What is Education for? Situating History, Cultural Understandings and Studies of Society and Environment against Neo-Conservative Critiques of Curriculum Reform
This paper explores some of debates about the nature and purpose of education in the social sciences in the Australian curriculum. It examines recent attempts in studies of society and environment and history curriculum to prepare students for global citizenship and responds to neo-conservative critiques that our "politically correct" curricula does not impart the "truth" about our "European" heritage. This paper argues that while the neo-conservative discourse makes claim to traditional views of knowledge and rationality, its discursive field does not address the broader questions of what sort of education our students require for the twenty-first century
