During the 1930s there was a significant shift in the debate about African colonial education. Above all, somewhat discreetly hidden behind the formal language of the educational documents, is the question of the challenge presented to the traditional literary/religious missionary curriculum, or even to the "adaptationist" debate about…

Driven by our recent mapping of the human genome, genetics research is increasingly prominent and beginning to reintersect with education research. We describe previous intersections of these fields, focusing on the ways that they were harmful. We then discuss novel features of genetics research in the current era, with an emphasis on…

Driven by our recent mapping of the human genome, genetics research is increasingly prominent and beginning to reintersect with education research. We describe previous intersections of these fields, focusing on the ways that they were harmful. We then discuss novel features of genetics research in the current era, with an emphasis on…

Biology teachers consider basic Mendelian genetics to be value-free, objective science, immune to misinterpretation and misuse. It may thus come as a surprise to learn that in the early days of genetics a cornerstone of genetics education, the dihybrid cross, was employed to support claims of the racial superiority of whites over blacks and to…

Rapid changes in American society in the early twentieth century fostered both a general sense of optimism for America's future and a perceived sense of moral dislocation affecting present and future generations of America's youth. Urbanization, modernization, and the increasing presence of immigrant populations were often viewed as challenges to…

This article pays attention to the regional embeddedness of early research on giftedness, looking principally at the works of Lewis Terman and his peers, between the 1910s and 1930s. The rhetoric, ideology, and aesthetics of giftedness in those early works were, I argue, stamped by the context and imaginary of Progressive-Era California and shaped…

Genetic research was banned in the Polish People's Republic from 1949 to 1956 as a result of the activities of Trofim D. Lysenko, a pseudo-biologist in the Soviet Union. This article examines the impact upon education in biology in Poland, including textbook revision, curriculum reform and revised understandings of the purpose of scientific…