Home - Cambridge Scholars Publishing

Re-Shaping Education for Citizenship: Democratic National Citizenship in Hong Kong
Author: Pak-sang Lai and Michael Byram
Date Of Publication: Feb 2012
Isbn13: 978-1-4438-3531-2
Isbn: 1-4438-3531-5
Despite or perhaps because of globalisation and internationalisation in the contemporary world, the role of education has become more significant in nation formation. However, whereas in the past its function was to create homogeneity and assimilation, today it must deal with diversity and plurality. The modernist premise of “one nation one state” is being questioned and re-constituted with the notion of the plural national-state.

This book explores school processes in Hong Kong under these new conditions. The focus is on investigating how the concept of a national identity of the “one country two systems” policy is developing, and is thus a study of that diversity which all education systems now have to address. The policy aims at facilitating national re-integration and consolidation in the face of an insistence on local citizens’ universal civic rights and the values of liberty, equality, democracy and autonomy.

The analysis shows citizenship education in the Hong Kong school system is more a locally-oriented cultural and political process than a transmission of a national ideology. Students learn their values, attitudes and perspectives by engaging and interacting with people within and beyond the school community. They acquire a liberal and democratic national identity which is distinct from that of pan-Chinese state-nationalism in mainland China.

The book is thus both a case study of Hong Kong and an analysis of change in the relationship of education, citizenship and national identity in the contemporary world.

Pak-sang Lai was a secondary school teacher and then a lecturer in teacher education, joining the Hong Kong Institute of Education in 1995 until retirement. He has taught and researched public affairs and education, and now serves as expert consultant on public policy for education and on education in schools. He has published on reproduction politics in bilingual education.

Michael Byram taught languages in secondary school and adult education. At Durham University since 1980, now Professor Emeritus, he has researched the education of linguistic minorities and foreign language education. His most recent book is From Foreign Language Education to Education for Intercultural Citizenship (Multilingual Matters) and he is the editor of the Routledge Encyclopedia of Language Teaching and Learning.

Price Uk Gbp: 39.99
Price Us Usd: 59.99

Sample pdf (including Table of Contents)

We recommend

Language and Literature
Middle-earth and Beyond: Essays on the World of J. R. R. Tolkien

History
Arctic Discourses

Education
The Supportive School: Wellbeing and the Young Adolescent

Interesting reviews

From Navigating Music and Sound Education

“We rarely have the opportunity and time to engage with the practicalities of music teaching through the lens of evidence-based practice. This book provides us with a wonderful exception that is accessible to beginning and established teachers. It contains a wide range of stimulating and thought-provoking material that draws on real-world experiences and events, which are contextualised, informed and structured by theory. This is a powerful combination that we can visit again and again for insight and inspiration. Congratulations to all involved, particularly the editors for shaping such a valuable contribution!”
—Professor Graham F. Welch, University of London; President, International Society of Music Education

“Navigating music and sound education draws together a range of issues increasingly acknowledged to be at the basis of reflective and effective music learning and teaching: social settings, cultural dimensions, gender, indigeneity, varying cognitive approaches, inter-disciplinary connections, technology, types of learning, and creativity. It opens up areas of pedagogy that go beyond classroom methodology to acknowledge student individuality and encourage music learning and teaching grounded in the reality of students’ musical and social lives. It will be invaluable for those training to become educators and for teachers already in the field.”
—Associate Professor Peter Dunbar-Hall, University of Sydney

“This book brings an important contribution to music teacher education as it challenges the readers to rethink their paradigms of music education. It highlights the importance of preparing a reflective teacher, autonomous, creative and conscious of the multifaceted and multicultural locus in which they will work. The book also draws on the importance for music teachers to consider the context in which they work, and establish a dialog between local musical traditions, informal music practices and global trends of music teaching and learning. Most importantly, all chapters are in one way or another derived from research carried out on specific areas, thus stressing the importance of the research informed practice in music education.”
—Professor Liane Hentschke, Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil; International Society of Music Education Immediate Past President

Many readers will appreciate Steve Dillon and Kathy Hirche’s description of the future of education in their work with dynamic technological contexts.

Navigating Music and Sound Education is a wonderful guide and resource for pre-service music teachers, for teachers in the field, and for teacher educators.

It offers a range of fresh perspectives on the state of music education as it is and as it might be. Kari K Veblen

Navigating Music and Sound Education is an ambitious project which features current research from 20 individuals whose professional identities run the gamut from musician to songwriter to student to educator to music therapist to ethnomusicologist. The book’s scope is perhaps the most exciting aspect of Navigating Music and Sound Education.
Kari K Veblen
University of Western Ontario
British Journal of Music Education
October 2011