Public Schooling in English Canada: Addressing Difference in the Context of Globalization

ID:	HARP-556
Title:	Public Schooling in English Canada: Addressing Difference in the Context of Globalization
Source:	Canadian Ethnic Studies, 2000 Special Issue, Vol. 32 Issue 1, p38, 16p
Parties:
Dispute Resolution Organ:
Year:	2000
Pages:	0
Author(s):
Keywords:	Canada, citizenship, culture, democracy, economic, social, and cultural rights, globalization, human rights, non-discrimination, Quebec, ideology, racism, sexism, civil and political rights, indigenous people, education
Abstract:	Our understanding of Canadian polity formation is based on a pluralistic moral democracy that recognizes a fluid concept of cultural retention, differentiated citizenship as explained by Kymlicka, and a social ethic of care. We argue that multicultural education has not addressed issues concerning the national question with respect to Aboriginal nationalist and Quebec demands, or has done so only in a fragmentary manner. Anti-racist education has developed a refreshing oppositional approach that deals with structures sustaining racism, sexism, and power issues. However, we contend that the dominance of globalization as an economic ideology and concomitant educational changes have generated conditions to deal with difference in terms of a democracy that has great faith in the power of the free market and lacks confidence in the possibility of conscious collective efforts to build a space to define and redefine a public good. There is no doubt that the economic agenda is influencing citizenship formation in our schools even as teachers and students mediate those influences. Relevant to the understanding of the building of a Canadian polity is the clarification of the concept of democracy in light of the market imperative which has permeated language and the construction of meanings.
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