Ralph Leighton Teaching Citizenship is A Subversive Activity BSA, March 2005
TEACHING CITIZENSHIP IS A SUBVERSIVE ACTIVITY
Paper presented to the British Sociological Association Annual Conference, University of York, 21/23 March 2005.
Ralph Leighton,
Senior Lecturer in Education,
POINTED,
Faculty of Education,
Canterbury Christ Church University College,
Canterbury
CT1 1QU
This paper represents research still in progress into the purpose(s), nature and effectiveness of Citizenship Education provision in England.
Please do not cite or quote from the paper without the consent of the author.
‘the nature of what children are taught is being distorted by a misguided emphasis on utilitarian "skills", undermining the integrity of the national curriculum and destroying the substance of what ought to be happening in the classroom.’
‘[For] Mr Blunkett, "skills" take precedence over "knowledge". A commitment "to value our families and other relationships, the wider group to which we belong, the diversity in our society and the environment in which we live," is promoted as a key value "underpinning" the work of schools. A new subject, citizenship, is introduced to help pupils "develop a full understanding of their roles and responsibilities as citizens in a modern democracy" and "deal with difficult moral and social questions that arise in their lives and in society".
Clearly, Mr Blunkett wants teachers to save the world. As a view of education, this is both absurdly grandiose and dangerously diminishing. Grandiose because utopian goals can never be realised, and diminishing because it hammers one more nail into the concept of the teacher as an authority in a particular subject whose job it is to teach it.’
Chris Woodhead, former Chief Inspector of Schools
http://theinternetforum.co.uk/school/woodhead3.html
INTRODUCTION
This paper attempts to re-examine some significant educational sociology from the 1970s in addressing the real impact of the introduction of Citizenship Education as a National Curriculum Subject. The title should be taken as both a statement of intent and as identifying the homage paid to Postman and Weingartner (1976) who shaped many of my insights and much of my understanding as a student teacher and as a practitioner. The paper borrows heavily from their ideas and from the structure of their book in order to demonstrate both the re-emerging importance of their polemic stance which emphasised a need for belief, commitment and passion in educational research and even though they were writing at a different time and in a different place, and about a specific aspect of education rather than about the whole field, I find that their work remains relevant because so little of substance has changed. The influences of other writers and researchers of that time – particularly Illich, Goodman, Keddie and Bernstein – will also be evident far beyond the citations which follow.
At the beginning of ‘Teaching as a Subversive Activity’ (Postman and Weingartner, 1976) the authors offer a quotation from the late 17th century to the effect that the dissemination of learning causes nothing but trouble, followed by the lyrics of a Tom Paxton song which implied that schooling is designed to produce unquestioning loyalty and a willingness to become cannon fodder. The quotations and lyrics with which this paper opens are intended to indicate that there is still a fear amongst policy shapers that those who are educated will become more questioning, while the reality is that many young people have moved beyond questioning to rejection. It may be that those who have influenced policy might share a view of the world similar to that of Britain’s governor of Virginia in the late 1600s. That attitude, although representative of his class and time, showed how out of touch with the masses such people were. Not only do the opening quotations hark back to a mythical golden age, but they are even more out of touch now than Berkley was then.
We have also moved on from Paxton’s lyrics, with their subtle peeling away of layers of innocence to show the corrupting influence of education; the innocence has gone. Indeed, as the edition of their book used here was published the year after punk hit the streets and our ears, it could be argued that such innocence as is contained in Paxton’s words was already on its way out. Since then, American schools have seen young people ‘load up on guns’; young people are becoming ‘over bored’ as well as being metaphorically ‘lost overboard’; teachers and other adults might not always welcome the self-assurance of modern youth; fascination with guns, with libido, with entertainment – and that Kurt Cobhain became and remains a heroic figure to many – indicate not innocence and passivity but awareness, reaction and rejection. The position of this paper is that it is more rational to examine why so many young people appear to have rejected the current state of affairs than it is to say that they should not have done so, and that it is more sensible to develop strategies to encourage their involvement and contribution than to demand their subservience. Pandora’s box is open, there is no point trying to force the lid shut now.
‘Subversive’, in the sense it is used in this paper and how it was used in the original text, does not mean an intention to overthrow or undermine social values, but to face and attempt to resolve the problems facing society, to undermine the attitudes which result in suffering and the processes which result in feelings of hopelessness and social alienation. Postman and Weingartner tried to address the question of whether anything could be done to improve/save society. They identify such problems as including:
“the number one health problem in the United States is mental illness: there are
more Americans suffering from mental illness than from all other forms of illness
combined. Of almost equal magnitude is the crime problem . . . from delinquency
among affluent adolescents to frauds perpetrated by some of our richest
corporations. Another is . . . that suicide is the second most common cause of death
among adolescents. The most common form of infant mortality in the United States
is parental beating. Still another problem concerns misinformation [which] takes
many forms, such as lies, clichés, rumour, and implicates almost everybody,
including the President of the United States . . . [And] the air pollution problem, the
water pollution problem, the garbage disposal problem, the radio-activity problem,
the megalopolis problem, the supersonic-jet-noise problem, the traffic problem, the
who-am-I problem and the what does it all mean problem.” (pp12 & 13)
It would appear that little has changed and that we still have much to learn as few of these problems have disappeared or even dissipated, but we can add many others to the list. There is the religious fundamentalism problem, the religious intolerance problem and the decline of faith and values problem; there is the impending environmental disaster problem, the growing consumer debt problem, the internet pornography problem, the too-much-violence problem; the problem of falling standards and the problem of unrealistic expectations; the problem of political apathy, the problem of political intolerance, the problem of political inertia, the problem of political disempowerment, and the problem of politicians who neither deserve nor earn respect.
Many more problems could be added to this list, and it lists such as these which lie at the heart of citizenship education. If the current social order and authoritative establishment does not seek to address and resolve these problems but, through deliberate endeavour or casual oversight, allows them to continue and to multiply, then that order and establishment must be scrutinised and exposed. The teaching of citizenship education, at its best, equips young people with the tools, knowledge, skills and information through which such scrutiny can be conducted. The purpose and practice of citizenship education is not to produce mindless electoral fodder but to question a society which accommodates or even expects and accepts problems such as these. With such a questioning approach, young people are enabled to subvert values and structures shown to be bankrupt, while retaining those demonstrably effective and appropriate to their lives. It is from this position that this paper argues that teaching citizenship is both a subversive and empowering activity.
This paper is based on two assumptions; one indisputable, the other perhaps questionable. These assumptions are (a) that the survival of society and development of social well-being are dependent on a seismic shift in attitudes and behaviour; and (b) that Citizenship Education will only make a contribution to that shift if it is approached from a critical and empowering position. The data offered comes from a variety of sources, primarily observations and comments gathered during ongoing research relating to the development of citizenship education in schools and to the experiences of teachers of citizenship – specialist trainees and longer-serving non-specialists. Unlike Chris Woodhead, I believe that the teaching of citizenship can and will change the world.
I. Crap Detecting – It’s what children do
While the theory and proponents of democracy might tell us that everyone is equal in law, in access to power and in social engagement, we know this is not true. Weber explained the need for clear rules and structures to prevent bureaucrats from assuming the authority of their office and manipulating decision making to their own ends; Michels’ (1949) ‘Iron Law of Oligarchy’ demonstrates the inevitability of people becoming more answerable to their hierarchical superiors than to the system they both serve. Such ideas are not simply for sociological consumption: television’s “Yes, Minister” & “Yes, Prime Minister”, “West Wing” and “House of Cards”; the populist and popular journalism, film-making and books of Michael Moore; news coverage and popular street mythology; all reinforce the perception that the same could be said for capitalist democracy as was often said about state communism – it is fine in theory but unworkable in practice – although capitalism is more colourful, generally more comfortable, and there are more television channels.
We might ridicule political leaders but they continue as political leaders, irrespective of incoherent speech, internecine rivalry, mud-slinging, corruption, double-dealing, deception and dishonesty. We have been told ‘there is no alternative’ when clearly there are alternatives, that weapons exist when there is no apparent evidence of their existence, that politicians have our interests at heart when they consistently demonstrate the opposite. It may be that the perceptions of alternatives, clarity and consistency are not true but, as WI Thomas demonstrated, ‘if people believe something to be real, it becomes real in its social consequences’; in other words, if people believe they are being fed crap, they’re going to stop eating - and may well bite the hand that tries to feed them crap.
Postman and Weingartner argued that there is a need for ‘a new education that would set out to cultivate . . experts in crap detecting’ (p16). Teaching is no longer about the dissemination of information, if it ever was. The teaching of Citizenship in particular is the cultivation of skills of communication and informed participation, the development of both knowledge and understanding of structures and relationships in society, and how such skills and knowledge can be deployed. In order for young people to understand “what can be” and possibly “what should be”, they need to look at and understand “what is”. Many bring a perception of how life and society operate, rejecting politics in its party, economic strategy, acceptance and admiration of one’s betters sense while developing interests and at least partially formed opinions on environmentalism, im/emigration, Islam and Islamophobia, concepts of crime and punishment and a range of other political issues. Such young people comfortably fit Postman and Weingarten’s criteria for crap detectors.
The perception of politicians that political activity and political literacy are synonymous with voting is one of the areas of crap most frequently detected. Home Office Minister Fiona Mctaggart’s declaration reported in The Times 20/1/05 (Ford 2005) that society would benefit from a rite of passage for 18 year olds in which they could assert their commitment to British values and the British way of life, then be given a pocket guide to the constitution and be more likely to vote, showed a marked lack of awareness of many issues – and not only that Britain does not have a constitution to be reduced for bite-sized consumption. It is unlikely that disillusioned 18 year olds would flock to such ceremonies, making it probable that – if anyone does take up the idea – they will be those who feel committed and attached to society and probably therefore likely voters. The notion that there is such a thing as ‘Britishness’ – for which we might usually be expected to read ‘Englishness – is at best unproven and clearly at odds with the approach to citizenship education supported by Ms Mctaggart’s colleagues in government. Equally unproven is the notion of any correlation between citizenship ceremonies and increases in voting.
The USA has long has ceremonies both of citizenship and of coming of academic, if not majority, age. The consistently low electoral turnout and rarity of underclass involvement in ritualised civic progression in the USA might be taken to indicate that such ceremonies will be as well received and successful as those suggested by Estelle Morris when Education Secretary in 2002. They have yet to be introduced and the current likelihood is that, if introduced, they will not succeed. Failure will not be due to the ‘unBritishness’ of such rituals – after all, many other US-inspired attitudes and forms of behaviour have been successfully transplanted in the UK and elsewhere – but because involvement in them requires and implies some commitment to the values and principles being espoused. For these ceremonies to succeed they will need to have meaning in the lives of the participants; at the moment, too many potential participants see such ceremony as crap.