Fred Dervin

Fred Dervin
University of Helsinki | HY · Department of Teacher Education

PhD (Turku, Finland), DÈL (Sorbonne, France)

About

344
Publications
37,555
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Citations since 2017
212 Research Items
1870 Citations
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Introduction
Fred Dervin is Professor of Multicultural Education at the University of Helsinki, Finland. Prof. Dervin specializes in intercultural education, the sociology of multiculturalism, and student and academic mobility. He has widely published in different languages on identity, the 'intercultural' and mobility/migration (over 170 articles and 70 books). His latest books include Dervin (2022) Fragments in Interculturality: A Reflexive Approach (Springer).

Publications

Publications (344)
Book
This book starts from the premise that honest and constructive dialogue between scholars and educators of interculturality, especially from different geopolitical spheres, is needed more than ever. The book is about the important and yet contested notion of interculturality—a notion used in different fields of research. It was co-written by two sch...
Book
Full-text available
This book continues the author’s long-term reflections (over 20 years of scholarship and experience in intercultural communication education) around the fascinating and yet contestable notion of interculturality in education. As an unstable and polysemic notion, interculturality deserves to be opened up again and again and there is a need to engage...
Chapter
In this second dream the metaphor of bedazzlement, inspired by a musical piece by Finnish composer Kaija Saariaho, the author (Fred) first tells us that the dream is momentary and that it will change as he himself evolves in his engagement with interculturality as an object of research and teaching–learning. After highlighting several major problem...
Book
Full-text available
This book proposes a new method for working on the complex and polysemic notion of interculturality, aimed at scholars, students and educators who have an interest in enriching and challenging their own take on this somewhat controversial scientific notion. Multiple examples of observability made by the authors are provided to illustrate the method...
Article
Global rankings on the performance of systems of education are ubiquitous in education. Finland is often put forward as one of the leading forces of education. For years, thanks to its reputation in the PISA studies, Finland has attracted thousands of ‘educational tourists’ who want to unlock the secrets of this small Nordic country. While these to...
Book
Preparing teachers to work with and for diversity in their classrooms and beyond is an objective that seems to be globally accepted in pre-service and in-service teacher education. However, what diversity means, what it entails and how to engage with diverse individuals in educational contexts can take on multiple shapes in different parts of the w...
Chapter
This chapter starts from the need to decentre from overly Western-/Euro-centric ways of dealing with interculturality as an object of research and education. And while democracy-talk has started to ‘creep in’ intercultural communication education, under the leadership of e.g. the Council of Europe, other voices from the periphery (e.g. the Global S...
Chapter
Internationalisation of universities has not only resulted in the strengthening of English as a “hypercentral language” (de Swaan, 2001) but has also brought a diverse ‘language galaxy’ on campuses around the world. Nevertheless, the university environment, through the multifaceted intercultural academic encounters it triggers, does not necessarily...
Book
Full-text available
Offering a unique reading experience, this book examines the epistemologies of interculturality and explores potential routes to review and revisit the notion anew. Grounded in different sociocultural, economic and political perspectives around the world, interculturality in education and research bears a paradoxical attribute of 'contradictions' a...
Chapter
Dialogue 4 is at the core of Chapter 11. It starts with reactions from one teacher on the students’ commentaries from previous chapters as a way of reinforcing reflections on supercriticality. In the rest of the chapter, the idea of surveying oneself is worked upon, using pictorial representations of ‘Chinese daily life’ chosen by the teacher. The...
Chapter
This chapter serves as an introduction to the book. It starts by reminding the reader that interculturality is an omnipresent phenomenon in both daily life and scholarship. The polysemy and various ideological positions of interculturality are also highlighted. The central concept of supercriticality is then defined and the author explains how it w...
Chapter
This chapter presents the first dialogue between the teachers and the students. Based on questions submitted by the students before the dialogue, this chapter demonstrates how supercriticality could function when answering questions about interculturality as an object of research and education. The principle of crossing bridges to enable ‘speaking...
Chapter
As a diverse and complex country China lays a strong emphasis on the inclusion and unity of its many and varied Minzu “ethnic” groups in all aspects of life. One cannot understand China seriously without taking this encompassing element into account when trying to make sense of various aspects of the Middle Kingdom. The notion of Minzu is often (mi...
Chapter
This chapter focuses on an approach to diversity in education, with a focus on languages and literacies, which has not been systematically discussed globally: Chinese Minzu education. As a unitary multiethnic country, China is composed of 56 Minzu (“ethnic”) groups, which are omnipresent in economic-political, social and educational discussions and...
Research
Full-text available
This book project presents how the author has turned his research ideas about interculturality and identity into artworks. KASVOT, a plural noun in the Finnish language, means face. The use of the Finnish word hints at the temporal, spatial and ecological transformations of our identity, symbolized by the complexity of our faces.
Chapter
This chapter represents the focal point of the book. Five ‘Chinese’ things (calligraphy, chopsticks, jade, mahjong, Resident Identity Card) are introduced one by one and problematised with and for interculturality. The chapter is meant to serve as support for reader reflexivity and is written as such. Questions are proposed to reflect further on wh...
Chapter
This chapter problematises the polysemous notion of interculturality, which is at the centre of the book. As a ‘Western-centric’ notion, the authors argue that it needs to be unthought and rethought to allow research and education discourses to evolve constantly, including e.g. more marginalised voices in the process. The notion is decomposed in th...
Chapter
The more-than-human is discussed in this chapter. The authors provide two useful reviews of 1. Research on the more-than-human in the human and social sciences; 2. Previous studies of interculturality that have given space to things. Based on discussions of these studies, the authors summarize what things are/not, can/not ‘do’ to us and with us and...
Chapter
This chapter serves as the introduction to the book. Fred Dervin starts by explaining why a book on the more-than-human is needed in the broad field of intercultural communication education. He also reminds the reader that things are omnipresent and do influence constantly the way we interact with others interculturally. Dervin shows that things ha...
Chapter
This chapter closes the book, suggesting that the more-than-human can offer unparalleled insights into interculturality. Summarizing the main observations made throughout the book and especially in Chap. 4 (Chinese things for interculturality), Fred Dervin reveals the multiple positions that things offer us for interculturality. What things can ‘do...
Chapter
This chapter deals with what the authors refer to as their ‘core voltage’ (what constitutes their own ‘vital energy’ in researching and educating for interculturality in their specific context(s) and through their writing, researching and teaching). The authors discuss the struggles and burdens that they have faced/are facing; share snapshots of th...
Chapter
This chapter introduces the topic of the book arguing that encounters and dialogue between scholars and educators of interculturality, especially from different geopolitical spheres, are needed more than ever. The authors also justify the need for books like this one; they then present and problematize their conditions of knowledge co-construction...
Chapter
This chapter allows looking behind the stage of what Through the Looking-glass of Interculturality: Autocritiques is about. It offers peeking into the authors’ different (and, at times, similar) realities—paralleling them. Meeting, getting to know each other and writing the book together from a distance required the authors to ‘grow’ closer to each...
Chapter
This chapter revolves around the idea of fragments in intercultural research. Based on a Latin word, fragmentum, for a remnant, a piece broken off, from frangere for to break, the authors argue that the very word fragments allows them to identify and free themselves from (their fear) of contradictions and indoctrination in research and education. F...
Chapter
This penultimate chapter guides the reader towards unthinking and rethinking what they can take away from the book. After problematizing the idea of moving forward in research and education, the need to destabilize one’s rhetorics of interculturality is reinforced, building up on previous chapters. These movements urge everyone involved with interc...
Chapter
Based on two neologisms, devenir-être (Be(ing)coming) and devenir-langue (Becoming-language/Languaging), the chapter engages with the idea that the (endless) processes of becoming are inherent to the work of the scholar and educator interested in interculturality. Attempting to be-come (together with others, ideas, concepts, objects) and to become-...
Book
This book examines today's central and yet often misunderstood and misconstrued notion of interculturality. It specifically focuses on one aspect of intercultural awareness that has been ignored in research and education: the presence and influence of things on the way we experience, do, and reflect on interculturality. This book provides the reade...
Chapter
This chapter focuses on the reflections and comments made by the students about the first intercultural dialogue. They use interesting words and phrases to describe how they perceive supercriticality in the dialogue: e.g., ‘to dismantle questions’, ‘to expand the breadth and depth of thinking’. All in all, thinking big and deep about interculturali...
Chapter
This second dialogue introduces further critical aspects to the definition(s) and use(s) of interculturality in research and education. Culture as an alibi, differilitude, accepting the imperfection of communication and advising versus preparing for interculturality are problematised first. Pictorial representations of interculturality (photographs...
Chapter
This chapter explores the power of metaphors to problematize, unthink and rethink interculturality as an object of research and education. Following Dialogue 3, the students came up with a long list of metaphors, many from the Chinese context, to deepen their take on interculturality. As such they used idioms, mythical figures, characters from fict...
Chapter
Chapter 9 presents the students’ reactions to dialogue 3. Without any surprise the metaphors introduced in the dialogue caught the attention of most students and forced them to deepen their unthinking and rethinking of interculturality. The idea of performance as discussed by the students shows their awareness of its influence on what we do and say...
Chapter
This chapter problematises identity and othering, while presenting ‘Chinese stories of interculturality’, from the perspectives of the students. As a student puts it, identity and othering represent a ‘crash course’ for people involved in interculturality. In their multifaceted takes on the two concepts that are central for reflecting on intercultu...
Chapter
The issue of alternative ideologies of interculturality is discussed in this chapter. Since the beginning of this book, the authors have insisted on the importance of ‘digging out’ alternatives in the way interculturality is constructed in research and education. The students thus reflect on three ‘Chinese discourse instruments’ here: cultural arro...
Chapter
This chapter is based on the students’ reactions to the second dialogue with one of the teachers. They review their own understandings of the notion of interculturality and the ways it is tackled in education. Their views on the notion already reflect supercritical engagement with some of the ideas shared by the lecturer, for example, in relation t...
Chapter
This chapter deals with the important issue of being ‘good’ at interculturality—hinting at the ideology of intercultural competence. The students seem confident in the fact that one cannot really determine both what ‘good’ would mean here and that one cannot find a ‘miraculous’ recipe ensuring that ‘good’ occurs. Sharing about their own experiences...
Chapter
In this third dialogue, the continuum of balance and chaos serves as interrelated symbols to continue problematizing the complexities of interculturality. The chapter starts with a certain number of metaphors to introduce a core topic: performance on stage and backstage. It is argued that interculturality leads us to perform together, wearing chang...
Chapter
Increasingly, scholars and educators are urged to engage with the notion of interculturality through the lens of politics. As a project of potential togetherness, social justice and inclusion, interculturality is highly ideologically oriented, influenced by, e.g., economic and political forces. In this chapter, the students reflect on the intrinsic...
Chapter
This last chapter around the dialogues is meant to sum up what the students take away from interacting with multiple voices during the months they spent with others discussing interculturality. The following questions were asked: Could you explain in your own words what ‘interculturalizing interculturality’ could mean? Could you also give a concret...
Chapter
This chapter concludes the book. The authors share their reflections on the dialogues and the paratexts produced by the students. They note that the proposed pedagogical and/or personal approach to interculturality (complex dialogues between all actors) is not miraculous. As such while some aspects of supercriticality are evident in the dialogues,...
Chapter
This chapter deepens our engagement with pictorial representations of interculturality by listening to the students’ reactions to the photographs shared by a teacher in dialogue 4. Multifaceted interpretations of both the photographs and different reactions to them are shared. In doing so, the students show their wish and interest in listening to o...
Chapter
This chapter corresponds to the fifth and final dialogue between the students and the teacher. It starts with a dialogue within a dialogue: the teacher reacting to the students’ commentaries in the two previous chapters. In this dialogue within a dialogue, the teacher also tries to demonstrate how he surveyed himself while reading the students’ rea...
Chapter
Interculturality is protean, uncontrollable and somewhat mysterious, which urges us to move away from the ‘correct’ and the ‘effective’ of, e.g., many models of intercultural competence. This chapter emphasizes the importance of considering interculturality through the prism of change and stability—a central continuum in the way we ‘do’ it together...
Chapter
The first chapter is based on fragments cogitating what interculturality is not, looking into misconceptions and misperceptions around this complex notion. A certain number of keywords are explored to do so, including orthodoxy, sloganism and ventriloquism. The chapter also examines the use, misuse and abuse of the concept of culture in intercultur...
Chapter
The focus of this chapter is ideologies. This important and yet controversial concept can help us deconstruct and rethink interculturality. An ideology is an order passed onto us through different influential channels, without us necessarily noticing. The concepts, notions, ideas and arguments that we use to discuss interculturality are all ideolog...
Chapter
As a companion to the previous chapter, this chapter focuses on what interculturality could be. Through discussing the fragments, the chapter shows that interculturality as both a phenomenon (‘encounters’) and an object of research and education is polysemic, complex and malleable. There is no ‘one-size-fits-all’ in interculturality. A certain numb...
Chapter
The chapter suggests to be vigilant with the way research we produce on interculturality is done, and never to be satisfied and/or overly confident about it. Several critical aspects of researching interculturality are tackled: revising the said boundary between objectivity/subjectivity; treating every situation of research as intercultural too and...
Chapter
The chapter starts with the argument that othering is a necessary and yet unavoidable ‘evil’ and that attempts to get rid of it cannot but be inadequate and, at times, mere performances and victims of political correctness. Blaming others for othering is a constant in intercultural research and education. Yet the fragments from this chapter remind...
Chapter
This chapter argues that language should be taken systematically into account when dealing with interculturality, especially to treat the notion through the prism of politics. Translating is central to this important issue and recommended as a starting point for discussing with the other. The same applies to etymological work, whereby we can consid...
Chapter
This chapter deals with the importance of reflecting on the constant co-performance of interculturality. As soon as we interact with each other, we perform identities, discourses, actions together, influenced by, e.g., multiple ideologies, political and economic elements. Such performances take place on stage, while backstage, we might retain our ‘...
Book
Full-text available
FRAMMENTI D'INTERCULTURA. APPUNTI SU UN CONCETTO DA NEGOZIARE Fred Dervin ☻ Attraverso una serie di frammenti e di note personali, l'autore analizza la nozione d'intercultura, quale emerge nei lavori scientifici, con tutte le sue incoerenze e contraddizioni. Il confronto con la società cinese, in particolare, offre spunti per riflessioni che posson...
Chapter
In this chapter, Dervin justifies the importance of the book by situating it in global scholarship of interculturality and global education. Using the metaphor of an octopus, he provides details about the different ‘arms’ that compose research and education on issues of diversity in the world. He notes that, although many and varied perspectives ha...
Chapter
This chapter focuses on ways of thinking about and doing interculturality together, especially at an interpersonal level. The term of harmony is often at the centre of attention of the discourse instruments here, with mutuality, differilitude (difference-similitude) and ‘beauty’ (‘diversity’) as essential components of interculturality. Considering...
Chapter
This chapter is dedicated to two concepts that have been at the centre of discussions on the notion of interculturality: culture and civilization. The authors note that the discourse instruments based on the two concepts often reflect change (and exchange) in Chinese. The authors also pinpoint many similarities with familiar phenomena globally in t...
Chapter
In this chapter, the authors examine two kinds of discourse instruments: (1) Instruments that can provide support in understanding and explaining central aspects of interculturality such as dialogue, mistreatment and competition; and (2) Instruments that can help us reflect on how we experience interculturality as a real complex phenomenon. Challen...
Chapter
This chapter, written by Fred Dervin, offers temporary conclusions, since the authors see this book as embedded in a (past and future) list of joint publications. Dervin starts by highlighting and reiterating the importance of renegotiating the meanings and connotations of words in different languages and especially in English as a global language...
Article
Full-text available
Being able to deal with “moments of crisis” is crucial in intercultural communication. Using identities as an analytical lens, this paper examines different types of “moments of crisis” identified in educational virtual exchanges between Chinese and Finnish university students. The study shows that the participants use soothing and code-switching a...
Chapter
This chapter is dedicated to discourse instruments related to today’s ‘Chinese stories of interculturality’ (with many links to the past). Different levels were identified from the national to the global: for example, Minzu unity, solidarity and harmony; the Chinese nation is pluralistic and unified (national context) and The One Belt One Road (glo...
Chapter
In this chapter, the authors tackle the important issue of language and interculturality by reviewing several discourse instruments. The chapter starts by reminding the reader of the limits of language and of how it can be misused in communication. Some instruments from the chapter also provide guidance for speaking with the other. These serve as s...
Chapter
This chapter advocates looking inwards and to use the other as a mirror for observing ourselves. It asks us to reflect on ourselves and to think ‘thrice’ before talking and acting interculturally. The important Confucian figure of the 君子 (Jūnzı̌), a ‘Man (sic) of virtue’, a ‘person of noble character’ who shows benevolence, love and care for others...
Article
Full-text available
Political ideology and atonality in language and intercultural education: A rejoinder to ‘Between professionalism and political engagement in foreign language teaching practice’ https://journal.equinoxpub.com/JALPP/article/view/21085/25704
Poster
Full-text available
The latest issue Empowering Student Learning in Higher Education: Pathways to Possibility has been online! This time, we have researchers from five different countries (China, Chile, Finland, New Zealand and the UK).The special issue breaks down geographical and cultural barriers to take a comprehensive look at how higher education affect student l...
Chapter
This chapter represents the third Tableau of the book. Its focus is on so-called ‘critical’ perspectives on interculturality that have blossomed over the past decade—wishing to move away from the remnants of past e.g. Hofstedian/culturalist approaches. The authors review such initiatives and note that they have mostly emerged from and revolved arou...
Chapter
In the first dream about interculturality, the author (Andreas) first wishes for interculturalists to be creative and courageous by thinking beyond the established box. Begging for putting an end to the strong positivist objectivity that still lingers on in research and education around interculturality, the dream urges the reader to accept and pro...
Chapter
The second chapter goes deeper into critiques of intercultural communication education by unveiling three main problems: Otherisation/Culturalisation, Scientism, and Eurocentrism. First defined to ensure co-understanding with the reader, each problem is illustrated by making references to past scholarship on interculturality that is still somewhat...
Chapter
This first chapter (Tableau 1) revolves around the metaphor of the brushstroke of interculturality. It deconstructs and describes how the field of interculturality functions in the world today. A complex notion glocally—meaning in different contexts of our globalised world, interculturality in education and research is dominated however by certain...
Chapter
This chapter concludes the book by summarizing the main points made about the need to interculturalise interculturality. Bearing in mind the current problems faced by interculturalists, noted in the book chapters, the authors’ dreams are made to come together. Although the dreams were formulated differently (author 1 called for a multipolar order v...
Chapter
Building on the previous chapters, this chapter represents the first steps to be taken into interculturality. The concept of identity is used as a ‘ferryman’ into the complexity of the notion. Identity is discussed here as a phenomenon that takes place between individuals who have to negotiate who they are with each other, bearing in mind that thei...
Chapter
The book argues that it is important to listen to different voices about the notion of interculturality. In this chapter, we go behind the scene of a specific university in China, where members of different Minzu ‘ethnic’ groups live, work and study together. Having taken several courses with the authors off and online about interculturality, they...
Chapter
This chapter also looks into discourses of culture, asking this provocative question: should we kill or cure the concept when dealing with interculturality? It starts with a short recap from the previous chapter. As a companion to that chapter, it adds extra elements to the discussions of culture in the Chinese context, converses reflexively about...
Chapter
Interculturality is a complex notion that can mean different things to different people. What is more it can be tackled and discussed in many different ways. This chapter confronts what the authors consider to be imaginaries and misconceptions of intercultural competence today. These elements are opposed by summarizing points made in the previous c...
Chapter
This chapter offers final remarks and suggestions to close the book—although it suggests that it is ‘to be continued’. Going back to a metaphor from the introduction to the book, the authors call for a shift from the ‘solid’, ‘polished’ dominating discourses of interculturality in education and research to alternative, oft-silenced discourses from...
Chapter
Interculturality in research and education is much more complicated than it might appear to be. In fact, as a doctrine, it is composed of an uncountable number of ideologies, beliefs and worldviews around the world. However, many scholars have noted that very few perspectives dominate the worlds of research and education globally. This chapter enga...
Chapter
This chapter is dedicated to translation. In their work, the authors constantly discuss the translation of words used to deal with interculturality in order to avoid ‘untranslatability’, ‘misunderstanding’ and ‘non-understanding’, but, maybe, more importantly, in order to rebalance the power relations between East and West. Renegotiating translatio...
Chapter
In this reflexive piece, one of the authors goes back to his experiences of another context (China) and describes the kinds of silent transformations that have happened to him. Silent transformations are invisible, slow yet very meaningful changes taking place in long-term engagement with otherness. Sharing pictures and reflections on his experienc...

Questions

Question (1)
Question
Hi everyone
Are you aware of research (being) done on successful strategies used in rural education in China to empower students and make sure they experience more social justice?
All these terms are polysemic... But you probably see what I mean.
Best and thanks, Fred

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Projects

Projects (2)
Project
Call for chapters TRANSNATIONAL EDUCATION EXPORTS AND IMPORTS THE SEARCH FOR THE CHINESE EL DORADO Eds. Fred Dervin (University of Helsinki), Xiangyun Du (Aalborg University) & Zhao Ke (SHUFE) Deadline for abstracts: 20th November 2017 Volume to be published by Palgrave Macmillan in the Palgrave Studies on Chinese Education in a Global Perspective (Eds. Dervin/Du) It has become a truism to say that education is now a global business. It is marketised, sold and consumed across borders, in multifaceted forms. Like most countries around the world, China has witnessed education as an import and, increasingly, an export sector. Through her driving growth, China is engaging in selling and buying knowledge-based products and services, sending and attracting students, and setting up international branches locally and internationally. Some examples: – More than half a million Chinese students study abroad every year. In Australia, for instance, Chinese students accounted for 27% of all Australian education export earnings in 2016. – At home, Chinese universities are hiring foreign expects and attracting an increasing number of international students. In 2015, there were 397,635 international students from 202 countries and regions (in comparison to 100,000 in 2004). They studied in a wide range of geographic areas within China: for example, in 2015 31 provinces and regions received international students, the top three being Beijing, Shanghai and Zhejiang provinces (MOE, 2016). China is also involved in franchising, twinning degrees activities as well as programme articulations and branch campuses. – China’s so-called soft-power diplomacy has also led to the creation of culture and language schools and Confucius Institutes around the world. These institutions contribute highly to exporting and importing many and varied forms of education. – The first overseas university founded by a Chinese university was founded in the capital of Laos by Soochow University in 2011. International Economy and Trade, International Finance but also Chinese and Computer Science and are offered at the satellite campus. Xiamen University Malaysia opened its doors in 2016 in Kuala Lumpur, offering bachelor degree courses in Chinese studies, journalism, digital media technology, Traditional Chinese Medicine, amongst others. This was the first overseas branch of a top tier Chinese university. One of the best Chinese universities, Peking University, is opening a branch of its HSBC Business School in Oxford in 2017, having bought Foxcombe Hall in the city. – Finally, math textbooks imported from Shanghai will be used in the UK in 2017. According to the managing director for Collins Learning, the education division of HarperCollins, “they’re producing content that is of a fantastically high quality.” Real Shanghai Mathematics consists of a Teacher Guide, Textbook and Pupil Practice Book for each Year (1-6). It “emphasises complete mastery of basic numeracy knowledge and skills to allow vastly accelerated progression through to advanced numeracy”. The British government has allocated $71-million to train teachers in the methods used in Chinese schools. For this volume, potential authors may submit a proposal about the following issues – or other relevant issues related to education exports and imports to and from China: -Policy analysis related to transnational education exports/imports -Success and/or failure of transnational education exports/imports (concrete impact, who benefits?, hidden agendas) -Impact on individuals, knowledge, locality and any other relevant aspects -Intercultural and identity aspects of transnational education exports/imports -Social justice, equality and equity issues in transnational education exports/imports -Languages in transnational education exports/imports (learning and use, hierarchies, etc.) -Transnational education exports/imports beyond the classroom (parents, larger community, involvement of the business world) -The use of ICT in transnational education exports/imports. -Critical reflection on student and teacher experiences -Critical studies on pedagogy and curriculum issues in educational exports and imports – Employability and sustainability of education exports and imports. Deadlines Abstract of proposed chapter (300 words): 20th November 2017 Full chapters to be submitted: 15th March 2018 Authors are invited to submit a 300-word proposal (including a few lines about the author(s)) in English to both editors (fred.dervin@helsinki.fi, xiangyun@learning.aau.dk, zhao.ke@mail.shufe.edu.cn) – please no pdf! The proposals should clearly explain the theoretical positioning and concerns of the proposed chapter, and include a short description of data (where applicable). A basic bibliography may also be added.
Project
Call for chapters Chinese rural schooling: Good practices for successful social justice Eds.: Yongjian Li (RUC, China), Fred Dervin (University of Helsinki, Finland) & Shibao Guo (University of Calgary, Canada) Deadline for abstracts: 15 November 2017 Volume to be published by Palgrave Macmillan in the Palgrave Studies on Chinese Education in a Global Perspective (Eds. Dervin/Du) The word rural can have different meanings in different contexts. In this volume, we are interested in rural schooling in Mainland China. In the Middle Kingdom, rural schooling can both refer to the educational experiences of migrant children in Chinese urban contexts and to those of children who live and study in Chinese rural areas. Migrant children (also referred to as ‘floating children’, Li, 1995) often follow the 282 million rural migrant workers employed in an urban workplace (2015, National Bureau of Statistics). Since 2001 rural migrant children have been allowed to attend urban public schools regardless of their household registration (Hukou, 户口). Although progress has been made in promoting access to public schools many migrant children attend private schools sponsored by local communities or private business institutions. While Chinese and national scientific literatures have concentrated on the case of these migrant children, fewer studies have been published on the experiences of children based in rural areas. It is important to note that many migrant workers leave their children behind. In 2010, more than 61 million children between birth and 17 years old were “left behind” (Chinese National Census). This volume is interested in how these two kinds of rural schooling promote successful social justice for the children. The focus can be based on a macro-perspective (e.g. policy-level) and/or micro-level (e.g. students’, teachers’, principals’ perspectives, amongst others). According to Yang, Huang and Liu’s (2014) article “An analysis of education inequality in China”, a sharp decrease in education inequality has been witnessed in China thanks to e.g. the education expansion policy of the last decades. They note, however, that the rural-urban division is still deep in China esp. in terms of educational achievement. Most publications on Chinese rural schooling tend to concentrate on negative aspects and to generalise somewhat about what it means to be either a student in a rural school or a migrant student in an urban context. In volume, we wish to examine what we call Good practises for successful social justice in rural schooling in China, and thus look at this multifaceted educational context from a more positive perspective. We believe that many schools around China are doing their best to ensure that rural children’s educational experiences give them a boost in life and for their future life. To the editors, social justice refers to the explicit efforts made by school leaders, teachers, with the local community and beyond, to make sure that rural students are given opportunities to succeed at school and in their future lives. These efforts can include tackling the following issues (amongst others): – Help students increase their level of participation in school and beyond – Implement equality-equity measures in the school context – Help students integrate in the school context and beyond by building up a sense of belonging and fighting against alienation, marginalization or disenfranchisement – Fight against different forms of discrimination against rural students and pass onto them skills to counter-attack such wicked problems to empower them – Reduce the number of dropouts – Diminish gender differences in achievement – Support rural students struggling with mental health issues. Prospective authors can examine any of these aspects of social justice in Chinese rural schooling – or other aspects – by concentrating on how these have been implemented short-term or long-term in a specific school context (rural/migrants in urban contexts). More specifically authors could look into the following social justice strategies (amongst others): the implementation of special education needs; specific forms of pedagogical practices; the use of technology for social justice; the building of relationships between schools, parents (grandparents too in the case of children “left behind”) and students; pre- service or in-service training to help teachers work with rural children (work on teachers’ expectations and stereotypes, etc.). Deadlines Abstract of proposed chapter (300 words): 15 November 2017 Full chapters to be submitted: 15 April 2018 Authors are invited to submit a 300-word proposal (including a few lines about the author(s)) in English to the editors (404385534@qq.com, fred.dervin@helsinki.fi, guos@ucalgary.ca) – please no pdf! The proposals should clearly explain the theoretical positioning and concerns of the proposed chapter, and include a short description of data (where applicable). A basic bibliography may also be added. Prospective authors should note that only original and previously unpublished articles will be considered. All article submissions of 5,500 to 8,000 words will be forwarded to 2 members of the volume scientific committee. Final decision regarding acceptance/revision/rejection will be based on the reviews received from the reviewers.