Learning, Curriculum and Life Politics: the selected works of Ivor F. Goodson
Towards a Social Constructionist Perspective
One of the perennial problems of studying curriculum is that it is a multi-faceted concept constructed, negotiated and re-negotiated at a variety of levels and in a variety of arenas. This elusiveness has no doubt contributed to the rise of theoretical and overarching perspectives -psychological, philosophical and sociological - as well as more technical or scientific paradigms. But these perspectives and paradigms have been criticised recurrently because they do violence to the practical essentials of curriculum as conceived of and realised.
In this paper, I shall argue that we need to move firmly and sharply away from de-contextualised and disembodied modes of analysis whether they be philosophical, psychological or sociological; away from technical, rational or scientific management models - away from the 'objectives game'. Above all, we need to move away from a singular focus on curriculum as prescription. This means that we must embrace fully the notion of curriculum as social construction firstly at the level of prescription itself, but also at the levels of process and practice.
