This article analyses the youth social movements in Hong Kong employing 'conscientisation' popularized by Paulo Freire. It is argued that the youth, as historical beings, promote humanisation by seeking to effect structural changes with the help of the social media. However, the youth-led movements in Hong Kong differ from Freire's ideas in two…

The Confucian temple (Kong miao[characters omitted]) was the most important official educational institution and the centre of local education in ancient China. This study explores the history of the Confucian temple in Jiangyin ([characters omitted]) as a case to reveal the dynamics of educational reform in China, which had witnessed the…

This paper analyses how 'criticality' is negotiated in the global policy frameworks on Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) and re-conceptualised in Vietnamese ESD policymaking. Taking the context of Viet Nam, this paper reflects on what constitutes criticality in education in the light of cultural and historical contexts of the education…

This paper delineates the rise, fall and re-emergence of "tongshi" education in Chinese higher education history, and in doing so hopes to reveal the underlying forces behind the two waves of "tongshi" education and capture their important 'Chinese' characteristics. Based on a comparative-historical examination of the Chinese…

This paper examines the changing presentation of teachers in the post-Mao era. The image of teachers was almost sacred in traditional Confucian society until Mao Zedong launched China's Cultural Revolution in 1966, when children were encouraged to use the pretext of class struggle to critique and even to attack their teachers. As such, restoring…

As Paulo Freire's education theory for social change and emancipation is being continually studied and disseminated in East Asia, it has faced skepticism as some educators are unfamiliar with its critical pedagogy or education for freedom concepts. In light of this, scholars have attempted to compare Freirean philosophies with concepts in Chinese…

The four decades since reform and opening up have seen dramatic changes in China's higher education system. Focusing on international dimensions, the analysis supports the view that reform and opening up was not merely an economic and political reform, but an opening of the mind to the outside world, after the disaster of the Cultural Revolution.…

It is widely acknowledged that China is much wealthier than ever before. However, many have witnessed rising cases of moral disorders and the inefficiency of school-based moral education. As one of the most widely known theoretical frameworks in the social sciences, Bronfenbrenner's bio-ecological systems theory of human development can provide an…

The image of country is overall impression and evaluation of the country itself given by countries and people at home and abroad. It is a concrete expression of the country's strategic resources and overall strength. Since the founding of the People's Republic of China, its national image has evolved over the past 70 years. It has realized the…

The historical debate between a liberal orientation of university education and a university education with a more practical orientation has been reproduced by defenders and detractors of the course that is being adopted by the European Higher Education Area (EHEA). Instead of resorting to a dichotomous view of these two arguments, this article…

This paper investigates the transformation in the Zhou dynasty China (1046-256 BC) of the concept of education in relation to the process of social selection, which concerns the distribution both of knowledge and of social ranks. An approach in terms of historical semantics, mainly influenced by Luhmannian sociological theory with some reference…

This paper develops an interdisciplinary critical perspective on the concept of "Confucian Heritage Cultures" (CHC), used in intercultural and English language teaching theory to explain the supposed culturally distinct learning habits, expectations and schemas many Asian students bring to academic classrooms in English-speaking…

This inquiry aims to advance curricular discourses on equity and social transformation by reviewing Korea's indigenous philosophy and religion, Donghak [(foreign characters omitted) Eastern Learning]. I explicate the ways in which the democratic ideals of equity and justice were implemented in nineteenth- and twentieth-Korean society, founded upon…

Teaching and learning of Chinese as a foreign language and its culture is complex for Kenyan learners. It requires them to consider contrasting intellectual, policy and economic dimensions that instead of aiding its propagation among Kenyan learners, could even facilitate a hindrance to its progression. Potential measures that could be embraced…

This study, informed by social constructionism and narrative theories, explored the relationship stories told by visiting Chinese grandparents and their adult children in a southern region of the United States. The purpose of this research was to create space for family members' explanations of their familial interactions and the meanings they…