This article describes the important ways in which Harold Guetzkow mentored his student, helping him to develop conceptual and methodological skills and to become a rigorous thinker. While the path was sometimes difficult and stressful, the intellectual skills transmitted from Harold Guetzkow were vital to the teaching and research skills of his…

The article examines the enduring popularity of a form of school history which is based predominantly on the idea that the transmission of a positive story about the national past will inculcate in young people a sense of loyalty to the state; a reassuring and positive sense of identity and belonging; and a sense of social solidarity with fellow…

The consequence of narratives becoming stagnant or controlled is that they become a Master Narrative. The Master Narrative is an "ideological script that is being imposed by the people in authority on everybody else: The Master Fiction... history" (Moyers, 1990, para. 4). Master Narratives use myths and ideologies to sustain a sanitized version of…

Public discourse suggests that volunteer work will transform youth into productive citizens by connecting youth to their communities. However, the meaning and practice of "community" is rarely defined or investigated. Using interview and observation data from a study of 47 volunteers aged 15-23, I argue that there are three different types of…

The Ninth of May 2010 marks the sixty-fifth anniversary of the Day of Victory in the Great War for the Fatherland (World War II). Although so much time has passed, the moral asset of this historical event remains large. The Russian people perceive this victory as a heroic symbol of the whole Fatherland, and its results and consequences are…

The literature on political socialization has overlooked the influence of system characteristics of schooling on civic values and youth political identities. This article addresses that gap by investigating the degree to which system differentiation relates to the values of ethnic tolerance and patriotism. We distinguish between pedagogical…

This article looks at the way in which patriotism and citizenship were used almost interchangeably in educational circles during the first half of the twentieth century. It traces the development of patriotism, citizenship and civics teaching during this period by discussing the way in which the London County Council approached these areas in the…

In this essay Duck-Joo Kwak explores a moral perfectionist approach to citizenship education, which is distinct from liberal and communitarian models. One of educational challenges to this approach is how to cultivate our students' sense of membership, which is shaped by a thick sense of the good life, while being not merely compatible with but…

In a democracy, agents of political socialization, such as schools and parents, generally emphasize the importance of voting. While college students may be exposed briefly to voter registration as a barrier to participation, there is little evidence that the topic is given serious attention in the classroom. This research addresses how classroom…

Hong Kong has become a political city since 1997 after the return of sovereignty from Britain to China, and the issue of democracy and universal suffrage is still a question. Since then, there have been constant demonstrations in the streets to struggle for social justice and true universal suffrage, participated in by thousands of Hong Kong…

This article presents the Quebec ministry of education's (MELS) strategy for diversifying the national historical narrative that is transmitted in the province's History and Citizenship Education program as well as the manner in which Francophone national history teachers put this strategy into practice. In bringing research on their social…

The strong relationship between education and civic engagement is what leads Fraga and Frost (2010) to describe the U.S. school system as a "center of democratic governance" (p. 119). For immigrant communities, schools also serve to foster political socialization and incorporation. This chapter considers schools' democratic roles from an…

Despite repeating claims that Canadians are less nationalistic than members of other nations, English as a second language (ESL) textbooks often participate in banal repetitions of nation-ness and nationalism. This banal nationalism takes the form of the marking of nation through flags, maps, routine deixis, and nationalized symbols. This study…

In everyday language, whether a school is described as "public" or not is determined by the way it is funded and by who is allowed to attend it. Ideally however, a public school should also be defined and evaluated by its unique goal--to renew a public by providing the young with the skills, dispositions, and perspectives required to…

The author presents evidence of "glaring gaps in U.S. students' civic knowledge, motivation, and interest." From the inception of the United States through the mid-20th century, he writes, civic education was at the center of U.S. schooling. Since then, however, there has been a decline in civics instruction, fueled by increasing…