‘To benefit the world by whatever means possible’: Adolescents' constructed meanings for global citizenship

Abstract

This article reports on the ways that 77 students in an international studies programme constructed meanings for global citizenship. The focus was on their personal meanings for the topic and how they articulated a global identity with their national civic beliefs. Data were collected from online discussion boards, written essays and 20 interviews. A key finding was that the students' political language for global citizenship, examined here in terms of purpose, membership and relationship with national citizenship, was predominantly a moral commitment framed in universal language. A second finding was that the students understood global citizenship as a heterogeneous and complex affiliation shaped by a range of sources. The implication is that citizenship education emphasizing a narrow notion of patriotism may encourage students to disengage from civic life because it does not represent their lived experiences and identities. Insights for making citizenship education practices more inclusive are discussed.

Youth in a global world: attitudes towards globalization and global citizenship among university students in Hong Kong

“…A few exceptions stand out. First, Myers (2010) provides a fruitful discussion in documenting the discursive understanding of global citizenship of students in Pennsylvania through a series of in-depth interviews, bringing out the dispute about whether or not global citizenship is innate (i.e., membership belongs to all humans) or acquired, whether it is a moral commitment or a legal status, and whether or not it is compatible with national citizenship. Roudometof (2005) took note of this tension early on in his discussion on "rooted cosmopolitanism", where global and local are seen as reconcilable through the emergence of "glocalization" as an expression of manifestations of the global in the context of the local (Robertson, 1994).…”

Fostering Global Citizenship Education for Teachers Through Online Research

“…Studies of global citizenship education have found that teachers in the United States, compared to their colleagues in Canada, Western Europe, and Southeast Asia, are less enthusiastic about teaching global citizenship and prefer a national model (Myers, 2010 Harshman and Augustine Rapoport, 2010). Building on these fi ndings, a study to understand how teachers in Indiana conceptualize and teach about global citizenship found that teachers tend to rationalize the unfamiliar concepts of global citizenship through more familiar concepts related to national citizenship (Rapoport, 2010).…”

An Exploration into the Teaching of Cosmopolitan Ideals: The Case of ‘Global Citizenship’

“…I would suggest that Myers' (2010) findings are representative of my earlier points concerning the separation of cosmopolitan ideals and the implementation of global citizenship as a concept. Firstly, Myers' study reinforces the case that there is a disjuncture between what is national and what is global.…”

“…As a result of this, Myers (2010) argues that whilst a global awareness has the ability to enhance our moral outlook towards the world as a whole, it is potentially divisive with regard to our local, national and cultural affiliations. Myers interviewed 77 adolescent students about their views of global citizenship, which they were taught within an international school in the United States.…”