysis of the moral aspects of praise suggests a significant dimension of the parent-child relationship that is missing from, and obscured by, the kind of parent…Read more
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106Teaching and Doing Philosophy of Education: The Question of StyleStudies in Philosophy and Education 27 (2): 185-195. 2008.This paper explores the practice of teaching philosophy, and particularly philosophy of education, in a higher education context. Starting from a critical discussion of some of the literature on teaching and learning in higher education, I introduce the notions of philosophical style and temperament and suggest that exploring these notions, the problems they raise, and their implications for issues to do with our own identity as philosophers and as teachers, can enrich our understanding of the p…Read more
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95Lessons from a new science? On teaching happiness in schoolsJournal of Philosophy of Education 42 (3-4): 575-590. 2008.Recent media reports about new programmes for 'happiness lessons' in schools signal a welcome concern with children's well-being. However, as I shall argue, the presuppositions of the discourse in which many of these proposals are framed, and their orientation towards particular strands of positive psychology, involve ideas about human life that are, in an important sense, anti-educational.
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95Anarchism, utopias and philosophy of educationJournal of Philosophy of Education 35 (4). 2001.This paper presents a discussion of some central ideas in anarchist thought, alongside an account of experiments in anarchist education. In the course of the discussion, I try to challenge certain preconceptions about anarchism, especially concerning the anarchist view of human nature. I address the questions of whether or not anarchism is utopian, what this means, and what implications these ideas may have for dominant paradigms in philosophy of education.
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67Untangling the mother knot: some thoughts on parents, children and philosophers of educationEthics and Education 1 (1): 65-77. 2006.Although children and parents often feature in philosophical literature on education, the nature of the parent–child relationship remains occluded by the language of rights, duties and entitlements. Likewise, talk of ‘parenting’ in popular literature and culture implies that being a parent is primarily about performing tasks. Drawing on popular literature, moral philosophy and philosophy of education, I make some suggestions towards articulating a richer philosophical conception of this relation…Read more
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56What All Parents Need to Know? Exploring the Hidden Normativity of the Language of Developmental Psychology in ParentingJournal of Philosophy of Education 46 (3): 352-369. 2012.In this article we focus on how the language of developmental psychology shapes our conceptualisations and understandings of childrearing and of the parent-child relationship. By analysing some examples of contemporary research, policy and popular literature on parenting and parenting support in the UK and Flanders, we explore some of the ways in which normative assumptions about parenthood and upbringing are imported into these areas through the language of developmental psychology. We go on to…Read more
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53Character education and the disappearance of the politicalEthics and Education 10 (1): 105-117. 2015.In this article, I explore some contemporary versions of character education with specific reference to the extent to which they are viewed as constituting a form of citizenship education. I argue that such approaches often end up displacing the idea of political education and, through their language and stated aims, avoid any genuine engagement with the very concept of the political in all but its most superficial sense. In discussing some of the points raised by critics of character education,…Read more
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50Parents as ‘educators’: languages of education, pedagogy and ‘parenting’Ethics and Education 6 (2): 197-212. 2011.In this article, we explore to what extent parents should be ‘educators’ of their children. In the course of this exploration, we offer some examples of these practices and ways of speaking and thinking, indicate some of the problems and limitations they import into our understanding of the parent–child relationship, and make some tentative suggestions towards an alternative way of thinking about this relationship.
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44The question of 'parenting'Ethics and Education 6 (2): 101-108. 2011.Ethics and Education, Volume 6, Issue 2, Page 101-108, July 2011
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35Review of Claire Cassidy, Thinking Children (review)Studies in Philosophy and Education 29 (6): 591-596. 2010.
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30Private Schools, Choice And The Ethical EnvironmentBritish Journal of Educational Studies 61 (3): 345-362. 2013.ABSTRACT In this paper, we consider the relationship between the existence of private schools and public attitudes towards questions about educational provision. Data from the 2010 British Social Attitudes survey suggest that parents who choose to send children to private schools may become more entrenched in their support for more extensive forms of parental partiality, with potential ramifications for the future supporting of progressive education policy. We suggest that addressing questions a…Read more
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29Shovelling smoke? The experience of being a philosopher on an educational research training programmeJournal of Philosophy of Education 40 (4). 2006.This paper is a reflective account of the experience of designing and teaching a philosophy module as part of a research training programme for students studying for research degrees in education. In the course of the discussion, I address various problems and questions to do with the relationship between philosophy and educational research, the nature of philosophy of education and the role of the foundational disciplines in educational research.
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27Education and Non-domination: Reflections from the Radical TraditionStudies in Philosophy and Education 38 (4): 359-375. 2019.This paper explores the implications of a radical republican conception of freedom as non-domination, rooted in the anarchist tradition. In discussing both the non-statist theoretical frameworks and the practical educational experiments associated with this tradition, I suggest that it can add a valuable dimension to recent critical work in philosophy of education that draws on the republican idea of freedom as non-domination.
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26Minimal utopianism in the classroomEducational Philosophy and Theory 51 (3): 286-297. 2018.In this paper, we build on recent work on the role of the ‘utopian pedagogue’ to explore how utopian thinking can be developed within contemporary higher education institutions. In defending a utopian orientation on the part of HE lecturers, we develop the notion of ‘minimal utopianism’; a notion which, we suggest, expresses the difficult position of critical educators concerned to offer their students the tools with which to imagine and explore alternatives to current social and political reali…Read more
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26Dissenting voices: A reply to MaskellJournal of Philosophy of Education 34 (2). 2000.Duke Maskell ( Journal of Philosophy of Education, 32.2) argues that ‘our idea of education is puerile’ and that we need to rethink it. Drawing on the work of Jane Austen, he essentially reasserts the classic nineteenth-century ideal of Liberal Education. Yet in so doing, Maskell fails to acknowledge the social and political implications of this ideal. I argue that if we wish to engage in a rigorous philosophical debate on education, we cannot afford to ignore the social and political context im…Read more
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18Borrelli, mill, Emily and meJournal of Philosophy of Education 38 (3). 2004.In this paper, I explore the insights suggested by Michele Borrelli's ‘The Utopianisation of Critique’ in the context of a real-life educational encounter that involves an attempt at being ‘critical’. Borrelli's observation that all positive utopian critique implies an inevitable degree of dogmatism takes on a new—and less depressing—significance when examined in the light of such an encounter. Acknowledging the tensions suggested by Borelli's analysis is, I argue, what makes a particular educat…Read more
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16Testimony, Holocaust Education and Making the Unthinkable ThinkableJournal of Philosophy of Education 50 (2): 285-299. 2016.A great deal of philosophical work has explored the complex conceptual intersection between ethics and epistemology in the context of issues of testimony and belief, and much of this work has significant educational implications. In this paper, I discuss a troubling example of a case of testimony that seems to pose a problem for some established ways of thinking about these issues and that, in turn, suggests some equally troubling educational conclusions.
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15Creating and sustaining democratic spaces in educationJournal of Philosophy of Education 56 (6): 939-942. 2022.This article explores the context for the accompanying suite of papers on creating and sustaining democratic spaces in education. Prompted by the centenary of Summerhill, the internationally famous democratic school founded in Suffolk, England, in 1921, by A.S. Neill, this collection of papers explores and broadens out the central questions at the heart of experiments in democratic education. We suggest that, at a time of distrust in and questioning of the central institutions of democratic gove…Read more
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15Seducing Souls: Education and the Experience of Human Well‐BeingEducational Theory 65 (1): 73-78. 2015.
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14'From the margins’: Exploring the marginalisation, exclusion and oppression of overlooked groups in philosophy of educationInternational Journal of Educational Research 99. 2020.
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12EditorialEthics and Education 13 (1): 1-3. 2018.In this paper, I argue that the notion of ‘reasonableness’ that is, for many, at the heart of the Philosophy for Children approach particularly and education for democratic citizenship more broadly, is constituted within the epistemology of ‘white ignorance’ and operates in such a way that it is unlikely to transgress the boundaries of white ignorance so as to view it from without. Drawing on scholarship in critical legal studies and social epistemology, I highlight how notions of reasonableness…Read more
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11Reflections on the “Counter” in Educational CounterpublicsEducational Theory 66 (6): 769-786. 2016.In this essay, Judith Suissa draws on the tradition of radical and alternative education, and on some philosophical literature on democratic politics and the role of the political imagination, in order to suggest some ways of thinking about what constitutes an educational counterpublic that are different from those suggested in recent work by philosophers of education. Building on arguments by Nancy Fraser and others about the vital role of counterpublics in the political life of democracies, Su…Read more
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11Philosophical Reflections on Child Poverty and EducationStudies in Philosophy and Education 42 (1): 49-63. 2023.The harmful effects of Covid 19 on children living in poverty have refocused attention on the complex nature of child poverty and the vexed question of its relationship to education. The paper examines a tension at the heart of much discussion of child poverty and education. On the one hand, education is often regarded as essential for children’s flourishing and a means by which children can “escape” poverty; yet on the other hand, education systems, institutions, and practices, often reflect an…Read more
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10Anarchism, Utopias and Philosophy of EducationJournal of Philosophy of Education 35 (4): 627-646. 2001.This paper presents a discussion of some central ideas in anarchist thought, alongside an account of experiments in anarchist education. In the course of the discussion, I try to challenge certain preconceptions about anarchism, especially concerning the anarchist view of human nature. I address the questions of whether or not anarchism is utopian, what this means, and what implications these ideas may have for dominant paradigms in philosophy of education.
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6Lessons from a New Science? On Teaching Happiness in SchoolsJournal of Philosophy of Education 42 (3-4): 575-590. 2008.Recent media reports about new programmes for ‘happiness lessons’ in schools signal a welcome concern with children’s well-being. However, as I shall argue, the presuppositions of the discourse in which many of these proposals are framed, and their orientation towards particular strands of positive psychology, involve ideas about human life that are, in an important sense, anti-educational.