Table Of ContentEDUCATION, POLITICS AND PUBLIC LIFE
Conflicts in
Curriculum Theory
Challenging Hegemonic
Epistemologies
Second Edition
Foreword by Dwayne Huebner
João M. Paraskeva
Education, Politics and Public Life
More information about this series at
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João M. Paraskeva
Conflicts
in Curriculum Theory
Challenging Hegemonic Epistemologies
Second Edition
Foreword by Dwayne Huebner
João M. Paraskeva
University of Strathclyde
Glasgow, UK
Education, Politics and Public Life
ISBN 978-3-030-77422-6 ISBN 978-3-030-77420-2 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-77420-2
1st edition: © João M. Paraskeva, 2011
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In the memory of my father and my mother
A Foreword---Second Edition: Theory
Not as a Schema for Acting, But for
“ ”
Looking
“ ”
I tried to see education, specifically curriculum, through different lens, and
on this, Paraskeva follows my lead. (Huebner—Foreword Second Edition)
In 2001, João Paraskeva asked if he could look at my published and
unpublished papers, and lecture notes accumulated during twenty-five
years at Teachers College, Columbia University and if he could interview
me on matters related with the curriculum field. The request occurred
because he was writing a dissertation on the curriculum field using
Michael Apple’s work, and Apple was his doctoral advisor at Wisconsin.
Michael Apple, in the late sixties, was my advisee at Teachers College—
where he began to develop his orientation to the field. Now, in 2020,
Paraskeva has invited me to once again get involved in this so-called
curriculum theory field.
Much has happened in the fifty years between those days of advising
Apple and today. In 1982, I left the curriculum field to pursue educa-
tional endeavors more attuned to my interests. Since then, I have done
verylittle,infactalmostnoreadinginthefield.VeryoccasionallyIwould
be asked to do minor things in the field—a lecture now and then, even
a short two-week seminar. One of my stipulations for re-entry was that I
would not need to read recent literature in the field, for little of it inter-
estedme.Paraskeva’sinvitationtowriteaforewordforthissecondedition
vii
viii AFOREWORD—SECONDEDITION:THEORYNOTASASCHEMAFOR…
of Conflicts in Curriculum Theory: Challenging Hegemonic Epistemolo-
gies finds me with a thirty-eight-year gap in my awareness of work in the
field—one I am not inclined to fill.
My background in this field dates back to 1947, the year I began a
teacher education program at the University of Chicago. It was the year
Ralph Tyler and Virgil Herrick sponsored the well-known “curriculum
theory conference,” which brought together a variety of curriculum
specialists. As a newcomer to the study of education, the conference
meant little to me. My advisor at that time was Virgil Herrick, who left
Chicago for Wisconsin at the end of academic year. My new advisor,
Paul Eberman, left for Wisconsin the following year, but before leaving
Chicago he invited me to Wisconsin for further study.
My studies at Wisconsin were primarily in statistics, psychology, and
sociology with a continuing seminar in curriculum issues—a seminar
shaped by Virgil Herrick’s interests. Ralph Tyler’s “Basic Principles” was
acknowledged as the best way to think about designing curriculum, but
Virgil Herrick had questions about such things as scope, sequence, and
the nature of learning experiences.
My interest in a possible theory of curriculum began at Wisconsin
through my study of sociology. It became my major preoccupation when
the faculty of the Department of Curriculum and Teaching, Teachers
College, invited me to join their faculty in 1957. Their intent was to
develop graduate courses that looked at the foundations of curriculum.
Arno Bellack and I were asked to lead that effort. At that time Ralph
Tyler’s “basic principles” or Alice Miel’s “emerging curriculum” were
more or less the accepted approaches to curriculum design. Learning
theory was—and unfortunately it continues to be—the major tool of
implementation.
Using Paraskeva’s terms, these accepted approaches were “epistemi-
cides” of alternative ways of looking at the curriculum phenomena. For
me “theory” (theorein) was not a schema for “acting,” but a schema for
“looking.” Hence my search into a variety of disciplines and traditions
to identify better ways to see what was going on in educational settings.
My first course in curriculum theory, in the late fifties or early sixties,
seemed to be at the beginning of this fifty or sixty year of something
called “curriculum theory.” Over the years many others seemed to share
that interest. Unfortunately, the word “theory” became a catch-all for
AFOREWORD—SECONDEDITION:THEORYNOTASASCHEMAFOR… ix
almost any kind of discourse about education. Hence Bill Pinar’s “com-
plicated conversation”—itself an “epistemicide”—for the historical study
of discourse about curriculum and education.
In this book Paraskeva enters that fray. Chapters 2 through 6 provide
a look at more than a century of those discourses. He reviews a rich
collection of such materials and locates these various discourses in the
intellectual, social, economic, and political events or trends of the time.
Following that flow (in Paraskeva’s term “a river”) of language usage
about curriculum over time is obviously a difficult historical task. Others
interested in curriculum such as Herb Kliebard, William Shubert, and
othershavealsoworkedawayatdevelopinganhistoricalawareness.While
after so many years away from the field I am in no position to compare
Paraskeva’s historical work with that others, it seems that Paraskeva’s
“Conflicts in Curriculum Theory” relates the history of the field with
muchbroadernationalandinternationalcomplexsocialissues.Idoknow
thatthecraftofhistoryinvolvesadiscipline,notsimplyoflanguageusage,
but of careful responsiveness to the previous and current work of others
who share, or have shared, responsibility for a field, a responsiveness that
one identifies in Paraskeva’s approach.
But my interest in the field was not historical. I tried to see educa-
tion,specificallycurriculum,throughdifferentlens,andonthis,Paraskeva
follows my lead. I tried to change the language landscape, not the land-
scapes of schools or classrooms. For example, I questioned the predom-
inate focus on the word “learning.” In Paraskevas’ language, “learn-
ing” seemed to be an “epistimicide.” It hid more penetrating ways
of viewing educational phenomena. My legitimation for doing so was
different than Paraskeva’s though. Hans Vaihinger’s 1911 philosophy of
“As If” acknowledged that knowledge can be contradictory or false, and
yet one must often act “as If” it was true. R. G. H. Siu reinforced that
view in his 1957 “The Tao of Science” which recognizes “No Knowl-
edge”asanessentialaspectofthescientificenterprise.Finally,myreading
inavarietyofreligioustraditionsreinforcedVaihinger’s“AsIf”construct.
All knowledge is idolatrous if taken as final, rather than a stage on the
variouspathwaysofdiscovery.“TheCloudofUnknowing”isanexample
of such a religious contribution.
BillPinarcontinuedthetraditionoflookingateducationalphenomena
in a variety of different ways, frequently with prescriptive implication.
Manyalsotooktheresultsofmylookingasalsohavingprescriptiveintent.
In so doing, they became agents of social change, failing to acknowledge
x AFOREWORD—SECONDEDITION:THEORYNOTASASCHEMAFOR…
thattheywereengaginginpoliticalactivity.MichaelAppleacknowledged
thatfactandextensivelyexploredthesocial/politicalcontroloftheeduca-
tionalphenomena.WhilefollowingMichaelApple’stradition,Paraskeva’s
advocates for a different epistemological framework to explore education
though.
Paraskeva’s book suggests that the three or four academic generations
which followed my initial work in this so-called curriculum theory field
still seem to be searching for a “raison d’etre,” and still lack a common
discipline or disciplines. Paraskeva’s introduces the metaphors of a “crit-
ical curriculum river” and “itinerant curriculum theory,” as a possible
contribution to the search for “commonality” within the field.
One of the reasons for the difficulty building a shared language is also
illustrated by Paraskeva’s work: too many so-called curriculum specialists
or “theorists” conflate “curriculum” with the broader term “education.”
While Paraskeva doesn’t explicitly point out how these issues conflate, it
can be seen through a careful reading of his volume.
One can speak of education without speaking of curriculum, but it is
almostimpossibletotalkaboutcurriculumwithouthavingsomenotionof
“education.”Theresultisavast,widerangingandsometimemeandering
literature. Paraskeva tracks the historical flow of that literature, identifies
several of its conflicts and challenges others, such as the so-called recon-
ceptualistmovement.Herecognizesepistemologicalproblemsinthefield
by looking at the forms and place of knowledge in curriculum by those
writing about education and in the forms of knowledge used by student
and teachers in the classroom. He emphasizes the importance of critical
theory—its emphasis on the social and political grounds of all discourse
(hence his focus on the colonization of discourse), and the emancipatory
possibilities of critical theory.
Paraskeva’s work is serious work. His work is one more attempt to
challenge the vast, incoherent landscape of discourse about curriculum.
But obviously the curriculum field is not yet a mature academic disci-
pline. Acknowledging the works of others, rigorously criticizing it, and
making an effort to build a shared language continue to be problems
within the field. A struggle for dominance of the field seems more preva-
lentthanasearchforalanguagetoinformothereducatorsandthepublic
about the wonders and complexity of education. But the diversity of
curriculumliteratureindicatesthatproblemsstillexistinthefield,manyof
them definitional or conceptual in nature. Ludwig Wittgenstein claimed
that many philosophical problems were primarily problems of language
