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EDS 814: Engendered Education
Module convenor: Carolyn Jackson
Team Taught
This module explores the relationship between gender, culture and education, historically and socially, and engages critically with feminist approaches to the subject. It focuses attention on the ways in which gender relations, gender identities and gendered modes of thought both produce and are produced by education. Important themes which will be addressed throughout the course are the relationship between gender and identity; points of transition at which gender becomes important, sometimes super-salient; the intersections between gender, class and other cultural identities; and 'teaching as caring'.
Our consideration of these themes will include examination of educational policy, institutional structures and governance, educational processes and curricula, and student and teacher cultures, experiences and relationships. The course enables students to enlarge their understanding of education as a crucial site for the formation and experiencing of personal identity; for the operation of social inclusion and exclusion, and for the production of gendered knowledge. We encourage students to draw on a range of evidence including primary sources, empirical data, recent publications, the Internet and their own experiences in order to develop critical skills and broaden their knowledge of gender and education.
Brief syllabus
- The provision of education, feminisation of education and controversies in education for girls and women in the late 19 th and early 20 th centuries.
- Issues in co-education. Controversies over segregation of boys and girls in school and classes.
- Current debates about the relative academic achievements of boys and girls. Are boys really 'underachieving'?
- Classed femininities - exploring the influence of class processes on experiences in education and the shape of learning trajectories.
- Gender and teaching. Gender, Teaching and Management; the experiences of male staff in early years education.
- Doing research on gendered education; using historical and archival research; doing contemporary and field-study based research.
Assessment
Assessment is by means of an oral presentation to other course members on any aspect of gender and education and a written assignment of 3,500 words on any topic relevant to gender and education.
Preparatory Reading
DFES (2007) Gender and
Education: The evidence on pupils in England.
Francis, B. and Skelton, C. (2005) Reassessing Gender and Achievement: Questioning contemporary key debates. London: Routledge.
Hunt, Felicity (ed) (1987) Lessons for Life: The Schooling of Girls andWomen 1850-1950. Oxford: Blackwell.
Osler, A. and Vincent, K. (2003) Girls and exclusion: Rethinking the agenda. London: RoutledgeFalmer.
Purvis, June (1991) A History of Women's Education in England. Buckingham:Open University Press.
Riddell, S. and Tett, L. (2006) Gender and Teaching: Where have all the men gone? Edinburgh: Dunedin Academic Press.
Skelton, C., Francis, B. and Smulyan, L. (eds) (2006) The SAGE Handbook
of Gender and Education. London: Sage.
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