Critical Studies of Education in Asia features analyses that take seriously the complex postcolonial, historical, and cultural consciousnesses felt across societies in Asia, and that bring these to bear on the changing terrain of knowledge, subjectivities, and power relations constructed both within schools and across the public sphere. In documenting the multiple sites of conflict and contestation both between and within states in Asia and a host of pedagogic agents – ministries of education, state boards and agencies, schools, teachers and teacher unions, university departments of education, local interest groups, the media, international standards agencies, and global educational reform discourses – the chapters in this volume illuminate the struggles over knowledge, education, and the work of schools. Faced with emergent global and local forces that are determined to challenge ‘official’ knowledge and to offer alternative understandings of education and society in Asia, this volume offers critical insights for academic researchers, policy- makers, and graduate students seeking to understand the tensions and possibilities of educational change in the region. This book was originally published as a special issue of Curriculum Inquiry.
The rise in demand for higher education in the Asia-Pacific region is an undeniable reflection of the growing pace of globalization and the subsequent pressures imposed by it. Aspiring to become globally competitive and to position favourably in the global university league tables, governments in Asia have either engaged in a serious quest to become a regional education hub or they have concentrated on developing transnational higher education to create more opportunities, in order to meet their citizens’ pressing demand for higher education. Internationalization of Higher Education in East Asia critically examines and provides comparative perspectives on the major strategies that selected Asian countries and societies have adopted to transform their higher education sector and enhance their national competitiveness in the increasingly globalized world. This volume by leading scholars in the field of education development and policy studies makes critical reflections on how Asian governments in particular and universities in general have responded to the growing challenges of globalization by promoting more internationalization, student mobility and entrepreneurship in higher education. This book is an essential collection for policy makers, researchers and postgraduate students studying higher education, Asian education and international education.
Offering an encyclopedic survey of the state of primary-school English-language education across Asia, and exploring topics ranging from policy to curriculum, this volume presents the views not of outside experts but rather local experiences as understood and interpreted by local scholars of international standing, providing useful insights to policy makers, educators, and researchers.
Asia is the largest continent in the world. Five out of the top ten high performing economies in the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) 2018 are located in Asia. Why do Asian students perform so well in STEM-related subjects? This book answers this by examining the STEM education policies and initiatives in Asian economies, as well as the training programmes undertaken by STEM teachers in Asia. The book is broken into four sections, each accompanied by a passage of commentary that summarizes the key takeaways of the chapters. Section one focuses on STEM policy environments and how various countries have developed policies that promote STEM as an integral part of national economic development. Section two focuses on STEM teacher education in the Philippines and Thailand, while section three focuses on STEM curriculum design, context, and challenges in four Asian economies. The fourth and final section focuses on presenting snapshots of STEM education research efforts in Malaysia, South Korea, and Singapore. Written by Asian academics, this book will provide valuable insights to policy makers, educators, and researchers interested in the topic of STEM education, especially in the Asian context. Chapters 7 and 11 of this book are freely available as a downloadable Open Access PDF under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 4.0 license available at http://www.taylorfrancis.com
This is the third volume of a trilogy on English Language education in Asia within the Routledge Critical Studies in Asian Education. Put together by editors and contributors selected by Asia TEFL, this book provides a timely and critical review of the current trends in tertiary level English education in Asia. It foregrounds the developments and trends, policies and implementation, as well as research and practice. Written by ELT scholars and educational leaders, this book presents articles on China, Hong Kong, India, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam. While the authors focus on their own local issues, providing an overview of the state of tertiary English teaching in their respective territories, they also provide insights from their successes and failures which can help inspire solutions to similar challenges faced internationally in the field. Chapters in the book include: • Heading toward the global standardization of English education in Korean universities • English in tertiary education in India: A Janus-faced perspective with special reference to University of Delhi • Developing English language skills in the Singapore higher education context • ELT at tertiary institutions in China: A developmental perspective This book will be valued by administrators, researchers and scholars interested in bilingualism, language policy and planning in higher education.
This volume offers comprehensive 'state-of-the-art' overviews of educational policies concerning the teaching of English in a large number of Asian countries. Each contribution is written by a leading expert and gives a clear assessment of current policies and future trends. Starting with a description of the English education policies in the respective countries, the contributors then delve into the 'nuts and bolts' of the English education policies and how they play out in practice in the education system, in schools, in the curriculum, and in teaching. Topics covered include the balance between the acquisition of English and the national language, political, cultural, economic and technical factors that strengthen or weaken the learning of English.
Drawing on the fields of political economy and historical sociology, Jones dispels the overwhelming consensus among scholars that members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) never interfere in the internal affairs of other states, and pioneers a new approach to the understanding of regional politics in Southeast Asia.
Singapore has been taken by many researchers as a fascinating living language policy and planning laboratory. Language and education policy in Singapore has been pivotal not only to the establishment and growth of schooling, but to the very project of nation building. Since their inception, ‘mother tongue’ policies have been established with two explicit goals. Firstly there is the development and training of human and intellectual capital for the expansion and networking of a Singaporean service and information economy. Secondly there is the maintenance of cultural heritage and values as a means for social cohesion and, indeed, the maintenance of community and regional social capital. These tasks have been fraught with tension and contradiction, both in relation to the conditions of rapid cultural, economic and political change in Asia and globally, but as well because of the tensions between the so called ‘world language English’ and Singapore’s three other official languages, Tamil, Malay and Mandarin. This has been complicated, of course, by the challenges of vibrant regional dialects and the emergence of Singlish as a powerful medium of community life.
This collection identifies the challenges facing area studies as an organized intellectual project in this era of globalization, focusing in particular on conceptual issues and implications for pedagogical practice in Asia and the Pacific. The crisis in area studies is widely acknowledged; various prescriptions for solutions have been forthcoming, but few have also pursued practical applications of critical ideas for both teachers and students. Remaking Area Studies not only makes the case for more culturally sensitive and empowering forms of area studies, but indicates how these ideas can be translated into effective student-centered learning practices through the establishment of interactive regional learning communities. This pathbreaking work features original contributions from leading theorists of globalization and critics of area studies as practiced in the U.S. Essays in the first part of the book problematize the accepted categories of traditional area-making practices. Taken together, they provide an alternative conceptual framework for area studies that informs the subsequent contributions on pedagogical practices. To incorporate critical perspectives from the "areas studied," chapters examine the development of area studies programs in Japan and the Pacific Islands. Not surprisingly, given the lessons learned from critical examinations of area studies in the U.S., there are competing, state, institutional, and intellectual perspectives involved in each of these contexts that need to be taken into account before embarking on an interactive and collaborative area studies across Pacific Asia. Finally, area studies practitioners reflect on their experiences developing and teaching interactive, web-based courses linking classrooms in six universities located in Hawai‘i, Singapore, the Philippines, Japan, New Zealand, and Fiji. These collaborative on-line teaching and learning initiatives were designed specifically to address some of the conceptual and theoretical concerns associated with the production and dissemination of contemporary area studies knowledge. Multiauthored chapters draw useful lessons for international collaborative learning in an era of globalization, both in terms of their successes and occasional failures. Uniquely combining theoretical, institutional, and practical perspectives across the Asia Pacific region, Remaking Area Studies contributes to a rethinking and reinvigorating of regional approaches to knowledge formation in higher education. Contributors: Conrado Balabat, Lonny Carlile, T. C. Chang, Hezekiah A. Concepcion, Arif Dirlik, Jeremy Eades, Gerard Finin, Jon Goss, Peter Hempenstall, Lily Kong, Lisa Law, Martin W. Lewis, Robert Nicole, Neil Smith, Teresia Teaiwa, Ricardo Trimillos, Christine Yano, Terence Wesley-Smith.
This book addresses the incorporation of Global Englishes into language policy and curriculum, pedagogy and assessment practices, and focuses on a wide range of geographical and language contexts. It will be of interest to policymakers, curriculum developers and practitioner-researchers in the area of English language education.
