MA Education: Culture, Language & Identity

Language, culture and identity – and the relationships between them – are key aspects of educational theory and policy. They have also provided a rich site for educational research. Increasingly, this research has outgrown a national focus, to explore the ways in which global interconnections have produced hybrid cultures, complex identities and new questions for education. How are social norms to be negotiated and understood in a multicultural society? How does culture affect the way in which teaching and learning are understood? What role can and should education play in responding to questions about identity?

This module provides an introduction to social and educational research. It aims to help you develop a critical understanding of the main methodological debates surrounding educational research and the research methods central to the study of issues of culture, language and identity in education. This module will also offer you opportunities to examine some of the approaches used to research literacy cultures and some of the ideas which have been influential in educational research such as, poststructuralism, constructionism and the post-human, feminist and critical approaches. The module is designed to assist you in your study for the MA more generally, and support the work you carry out for your dissertation.

This module will begin by exploring the links between language, experience and culture, using autobiographies of migration as a means to understanding entry into a new world at different stages of life. We will then examine ethnographic studies of socialisation in cross-cultural contexts, revealing how multilingual resources are deployed and developed in home and community learning. This research challenges assumptions on the nature of teaching and learning in schools and other mainstream educational settings, leading to questions on how teachers and students can negotiate an inclusive classroom culture.

We will consider the relative status of different languages and language varieties, and discuss theories on how power relationships affect the construction of multilingual identities, including students’ identities as learners. Case studies of learners of different ages and from different linguistic and cultural backgrounds will enable us to evaluate a range of possible approaches to the teaching of literacy and other curriculum areas. Finally, we look to the future in comparing UK and international research into alternative curricula that expand and enrich learners’ multilingual repertoires.

This course emphasises the pleasures of literature and aims to make students knowledgeable and committed readers of literature for children and young people. In the course we aim to address a range of issues in relation to culture and identity through literature for children.

We take a wide definition which includes picture books and graphic novels, media and dramatic texts. We consider historical perspectives and explore children's literature for today, as a distinct form, which is a product of both literary traditions and current ideological contexts.

Sessions will include consideration of the nature of literature for children, poetry and oral texts, picture books, media texts, graphic novels and reader response theory, and an exploration of literature about the refugee experience.

This module examines current developments and collaborative approaches in SEN and behaviour management research and practice. It will be established throughout the module that working with SEN and behaviour management practice may well overlap in places but are not to be conflated with each other. Rather, the two subjects are taken as related inclusive practice issues.

The module challenges the deficit model as a way to understand behaviour and SEN issues from a variety of standpoints. While taking this module, you will have the opportunity to investigate an area of your own choosing.

You explore key ideas and issues in the area of young children’s learning, with special reference to the cultural contexts of that learning. You consider the impact of such ideas and issues on curriculum and policy development and become familiar with techniques for, and approaches to, observing and analysing young children’s learning. This includes a consideration of: the care and development of young children in diverse settings; cross cultural perspectives on children’s learning; the concept of childhood and its impact on policy development. Visits are taken to observe young children in different settings. 

This module considers various forms of masculinity and femininity and how they impact upon identity, and upon education. In it we discuss the social construction of masculinities and femininities and how this construction is enacted through and underpinned by the ways in which gender roles are practised. We will consider how stereotypical gender roles —and the behaviour they prescribe— are learned, and how these impact on our sense of ourselves and of others. We will also look at the extent to which personal identity, including gender identity, is affected by expectations of masculinity and femininity in Western society. The module will also be concerned with how particular masculinities and femininities and the identities associated with them affect how people are able to learn, both inside and outside of educational institutions. We will also look at the role of policy – state and educational – in reifying particular gender identities.

The topics we will address include:

• the intersection of race / class with masculinity and femininity
• girls, bodies and identity
• queer bodies
• adolescent masculinities and femininities
• how particular forms of masculinity and femininity relate to school curricula, schooling and the school experience.

This module explores how education policy is created, interpreted and put into practice in schools and classrooms. You will explore the political context in which the UK education system operates, before considering two key of examples of recent Government policy, one relating to the curriculum, the other to the effects of a market system in education. You will also look at examples of local policy initiatives so that you can develop your understanding of how both teachers and students can influence policy as well as understanding how policy impacts on them.

In the second part of the module, you will select a national, local or school policy of your choice for further research, and will be asked to participate in a student-led session to share this learning. This will form the basis of the assignment, which is in two parts: the first part is a professional document or a piece of writing which supports a professional document (e.g. a scheme of work, a CPD session, or a review of a behaviour policy) and the second will be an essay discussing the context for the document, and how your understanding of teaching and learning and educational policy has informed this work.

A key aim of the module is to enable participants to consider how to develop and respond to policy in ways which are both principled and empowering. It will be of interest to all education professionals, in particular those who wish to move into middle and senior management roles in schools.

Leadership in schools requires educators to manage large, complex systems. This requires specialised understandings and strategies, ranging from a deep comprehension of how policy is made and implemented and the training of new staff members; to the development of empowering, collaborative relationships, and the important business of involving the pupil voice in managing an institution that has been organised for them.

In this module, we engage with issues including:

• equity
• identity
• self-awareness
• policy into practice
• youth participation in governance
• learning as leadership
• organisation
• change management
• the embedding of meaningful strategic objectives through pragmatic action

We examine the relationship between management and education, considering what this means in practical terms in the school context, through developing the skills necessary for effective communication, strategic thinking, and the leading of whole-school initiatives.

The link between theory and practice will be the backbone of our seminars, with sessions delivering both a critical framework and a useful set of leadership strategies with which to engage. The mentoring component will offer participants the skills to support and embed teacher training as a tool for school improvement. It will constitute a case study for dovetailing leadership and management tasks so that they work in harmony with each other.

This module focuses on issues of race, ethnicity and cultural diversity in education. We will begin by considering what these terms mean, before discussing how and why ethnic and racial boundaries have been constructed through history, and to what extent people accept or contest these boundaries. We will pay particular attention to the history of the concept of racism, and to some of its contemporary manifestations around the world.

From these starting points we will move on to consider how these concepts impact on education. Issues such as what is or should constitute a 'good pupil', the nature of the teacher’s role in the classroom, what knowledge is valued, and who decides, will be investigated. We will also consider how other aspects of identity, notably social class and gender, intersect with ethnicity and race to affect learning and learner identities in different ways.

The module aims to challenge stereotypes, and notions of ethnic identities as fixed and unchanging. It invites participants to reflect on their own ethnic and cultural background, and to explore how this influences their own understandings of racialisation and identity. It also expects participants to draw directly on their own personal experiences as learners and, where appropriate, as teachers. Throughout the module we will seek to consider strategies and discourse which lead to a more inclusive socio-cultural approach to teaching and learning, and to experience the excitement and complexity of being part of an inclusive multicultural classroom ourselves.

This module is based on an integrated and inclusive approach to language learning incorporating the areas of foreign and community language teaching as well as English as an Additional Language and English mother tongue. It aims to critically examine key research as well as current trends in the field, but also to make links between theoretical perspectives and classroom practice.

Through the module you will gain a deeper understanding of both policy and pedagogy adapted to different learners and settings. This will help you analyse current practices including your own. We recognise that students come with a wide range of experience in language teaching and there will be opportunities for this to be shared and discussed in sessions.