Course Syllabi in Faculties of Education - (Bloomsbury Critical Education) by André Elias Mazawi & Michelle Stack (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

Course Syllabi in Faculties of Educationproblematizes one of the least researched phenomena in teacher education, the design of course syllabi, using critical and decolonial approaches. This book looks at the struggles that scholars, policy makers, and educators from a diverse range of countries including Australia, Canada, India, Iran, Palestine, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the USA, and Zambia face as they design course syllabi in higher education settings. The chapter authors argue that course syllabi are political constructions, representing intense sites of struggles over visions of teacher education and visions of society. As such, they are deeply immersed in what Walter Mignolo calls the "geopolitics of knowledge". Authors also show how syllabi have become akin to contractual documents that define relations between instructors and students Based on a set of empirically grounded studies that are compared and contrasted, the chapters offer a clearer picture of how course syllabi function within distinct socio-political, economic, and historical contexts of practice and teacher education.

Review Quotes

Course Syllabi is an absolute treasure. Any thought you might have entertained that course syllabi are technical tools has vanished. This is an important new contribution to the politics of knowledge.
Susan L. Robertson, Professor of Sociology of Education, University of Cambridge, UK

Mazawi, Stack and their contributors have provided an exceptionally valuable resource which reminds us of the inextricable link between instructors' biographies and the educational programs in which students participate. More importantly, Course Syllabi in Faculties of Education offers those of us engaged in creating syllabi, profound narratives and insightful analyses of how our lived experiences, personal investments, and scholarly judgements animate the knowledge and opportunities we wish to provide students. In addition to affording insights into the cultural and political contexts of schooling in some nine countries, this book leads us to consider: What if we were to co-create course syllabi with students whose learning needs, interests and aspirations we aim to satisfy?
Carl E. James, Professor & Jean Augustine Chair in Education, Community & Diaspora, York University, Toronto, Canada

Theoretically sophisticated and practically useful, this tightly edited, ground-breaking and unique volume addresses the challenge of designing course syllabi in faculties of education across a range of contexts in the global North and South. Informed by critical and post-colonial perspectives that acknowledge the deeply political nature of education and curricula, and what counts as legitimate pedagogical knowledge and professional practice, the contributors provide richly detailed accounts of the contingent and situated struggles and contestations faced by syllabus developers as they strive to articulate and enact their visions for teacher education.
Ronald G. Sultana, Professor of Education and Director of the Euro-Mediterranean Centre for Educational Research, University of Malta, Malta

About the Author

André Elias Mazawi is Professor of Sociology of Education and Higher Education at the University of British Columbia, Canada, and Affiliate Professor at the Euro-Mediterranean Centre for Educational Research at the University of Malta, Malta. He is also an Associate Researcher with the University of Geneva-based Equipe Dimensions Internationales de l'Education (ERDIE).

Michelle Stack is Associate Professor in the Department of Educational Studies, University of British Columbia, Canada. She is also the author of Global University Ranking and the Mediatization of Higher Education, and she is editor of a second upcoming book on university rankings and journal impact factors. Michelle has led several courses and workshops focused on building the capacity of teachers, youth, clinicians, scholars and scholar to engage media to expand policy debates. Her central research interest concerns how people, knowledge and institutions are categorized and the influence of these categorizations on our ability to grapple with "wicked problems" including inequity and climate change.