 | Beckett, David & John O'Toole, Educational Research: Creative Thinking and Doing, (Oxford) 2010Educational Research: Creative Thinking and Doing is an engaging and accessible introduction to the broad field of educational research. It demonstrates how to use research to think about issues arising from classroom settings, organisations, or wider professional activities. http://www.oup.com.au/titles/higher_ed/education/9780195518313 |
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 | Besley, Tina (A.C.) & Peters, Michael A., Subjectivity and Truth: Foucault, Education, and the Culture of Self, (Peter Lang) 2007This book focuses on Foucault's later work and his (re)turn to 'the hermeneutics of the subject', exploring the implications of his thinking for education, pedagogy, and related disciplines. What and who is the subject of education and what are the forms of self-constitution? Chapters investigate Foucault's notion of 'the culture of self' in relation to questions concerning truth (parrhesia or free speech) and subjectivity, especially with reference to the literary genres of confession and biography, and the contemporary political forms of individualization (governmentality). |
 | Thrupp, Martin & Irwin, Ruth, Another Decade of New Zealand Education Policy: Where to Now?, (Wilf Malcolm Institute of Educational Research) 2010This collection provides a review of New Zealand education policy under the Labour-led government of 1999-2008 and the emerging policies of the National government elected in November 2008. Nineteen contributors discuss education policy from early childhood through to tertiary and community education. Themes and concerns covered include teaching, learning, diversity, governance, choice, sustainability, privatisation, educational research and New Zealand’s relationship with the Pacific. Another decade of New Zealand education policy: Where to now? argues that Labour did not so much undo the neo-liberal project in New Zealand education as take some of the rough edges off it: producing neo-liberalism tempered with a social conscience. Contributors provide many insights into the nature and impact of recent education policy and likely directions in the future. |
 | Semetsky, Inna, Semiotics Education Experience, (Sense Publishers) 2011“Semiotics Education Experience” is a collection of fifteen essays edited by Inna Semetsky that explores semiotic approaches to education: semiotics of teaching, learning, and curriculum; educational theory and philosophies of Dewey, Peirce, and Deleuze; education as political semiosis; logic and mathematics; visual signs; semiotics and complexity; semiotics and ethics of the self. This is a landmark collection of cross-disciplinary chapters by international scholars that mark out the appeal and significance of a semiotic approach to education. As Marcel Danesi reminds us in the Foreword, Vygotsky construed learning theory as the science of signs. Semetsky's collection should be widely read by students and scholars in education, philosophy, futures studies, cultural studies, and related disciplines. It deserves the widest dissemination." Michael A Peters, Professor, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign |
 | White, E. Jayne & Peters, Michael A., Bakhtinian Pedagogy, (Peter Lang) 2011This collection of essays brings Bakhtinian ideas into dialogue with educational practice across cultural and pedagogical boundaries. These encounters offer fresh perspectives on contemporary issues in education, and consider pedagogical responses that are framed within a dialogic imperative. The book also pioneers an important discussion about the place of the Bakhtin Circle in educational philosophy today. Drawing on the historical and contemporary scholarship that has already taken place in education to date, the book emphasizes the living nature of language as intentional acts that take place within learning relationships. Consideration is given to the wider contexts in which pedagogy takes place, and shifts the role of the teacher as expert transmitter of knowledge to dialogic partner in learning. Bakhtinian Pedagogy is particularly suitable for undergraduate and postgraduate teacher education courses that focus on pedagogical studies in early childhood, primary, secondary, and tertiary learning. It is also a suitable text for educational philosophy students at postgraduate level. |
 | Marginson, S., Murphy, P. & Peters, M., Imagination: Three Models of Imagination in the Age of the Knowledge Economy, (Peter Lang) 2010Advancement in the arts and sciences is a primary driver of economic production and social policy in post-industrial societies. Imagination steps back and asks 'what advances the arts and sciences?' This book explores the collective, social and global dimension of human imagining-and the ambivalent relationship of social institutions, including universities, schools, economies, media and culture industries, to the collective imagination. Basic discovery requires high levels of creative thinking: Imagination looks at the social conditions that make path-breaking thought possible on a large scale. It examines the role of aesthetic, pictorial, digital, paradoxical and other imaginative styles of thinking, and the times and places in which such styles become socially prominent and a significant force in economic and cultural production. It looks at successful societies as they are approaching their peak, when new ideas are driving them forward. |
 | Farquhar, Sandy, Ricoeur, Identity and Early Childhood, (Rowman and Littlefield) 2010Early childhood education in Western society has come under increasing scrutiny by governments that see early education as an important factor in economic growth and development. Thus, social traditions in the field are increasingly giving way to an intensified focus on marketization and regulation, but with a corresponding diminishing concern for ethics and social participation. Drawing on the work of contemporary French philosopher Paul Ricoeur, Sandy Farquhar analyzes the problematic way in which we become who we are and the discourse that surrounds that learning. The book explores the ethical basis of identity formation in early childhood education and seeks fresh alternatives to commonly accepted perspectives on social policy, education, and the nature of our 'selves.' Farquhar uses Aotearoa New Zealand bicultural curriculum and policy context as examples for developing the theme of curriculum as a contest of ideas and a powerful form of resistance. Promoting the importance of narrative in understanding identity formation, the book elaborates on contemporary themes of difference, ethics, and social justice, calling for a revitalized sense of liberalism and social democracy. |
 | Georgina Stewart, Good Science? The Growing Gap between Power and Education, (Sense Publishers) 2010This work uses narrative research, including accounts of personal experiences, to explore the margins of science and ethics. Boundaries between science and other cultural and disciplinary forms of knowledge are illuminated through studying the inter-relationships between identity, knowledge and power, using narratives both in and as a form of philosophical reflection on educational practice. The story centres on a contemporary real-world context of minority-language science education, showing how this fits into longstanding trans-disciplinary intercultural debates about the nature of science and of knowledge in general. The narrative form is used to bridge and interweave the multiple discourses influencing both the real-world context and the approach to its investigation. This analysis clarifies the linkages between paradigms of critical postcolonial research and post-positivist epistemology, and illustrates how social science, including educational research, may use science and technology to assist, rather than delimit, our understanding of complex human phenomena such as education, culture, language and science. Those interested in reading this book will include critical scholars, educators and practitioners of indigenous knowledge, critical sociolinguistics and science and multicultural education. |
 | White, E.J. & Johansson, E., Educational research with our youngest: Voices of infants and toddlers, (Springer) 2011Interpreting the voices of under three year olds is central to early childhood education. Yet entering into their life-worlds is fraught with challenges and unrealised possibilities. This ground-breaking book generates a dialogue about the multiple ways researchers have exploited a range of methods for approaching, accessing, understanding and interpreting infant voice. Each chapter explores the kinds of ethical considerations and dilemmas that may arise in this process. The book itself represents a chorus of international voices (researchers, children, teachers and parents), all adding to a discussion about various circumstances, dilemmas and possibilities involved in doing research with our youngest. This book is an essential read for researchers and teachers alike who seek to 'listen' and 'see' very young children with fresh ears and eyes. http://www.springer.com/education+%26+language/book/978-94-007-2393-1 |
 | Roberts, P., Paulo Freire in the 21st Century: Education, Dialogue, and Transformation, (Paradigm) 2010The book explores the implications of Freirean theory for educational practice and shows how Freire can be helpful in bridging different genres and traditions. It addresses a number of themes, questions, and issues that have received relatively little attention to date, including Freire’s conception of the critical intellectual, Freire and the problem of defining literacy, and the possibility of a Freirean response to debates over political correctness. Roberts also puts Freire’s ideas into conversation with writers seldom considered by other Freirean scholars: Israel Scheffler, Fyodor Dostoevsky, and Hermann Hesse, among others. This book makes a distinctive contribution to the international literature on Freire’s work. http://www.paradigmpublishers.com/books/BookDetail.aspx?productID=215151 |
 | Roberts, P., From West to East and Back Again An Educational Reading of Hermann Hesse’s Later Work, (Sense Publishers) 2012Of all the great Western novelists of the twentieth century, the German writer Hermann Hesse is arguably one of the most important for educationists. Paying particular attention to Hesse’s last novel, The Glass Bead Game, and its immediate predecessor, The Journey to the East, this book suggests that Hesse was a man of the West who turned to the idea of ‘the East’ in seeking to understand himself and his society. From these later texts a rich, complex theory of educational transformation emerges. From West to East and Back Again examines the role of dialogue and uncertainty in the transformative process, considers utopian and ritualistic elements in Hesse’s work, and explores the notion of education serving as a bridge between life and death. Hesse’s novels address philosophical themes and questions of enduring significance, and this book will appeal to all who share an interest in human striving and growth. |
 | Roberts, P. & Peters, M.A., Better Worlds: Education, Art, and Utopia, (Lexington Books) 2013Better Worlds: Education, Art, and Utopia provides a fresh examination of utopia and education. Adopting an interdisciplinary approach and drawing on literature and the visual arts as well as traditional non-fiction sources, the authors explore utopia not as a model of social perfection but as the active, imaginative building of better worlds. Utopian questions, they argue, lie at the heart of education, and addressing such questions demands attention not just to matters of theoretical principle but to the particulars of everyday life and experience. Taking utopia seriously in educational thought also involves a consideration of that which is dystopian. Utopia, this book suggests, is not something that is fixed, final, or ever fully realized; instead, it must be constantly recreated, and education, as an ongoing process of reflection, action, and transformation, has a central role to play in this process. |