This short piece from the Forum archive introduces Caroline Benn's detailed critique of 'The myth of giftedness'. Her starting point is the need to define and then demand comprehensive education as a basic educational right, set alongside a mapping of the modern giftedness movement in the 1960s and 1970s.

Contrastive rhetoric (CR) has made great contributions to our understanding of L2 writing. Nevertheless, CR has endured countless criticisms over the years, resulting in "reimagined" forms attempting to address many of these criticisms. In doing so, these forms have shaped CR into a collection of complex ideologies that have…

Human Rights Education exists as an implementing entity of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Scholars such as Andre Keet and others have criticized the dissemination of universal rights through education because it covets Western ideology over local ethical and epistemological constructs. Using Tibbitts' revised typologies of Human Rights…

Teaching and reading literature are commonly viewed as contributing to the cultivation of empathy. This article presents critical and pedagogical approaches to test this view and suggests a distinction between low-level, simple empathy inspired by the reading and teaching of "The Tortilla Curtain" and a more complex, self-critical…

Suresh Canagarajah is Edwin Erle Sparks Professor and Director of the Migration Studies Project, Departments of Applied Linguistics and English, Pennsylvania State University, USA. Having a BA with a major in English from the University of Kelaniya, Sri Lanka, and a PhD in Applied Linguistics from the University of Texas at Austin, USA, Professor…

How should those who value reasonable pluralism navigate ethical and epistemological challenges related to speech and inquiry in higher education? We propose the ethical pursuit of public knowledge as a guiding vision for public colleges and universities with the understanding that other institutions will serve different purposes. The ethical…

This paper details the oscillation between the aesthetic and political response to the refugee crisis as seen through the eyes of the UK's emergency response committee COBRA (Cabinet Office Briefing Room A) and its alternative COBRA RES. Firstly, it examines the interjection of the official COBRA Committee within the image-economy of crisis,…

Major supranational organisations such as the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, the European Union, and the World Bank have used lifelong learning as a strategy to boost economic competitiveness both at individual and national levels. In the literature related to lifelong learning this is characterised as the economistic model…

The UK Government's PREVENT strategy to counter radicalisation and extremism has been the subject of criticism. Concerns arise over clarity of purpose, clarity of terminology used and potential human rights impacts. Where the policy engages with schools, one human right potentially engaged is the right of parents to transfer their religious…

Project-Based Learning (PBL) is increasingly popular in K-12 schools, not just in the United States but around the world. PBL is a great way to engage students in their learning. In this article, the author presents what PBL is and is not.

Critical applied linguistics remains deeply relevant today, arguably more than ever, but it needs constant renewal. This paper returns to these concerns to assess where this project has got to and where it may be headed. I review first both long-term and short-term political trends, from the rise of neoliberalism to the COVID pandemic. Next, I…

Contemporary understandings of inclusive education increasingly emphasise processes of reform, within and between schools, and across education systems, which respond to diversity amongst all students. The goal of an equitable, high quality and welcoming system in which all students are present, participating and achieving in their local school is…

In this commentary on "Corporate Responsibility to Respect Human Rights and Business Schools' Responsibility to Teach It" (McPhail 2013), the author discusses how McPhail's paper examines human rights teaching principles, the question of why corporations and business schools should respect and teach human rights, and how business…

With the hope of inspiring readers to reimagine the centrality of general education in constituting young adult capacities to create and sustain collective self-governance, this essay describes two courses and one activity built around public problems. General education viewed as a human right as well as a shared responsibility can thus serve as a…

The article discusses the role of human rights education in prejudice reduction. It critiques some selected educational principles that may be crucial for successful pedagogical approaches against prejudice in multiethnic societies. These pedagogical principles are elaborated further and illustrated with exemplary good pedagogy practice…