General Themes present articles that discuss issues in curriculum studies that challenge disciplinary, genre, and textual boundaries. Articles discussing curriculum studies as a field of study or/and its relationship with other areas in education are also welcome. If the topics of your article may not fit into the following sections, you can submit it to General Themes.
The Cultural Studies and Curriculum section of JCT welcomes manuscripts that address the intersection of two fields: “cultural studies” and “curriculum.” Cultural studies is an interdisciplinary field of research and teaching that investigates the ways that “culture” creates, transforms, and reinforces social relations—and the structures of power that are central to them—through every day experiences and interactions. Braiding fields like cultural anthropology, sociology, economics, history, gender studies, sexuality studies, and race studies, to name a few, cultural studies draws on methods and theories across fields to address sociopolitical and cultural questions that are resonant in contemporary societies and their associated popular cultures. Building on Stuart Hall’s (1981) argument that popular culture can be sites of “consent and resistance” (p. 239), this section seeks manuscripts that use the multiplicity of cultural studies as it intersects with questions of curricula and curriculum theorizing. Therefore, this section is as much about the field of cultural studies as it is about how popular culture creates curriculum that impacts educational spaces and places, both in and outside of schools and systems of schooling. Authors are urged to send manuscripts that not only advance the intersection of curriculum studies and cultural studies, but to submit work that attends to the fields in their historical and contemporary iterations in ways that commit to social justice in both their arguments and citations. Authors should consider questions such as: What is learned through popular culture as it relates to educational spaces and places? Using curriculum theory, what are the cultural politics of language and communication? What curricula are found in the history and contemporary iterations of media/technology? How might curriculum studies reflect on the cultural traditions of and across industries? What systems of power are learned or reinforced across forms of media and/or consumer culture?
The International Curriculum Discourses section is committed to developing international dialogue on curriculum issues. Topics including the following are encouraged: 1) studies and commentaries that draw upon postcolonial theories that deconstruct colonizing discourses in curriculum and educational issues writ large; 2) discussions of space and place from a geographic perspective and issues of borders as fluid and shifting ; 3) comparative education, international education, and global education discussions that interrupt deficit theories of the Other or analyze the tendency toward victory narratives and the standardizing/globalization of curriculoum; and, 4) discussions that highlight issues, such as global poverty, eco-feminism, and neo-colonial market forces in curriculum with an international perspective. This section is a place for discussions that complicates the issues of difference from an international perspective and aims to move the discussion beyond realist tales of practice.
This section welcomes manuscripts that address the theme of “engaging texts.” Engaging texts is to be understood broadly to include reading, writing, and interpreting texts in various forms, not only books, arts, and film, but also reading and writing the world and reading and writing oneself into the world. Authors might consider such questions as: In what ways do literacy practices that have multiple roles, purposes, contexts, modes of representation engage readers? What is the relationship between reading texts and the context of lived experience? In what ways does reading provide a theoretical base for my work? For what purpose do I read? What reading/textual engagement has changed my life? What texts have changed the lives of students? What readings don't work? What are some different types of texts students encounter? How does culture affect literacy? How might literacy be considered a political act?
This section also welcomes book review essays (length 2000-3000 words including references). These submissions should contextualize, review, and evaluate recent additions to the field of curriculum theory.
The Higher Education section of JCT will support the existing historical and conceptual aims of the journal in that the articles selected for publication will expand the reconceptualist movement in curriculum theorizing to encompass the work of post-secondary educators. Subsequently, the section is committed to providing a forum for a critical and lively dialogue on higher education curriculum issues such as but not limited to: (1) the influence of gender, sexuality, cultural/racial and or socio-political difference on teaching and learning in college settings; (2) the relationship between higher education and sustainability; (3) evolving conceptions of general education and liberal learning in 21st century higher education; (4) disciplinary or/and interdisciplinary advancement; (5) the establishment of spaces for autobiographical accounts that critique the conventional types of knowledge that are valued in higher education settings; and (6) curriculum based approaches to crisis management.
In addition, traditional disciplinary, genre, and textual boundaries specifically within higher education will be complicated, radicalized, and thoroughly interrogated.Moreover, special attention will be paid to studies that explore the fore-referenced topics with a specific focus on equity oriented change that goes beyond the limitations of identity politics.
In every case, copyright of work appearing in JCT is retained by the author. In accordance with its mandate to promote discussion on matters of curriculum, the Foundation for Curriculum Theory permits limited reproduction of parts of JCT. Individual articles may be reprinted for educational purposes, provided that no fees (other than copying costs) are charged.
For information regarding more extensive copying or reproduction for other purposes, contact:
editors@jctonline.org
