Scopic Systems, Pipes, Models and Transfers in the Global Circulation of Educational Knowledge and Practices

Sobe, Noah W.; Ortegón, Nicole D.

doi:10.1177/016146810911101404

Cited by 1 publication

(1 citation statement)

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“…Adaptation became an object of scientific study as part of the economic reorganization and administrative measures of the European colonial project. And in Sadler's formulation we see a historical instance of acclimatization reasoning being applied to the social world with tremendous consequence for determining who was and who wasn't suited for various educational initiatives (Sobe & Ortegón, 2009;Sobe, 2013)-with the schooling of indigenous and ethnic/racial minority populations being one of the most egregious historical examples of different methods and different standards being applied to particular "kinds" of people based on outsiders' perceptions of worth, aptitude and potential.…”

Section: Context Problemsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Exploding the Cube: Revisioning “Context” in the Field of Comparative Education

Sobe¹,

Kowalczyk²

2013

CICE

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This article problematizes some of the ways that the issue of "context" has been treated in comparative education scholarship. We critique the cube approach recommended by Bray and Thomas (1995) as well as the common recirculations of Sadler's (1900) garden metaphor. Borrowing a set of analytic concepts from Bruno Latour ( 2004), we suggest that too often in the field of comparative education the issue of context is treated as a "matter of fact" when instead context should be revisioned as a "matter of concern" and one of the central research concerns in our field. We propose the concept of 'big C' Context to link 'little c' contexts to power/knowledge concerns and the historical discourses that govern what it is possible to think and do.Despite notable recent efforts to focus research attention on the importance of taking "context" into account (Cowen, 2006;Crossley, 2009;Vavrus & Bartlett, 2009), the field of comparative education still remains hobbled by unsophisticated and inadequately theorized notions of context. This article explores the ways that establishing the context of an education policy, practice, institution, or system is caught up in the mobilization of norms, power relations, regulative principles, technologies, and strategies. Ascriptions of context can operate as externally imposed categories that enclose, disable, and deny access to resources, opportunities, agency, and subject positions. In like measure, inscriptions of context can sometimes be enabling, increase access to resources and opportunities, and generally privilege particular cultural groups or particular social settings (Sobe & Kowalczyk, 2012). The ethical, social, cultural and political significance of context thus demands that researchers pay careful attention to ways they use the concept of context in their research.In this piece, we problematize some of the ways that the issue of context has been treated in comparative education scholarship. In particular, we critique the "cube" approach recommended by Bray and Thomas (1995) as well as the feckless and regrettably common recirculations of Sadler's (1900) garden metaphor. Rather than thinking of "contextualization" or "establishing the context" as activity that takes place at the front-end as part of a preliminary "setting the stage" for a research project, we propose-returning to the word's etymological meaning of "inter-weaving"-that the problem of context be something that demands the researcher's attention across the entirety of a research endeavor. Borrowing a set of analytic concepts from Bruno Latour (2004), we suggest that too often in the field of comparative education the issue of context is treated as a "matter of fact" when instead context should be revisioned as a "matter of concern" and one of the central research topics in our field. As part of revisioning context as a matter of concern we discuss big 'C' Context as a set of historical Discourses (Gee, 1990) that interweave actors and objects and govern what it is possible to think and do. By little 'c' context...

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Section: Context Problemsmentioning

confidence: 99%