The changing curriculum. Studies in social construction [Book review]

Abstract

The book comprises ten chapters and a long introduction (30 pages) by Joe L.Kincheloe. All ten chapters are papers authored by Goodson (three in cooperation with others) which appeared in various journals and publications from 1988 to 1997. This is why we find a repetition of ideas, arguments and examples in the book. The first chapter "By way of Introduction" is an interview by Ivor Goodson with Don Santor which sets the leit -motif of the book, that the curriculum is not the product of a detached exercise and "a dispassionate and rational decision" but "an eminently political exercise." In the second chapter, "Investigating Schooling : From the Personal to the Programmatic", the author explains the personal experience which urged him to study the origins of the social construction of curriculum and schooling. In the third chapter, "Chariots of Fire. Etymologies, Epistemologies and the Emergence of Curriculum", he express his disagreement with philosophers (mainly Phenix and Hirst) whose understanding of knowledge as "fait accompli" leads to a prescriptive curriculum. He also stresses the need for the study of the social context in which knowledge is conceived and produced and the manner in which it is translated for use.