Inclusive education for Internally Displaced Children in Kenya::Children perceptions of their learning and development needs in post-conflict schooling

Abstract The Kenyan society has been characterised by tribal-political-instigated violence since the declaration of multiparty democracy in 1991. The 2007/8 post-election violence (PEV) particularly saw the scattering of families where some children lost months or years of schooling; others were permanently excluded from education, while the participation and achievement of those arriving in school were characterised by complex needs and experiences. This paper aims to analyse literature and report on findings from creative activities with 16 conflict-affected children (9–12 years) regarding their experiences and understandings of inclusive education during their post-conflict school-life. I conducted an intrinsic case study with aspects of ethnography in a post-conflict community primary school in Kenya whose majority (71%) pupil population was attributed to internal displacement following the 2007/8 PEV. Children perceived inclusive education in regard to their own learning and development needs as involving access and acceptance in the new school community, social-emotional development, ‘peer-keeping’ and community-consciousness. Whilst valuing their teachers’ pursuit for inclusion-sensitive practices, children’s understanding of their own circumstances resulted in group-made strategies like ‘peer-keeping’ and peer-constructed rules of interaction, helping them negotiate systemic constrains and distortion of values. This study underscores the fundamental role of children in social integration in post-conflict circumstances

Advancement and subordination of women academics in Saudi Arabia’s higher education

This article explores the experience of women academics in Saudi Arabia’s higher education. Based on narrative inquiry and underpinned by Bourdieu’s work, I trace the influence of SA’s educational policy and the broader impact of patriarchal norms on the experience of 10 women academics. The article argues that gendered expectations mean that leadership roles within Higher Education (HE) are predominantly held by men, and women are prevented from fully participating in research, decision-making processes and other Higher Education activities beyond teaching and administration. The narratives presented in this article illustrate that HE in Saudi Arabia remains dominated by traditional patriarchal consciousness. The article concludes that to bring about change, women’s sections in Saudi universities need financial, administrative and academic independence

Reified languages and scripts versus real literacy values and practices: insights from research with young bilinguals in an Islamic state

The main focus of this article is on the multilingual literacy practices and values of English-educated university students (aged 14–20) in Brunei Darussalam, Southeast Asia. Multilingual literacy is used as a lens to examine the impact of globalization on the communicative practices of these young people and to investigate the specific ways in which they are engaging with the new technoscapes of the twenty-first century. The article draws on several research projects carried out between 2001 and 2007 and on case studies of 23 students. The different data sources include literacy diaries, samples of texts produced by the young people, narratives about their literacy histories and diary-based interviews. The article gives an account of the ways in which these young, cosmopolitan Bruneians positioned themselves vis-à-vis the reified language and literacy values encountered in the institutional and ‘regulated’ spaces of their lives and it provides insights into the ways in which they articulated both local and globalised identities through their digital and multilingual literacy practices, in ‘unregulated spaces’, such as on the internet or in SMS messaging with members of their peer group. The article contributes to the growing body of research on digital literacy in multilingual settings and to the debate, within the New Literacy Studies, about how the link between local and global should be conceptualised