Purpose: As the population of immigrant-origin youth continues to increase in the school systems of the United States and Canada, this study examined the relationship between immigrant youths' feelings of belonging and their developing understanding of citizenship. Research Methods/Approach: Adopting an ecological framework, this qualitative,…

This article examines how cultural and historical narratives influence the stories Alberta teachers tell about religion in their secondary social studies classrooms. The stories reveal the degree to which teachers are both thoughtful practitioners and shaped by their society. Study participants reflected this tension as the majority took religion…

The current political climate is characterized by an alarming pattern of global democratic regression driven by authoritarian populist leaders who deploy vast misinformation campaigns. These offensives are successful when the majority of the population lack skills that would allow them to think critically about information in the political sphere,…

This article first describes and then proposes a practical solution to the professional dilemma between the duty of impartiality and the duty of human rights advocacy that many teachers experience when teaching and talking about politically sensitive issues with students. The article begins by presenting an analysis of the source and signification…

Competition among parties is a central feature of democratic politics, but extreme partisanship can undermine democratic practices and institutions. We report the results of a formative curricular intervention involving reflective discussions designed to avoid hyper-partisanship in a training program for anyone--including university students--with…

Western nations are becoming increasingly socially and ethnically diverse. National policies aim to address this diversity through policies such as multiculturalism in Canada, which promotes appreciation for cultural pluralism. However, policy rhetoric can hide social issues related to increasing diversity. Using Canada as a case study discussion,…

Science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) is a form of education seen by many governments and educators as a preparation of the types of students needed for the future. STEM education is being developed in many countries without the support of official policy, such as is the case in Canada. In the United States, the National Science…

As a postsecondary educator with most of my experience teaching in colleges, but with some also in undergraduate and postgraduate studies both in Canada and the United States, I have been teaching politics and government for close to fifty years. That time has been spent not only undertaking empirical analyses of political behaviour and the…

Transnational academic mobility is often characterized in relation to terms such as "brain drain", "brain gain", or "brain circulation"--terms that isolate researchers' minds from their bodies, while saying nothing about their political identities as foreign nationals. In this paper, I explore the possibilities of a…

Postsecondary teacher, Howard Doughty, has been teaching politics and government for close to fifty years. That time has been spent not only working with the empirical analysis of political behaviour and the normative analysis of political theory, but also in the practical activity of promoting understanding of what is frequently called civic…

This paper engages with a selection of scholarly writing in English that was published in the last decade and written from particular liberal democratic contexts (predominantly the UK, the USA, and Canada). The literature diagnoses the need for a more complex theory of citizenship education and theorises schooling for citizenship in a global…

The main thesis we want to defend in this article is that learning about nationalism from a historical, sociological, and normative point of view constitutes one important, but rather neglected, dimension of a good citizenship education. Although the debate about nationalism and education has received considerable attention from political and…

Many Canadians seem to have lost track of the role that public education plays in the nurturing of our civic culture. We have allowed consumerist thinking--the more choice, the better--to infect public policy around education. A moment's reflection reminds us that the corollary of consumerism is fragmentation. It is important that choice in public…

During a time of post-war sensitivity to Canadian nationalism and patriotism, public feeling was aroused in 1920 New Brunswick regarding a world history textbook with a new chapter about the First World War. The American author made no reference to Canada's war efforts. The subsequent public discussion focused on issues of patriotism, citizenship,…

Anti-intellectualism and political illiteracy are sweeping across the American media and cultural landscape, giving rise to discourses that are unabashedly nativist, racist, and reactionary. Populist sentiments drive the rabid individualism and anti-government rhetoric of right-wing groups such as the Tea Party movement. Underlying these…