Category: Capacity Building

Diaspora and Education: Towards New Sociological Perspectives

A special issue for International Studies in Sociology of Education.

This Special Issue aims to explore the theoretical, methodological and empirical relevance of the concept of diaspora for an international sociology of education. It will bring together high-quality, original research and scholarship from a range of disciplines, including sociology, anthropology, migration and diaspora studies, comparative and international education, digital literacies, among others.

The Special Issue invites cutting edge empirical and theoretical research examining the ways in which diasporic communities are drawing upon their transnational linkages and manifold capitals to educate themselves and others in diverse societies.

The conception of diaspora which is the focus of this special issue is different from the so-called ‘check-list’ approach which associates diasporas with loss of, longing for and possible return to a homeland, while also moving beyond the ‘anti-essentialist’ focus on hybridity and difference. Rather, diasporas are seen as normal and constant features of the contemporary world and analysed as highly significant in shaping social, political, economic and cultural processes at local, national and transnational levels. Special attention is therefore expected to be paid to the particular nature of settlement, relationships with the country of settlement, and intra-diasporic, local and global dynamics. However, contributing authors are welcome to adopt other positions and to use their work to critique and further develop the concept of diaspora. 

Your paper may wish to address one or more of the following questions (not an exhaustive list):

• How can ‘diaspora’ help us to more rigorously challenge methodological nationalism in education and/or offer methodological innovations?
• What advantages (e.g. theoretical, empirical) does the diaspora concept offer the globally-comparative study of education?
• How do diasporans use their ‘diasporicity’ to engage with and challenge/overcome educational inequalities in national and international arenas?
• What does a diasporic approach to education offer in terms of developing (or theorizing) innovative, inclusive models of education and citizenship?

Submission Guidelines

Prospective authors are very welcome to contact the guest-editor directly to Dr Reza Gholami to informally discuss their contribution or seek feedback on their abstract.

To formally express an interest in contributing to the Special Issue, please submit an abstract of no more than 250 words to the same email address by 15 January 2020. Successful authors will be notified by 15 February 2020, and full drafts are required for submission and peer review by 1 April 2020.

For an example of an article in this special issue, refer here.

1. Title of the Special Issue

Resilience of Chinese children, parents, and educators: A powerful response to “lazy inclusivism”

2. Name of Special Issue Editor and Affiliation

Guanglun Michael Mu (m.mu@qut.edu.au), Queensland University of Technology

3. Introductory Statement

Three decades after the advent of “Learning in Regular Classroom” (LRC), various strategies have emerged to do “inclusion” in China. At the national level, the State Council (2010, 2019) has stressed the importance of inclusive education. At policy level, Ministry of Education (2018, 2019) has consistently included LRC as one of its annual key work objectives. At school level, students with special needs have become increasingly visible in regular classrooms (Mu, Hu, & Wang, 2017). Parallel to these developments is the strident criticism of the structural absence of system support to LRC (Wang et al., 2015). Behind the commitment to, and the criticism of, LRC is the logic of “lazy inclusivism” where seemingly hard-working legislation, regulation, and education paradoxically engage in much tokenistic inclusive practice that barely introduces transformational change.

In response to the paradox of “lazy inclusivism”, the Special Issue aims to produce knowledge about the ordinary and extraordinary wisdom of Chinese children, parents, and educators emerging from the context of inclusive education full of attractions and distractions. When faced with visible adverse conditions and invisible structural constraints, some may play the game of tokenism and become “lazy”; others, however, may strategically refuse to play the game, demonstrating resilience to symbolic violence of “lazy inclusivism”. Questions remain in terms of who become “lazy”, why and how; and who awaken from the epistemic slumber of “laziness”, why and how. To address these enigmatic questions, articles to be included in the Special Issue will collectively explore pathways to resilience that purposefully not perfunctorily transforms inclusive education into an enabling and welcoming pedagogical space for the betterment of children with diverse needs in China.

4. Paper Information

The Special Issue aims to put together seven articles, including an introductory article and a concluding article by the Special Issue Editor, and five empirical articles written by key researchers with expertise in Chinese inclusive/special education. Details regarding the authors and the topics of each empirical article are be confirmed.

5. Concluding Article

Author: Guanglun Michael Mu, Queensland University of Technology

The concluding article will engage in a critical analysis of the issues raised by the five empirical articles, connect these issues to the global debates around the concept and praxis of inclusion, and propose a tentative agenda for research and policy for Chinese inclusive education, which may also be of reference to inclusive education elsewhere.

6. Working Timeline

December 2019: Call for EOIs

January 2020: Editor’s response to EOIs

February 2020: Deadline for submission of proposal that includes a concise title, a 250-word abstract, and six keywords maximum

March 2020: Editor’s response to proposal

September 2020: Deadline for submission of full paper, 7000 words maximum including title, abstract, keywords, main text, footnotes and endnotes, tables and figures, references, acknowledgements, and appendices

October 2020: Completion of internal review by editor

December 2021: Deadline for submission of revised paper with a response to editor’s review

March 2021: Deadline for submission for external blind review

Expected publication date: End of 2021

7. Reference

Ministry of Education, P. R. C. (2018). 教育部2018年工作要点[2018 key work objectives of the Ministry of Education]. Beijing: Ministry of Education.

Ministry of Education, P. R. C. (2019). 教育部2019年工作要点[2019 key work objectives of the Ministry of Education]. Beijing: Ministry of Education.

Mu, G. M., Hu, Y., & Wang, Y. (2017). Building resilience of students with disabilities in China: The role of inclusive education teachers. Teaching and Teacher Education, 67, 125-134. doi:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tate.2017.06.004

State Council, P. R. C. (2010). 国家中长期教育改革和发展规划纲要(2010-2020年)[State guidelines for medium- and long-term education reform and development plan (2010-2020)]. Beijing: State Council.

State Council, P. R. C. (2019). 中国教育现代化2035[Modernisation of Chinese education 2035]. Beijing: State Council.

Wang, Y., Mu, G. M., Wang, Z., Deng, M., Cheng, L., & Wang, H. (2015). Multidimensional classroom support to inclusive education teachers in Beijing, China. International Journal of Disability, Development and Education, 62(6), 644-659. doi:10.1080/1034912X.2015.1077937

Submission deadline: 1 May 2020

Guest Editors: Dr Kun Dai (Peking University), Prof Mei Tian (Xi’an Jiaotong University)

Dr Kun Dai

Prof Mei Tian

China’s government and universities have taken many steps to internationalise higher education. Chinese universities are encouraged to collaborate with international partners on teaching and research. China continues to be the largest international student source country in the world. China has also developed its ability to attract international students to its own universities. Selected Chinese universities are also building campuses and research facilities abroad.

Such internationalisation diversifies Chinese higher education, and reveals opportunities as well as challenges. One critical challenge involves how Chinese people and universities perceive and (re)position their identify among the change. Much can be gleaned from foreign experiences, theories and methodologies. But it is becoming more important to move beyond such borrowing, adaptation and normalisation. There is an opportunity to build innovative insights into the nature and development of the ‘Chinese identity’.

In this IJCE Special Issue we invite discussions of and reflections on the ‘identities’ of different parties (e.g., policymakers, universities, academics, and students) in the current changes of Chinese higher education. We welcome contributions engaged with studies of ‘identities’ in Chinese higher education from different perspectives, i.e., sectoral, institutional, professional, or individual. Authors from doctoral students to established scholars are welcomed to contribute papers. Articles should make a theoretical or technical contribution.

Possible topics include but are not limited to studying:

• Educational policy and identity
• Globalisation/internationalisation of systems
• University characteristics
• Faculty education and research identity
• Student characteristics and theories

Interested authors are invited to contribute a 7,000 word paper (including abstract, references, footnotes, tables and figures) to the two guest editors Dr Kun Dai (kdai@pku.edu.cn) and Prof Mei Tian (temmytian@mail.xjtu.edu.cn). All submitted manuscripts will be double-blind reviewed. All paper submissions will use the online editorial system.

**Call for papers**

Hello! I am a PhD student at Birkbeck, University of London. I am recruiting Chinese students studying in the UK (Hong Kong, Taiwan, Macau, Mainland China, all welcome) to fill out a questionnaire for my PhD research.

This research aims to investigate the relationship between language experience in inner speech, and life in the UK as a Chinese student. It has received ethical approval from SSHP Ethics Committee, Birkbeck, University of London.