ESC - Educação, Sociedade & Culturas (Education, Society & Cultures) is a peer-reviewed journal published by the Centre for Research and Intervention in Education (CIIE) of the University of Porto, Portugal.
CIIE – Centro de Investigação e Intervenção Educativas da Faculdade de Psicologia e de Ciências da Educação da Universidade do Porto
Authors retain copyright, without restrictions, in their articles and grant the journal right of first publication with the work simultaneously licensed under Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike Licence 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-SA). Readers are free to copy, display, distribute, and adapt an article, as long as the work is attributed to the author(s) and ESC, the changes are identified, and the same license applies to the derivative work. Only non-commercial uses of the work are permitted.
Copyright (c) 2026 Tiago Neves https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
Configurações de conhecimento e política na regulação da educação sexual em meio escolar
In the last twenty-five years, the intervention of public authorities in the field of sexual education in schools has materialized through diverse modalities – by legislative acts, by the creation of programs, networks, working groups, as well by the production of texts aimed to coordinate, guide and support action among schoolchildren. This paper aims to describe and analyse the knowledge that support this public policy, as well as the governance practices that are associated with the mobilization and generation of such knowledge. In the first part the text draws a picture of the variety of knowledge that is brought together in the intervention of public authority, whether in problematization and elaboration of action plans. The second part of the paper gives attention to three controversies repeatedly present in public debates – the existence (or not) of sexual education in schools, the visions about youth sexuality and the ways it should be accomplished, and the hierarchy of knowledge generated in the education and health sectors. As in its first part, the text presents an interpretive analysis about the knowledge’s that are perceived, by actors, as relevant to coordinate and to provide sexual education in schools – what are those knowledge’s, from where do they come from, and how should they be combined.
Copyright (c) 2011 Luís Miguel Carvalho, Carla Cibele Figueiredo https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
Comment expliquer l’absence d’un consensus minimal concernant la scolarisation en Hongrie
Cet article présente la genèse et le fonctionnement des instances nationales de négociation et de consultation de l’enseignement primaire et secondaire mises en place en Hongrie au niveau national après le changement de régime. Sur la base de constats concernant le mode de construction et de fonctionnement de ces instances, se formule l’hypothèse selon laquelle les mouvements de balancier importants observés en Hongrie depuis deux décennies dans le domaine de la politique éducative peuvent être attribués en partie aux caractéristiques structurelles des conseils en question.
Copyright (c) 2011 Iván Bojami https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
Policy evaluation in education in France: Going beyond the state sciences model?
The global aim of this article is to question the evolution of the relations between knowledge and policy in the education sector and their possible effects on the current regulation of the educational systems. To do so, I focus on the policy evaluation led in education in France at the national level since the 1980s. My thesis is that in the policy evaluation of French education a particular type of knowledge production predominates, which can be understood as specific «state sciences». Through materials drawn from three main qualitative studies, two of them conducted within and for the Knowandpol Project, the article highlights the weight of state elites on the production of knowledge in the evaluation field and their particular methods of analysis. Then it stresses the key factors of explanation of the predominance of this state sciences model and its main implications on the current French education policy process.
Copyright (c) 2011 Xavier Pons https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
Connaissances et reconfiguration des entités de coordination: Le cas de l’enseignement en Belgique francophone
Toute société peut être décrite comme une configuration d’acteurs interdépendants. Dans ce réseau dense de liens, la définition des contours des entités de coordination constitue un enjeu majeur car elle détermine pour partie l’équilibre entre les coordinations hiérarchiques, délibératives et par ajustement. Ces contours sont évolutifs et socialement construits. Le système éducatif belge n’échappe pas à la règle. Sur les cent dernières années, deux phases peuvent être distinguées. Après une période marquée par un lent processus d’unification sectorielle et de cloisonnement des piliers confessionnels, succède une période caractérisée par une évolution vers la centralisation sectorielle et la fédéralisation de l’État. Le «système» éducatif belge francophone que ces tendances font peu à peu émerger est cependant travaillé par de nouvelles logiques de territorialisation et de désectorisation, qui semblent annoncer de futures reconfigurations. De tels processus évolutifs sont multifactoriels. Les connaissances y jouent un triple rôle: elles peuvent en effet agir en tant qu’argument, en tant qu’expérience ou en tant que savoir de gouvernement. Sous ces trois formes, elles contribuent à l’émergence, la consolidation ou la remise en cause des entités de coordination.
Copyright (c) 2011 Bernard Delvaux https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
The main purpose of this dossier is to analyse the articulation between knowledge and politics in the field of education, based on studies conducted in five European countries that participated in the Knowandpol research project. Each article focuses on a specific country and is authored by members of the respective national team. The reflection produced uses partial results from the project, taking into account its theoretical framework and the empirical material collected.
Copyright (c) 2011 João Barroso https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
This is a new thematic issue of the journal Educação, Sociedade & Culturas (Education, Society & Cultures), which, like previous issues, seeks to support research focused on relevant educational problems due to their contemporary presence in policies, processes, practices, and the perspectives of the actors involved. As a vehicle for disseminating scientific production, the journal presents itself as a means of social appropriation of scientific knowledge, keeping in mind diverse audiences, from scientific communities dedicated to specific problems, to professional audiences linked to the educational fields; and also those audiences seeking an informed and problematizing view of issues related to the production of education.
Copyright (c) 2011 Helena C. Araújo https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
Copyright (c) 2012 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
(D)Enunciar a autonomia: Contributos para a compreensão da génesee da construção da autonomia escolar
Ferreira, Elisabete (2012). (D)Enunciar a Autonomia: Contributos para a compreensão da génese e da construção da autonomia escolar [Revealing autonomy: contributions to understanding the genesis of the construction of school autonomy]. Porto: Porto Editora.
Copyright (c) 2012 Fernanda Martins https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
O currículo do ensino básico em Portugal: Políticas, perspectivas e desafios
Fernandes, Preciosa (2012). O currículo do ensino básico em Portugal: Políticas, perspectivas e desafios [The primary education curriculum in Portugal: policies, perspectives and challenges]. Porto: Porto Editora.
Copyright (c) 2012 Carlinda Leite https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
Grácio, Fátima (Org.) (2011). Cuidar a democracia, cuidar o futuro [Caring for democracy, caring for the future]. Porto: Fundação Cuidar o Futuro.
Copyright (c) 2012 Isabel Menezes https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
Decentering hegemonic gender theory: The implications for educational research
The knowledge gathered and reviewed in the field of gender studies has been disseminated globally over the twentieth century but has paid relatively little regard to the contexts and meanings that have simultaneously emerged in other regions of the world. The emergence of global equality agendas in education associated with new frameworks and metrics for national growth provides a unique opportunity to bring together these diverse understandings of gender. This paper compares gender education theory in Western Europe and North America on one hand, and those from locations within Africa and South Asia on the other. We examine the major contributions of Southern gender theorists, two from Africa and two from South Asia, through four themes raised by these authors: the category of «third world woman» and by implication the «girl child»; the othering of motherhood; the sexual/gendering of the body; and the consequence of dislocation on academic positionalities. A new feminist research agenda is indicated that aims to reduce binaries, increase bi-cultural workings, and readdress the role of positionality in the field of gender education research.
Copyright (c) 2012 Shailaja Fennell, Madeleine Arnot https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
Communication interculturelle: Exemples de rhétorique et de pragmatique culturelles
Cet article vise à analyser la manière dont les interlocuteurs utilisent les faits culturels à des fins de communication et d’argumentation. Les messages n’ont pas comme seule fonction l’information, d’autres enjeux, d’autres rapports se jouent. Dans le domaine culturel et linguistique, «celui qui est sûr de son identité culturelle peut jouer avec la règle du jeu culturel. Les indices linguistiques et culturels, les représentations mutuelles, deviennent alors des symptômes d’une relation et porteurs d’enjeux qu’il convient d’apprendre à décoder» (Abdallah-Pretceille, 1996: 117-118). Afin d’illustrer notre propos, nous avons choisi de traiter deux exemples issus d’horizons différents: la réalité et la fiction. Le premier a fait la une de l’actualité en octobre 2007 entre la France et le Tchad, l’affaire de l’Arche de Zoé, et le second est extrait d’un film français de Cédric Klapisch, «L’Auberge Espagnole» (2002), et concerne le problème du régionalisme entre le castillan et le catalan.
Copyright (c) 2012 Claire Chaplier https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
The paper is based on an ethnographic research conducted at a Czech grammar school as part of a PhD thesis that was defended in January 2010. The research within a single class of 11-13 year olds was focused on (re)production of gender in the school environment. The research strived to apply a complex perspective on gender reproduction within the classroom. The presented analysis is inspired by Valerie Walkerdine’s statement that gender is theorized as a fiction, shot through with fantasy, yet lived as a fact, produced and struggled over within the regulatory daily practices of schooling (Walkerdine, 1990). Using the technique of writing short text the role of gender in children’s fantasies was researched.
Copyright (c) 2012 Lucie Jarkovská https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
Reflecting on an academic practice to boost gender awareness in future schoolteachers
Gender mainstreaming has become an important issue in UE politics and has been included in most national educational policy. Nevertheless, its implementation is frequently more apparent than real. Here in Spain, schoolteachers are rarely prepared to overcome gender stereotypes. Moreover, university professors interested in developing gender awareness in future professionals generally face difficulties due to, on the one hand, the lack references and models to follow and, on the other hand young people general resistance to feminism claims. In this article we present a specific case of action research developed in order to stimulate gender self-awareness in future schoolteachers. The aim of the text is double: firstly, to critically evaluate our teaching experience in order to improve it in the next years and, secondly, to stimulate a debate with colleagues on potentialities and pitfalls of teaching gender sensibility to future schoolteachers and other educators.
Copyright (c) 2012 Barbara Biglia, Anna Velasco https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
The aim of this work is to discover how life improvement strategies can be developed for women who have suffered gender-based violence. Discussions from the World Leisure and Recreation Association (WLRA) and other research groups focus on leisure benefits for personal growth and community development. At the beginning of the twenty-first century, leisure emerges as a third generation human right, so that this work intends to strengthen this line of research – from development of a doctoral thesis –, which is going to connect leisure, education, and gender violence. We are trying to advance new ways for reducing the negative effects of violence against women in their daily life. To do this, we take Spanish Law No. 1/2004 on gender violence as reference. This is a social problem that is hindering women and girls’ autonomous development and that must be included in the public agenda.
Copyright (c) 2012 Tania Merelas Iglesias, Ana Sánchez Bello https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
(Re)Constructing femininities and masculinities
This paper builds on research aimed at understanding how young adults construct citizenship and how they interpret educational policies. The nodal point is constructing femininities and masculinities within school, the family and the public arena, as permeable locations to the construction of citizenship. I argue that the lack of dialogue with young adults may lead them to develop non-reflective thought which, in turn, may foster the reproduction of social order, whereas dialogue may have opposite tendencies. This work is theoretically informed by the epistemological-methodological feminist and critical emancipatory traditions combined with the claim for democratic pedagogic rights and equality of condition as pillars for recognition and informed choice. The qualitative interpretivist approach is supported on focus group discussion and individual interviews.
Copyright (c) 2012 Eunice Macedo https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
Perceptions and attitudes of senior managers toward gender in academia
This paper examines the inequalities of women’s position in senior management in higher education in Portugal and Turkey. It also examines the perceptions that rectors (vice-chancellors)/vice-rectors have about gender inequalities in higher education institutions (HEI) and the potential attitudes they may have about institutional policies developed to eliminate these inequalities. A qualitative study was developed with 46 interviews conducted in both countries. The paper then explores senior managers’ perceptions about gender inequalities in top positions in academia and the link between these perceptions and their attitudes concerning decisions to promote gender equality for senior managers in Portugal and Turkey. It concludes that in spite of the persistence of different obstacles for women working towards top positions in both countries, senior managers perceive universities as gender neutral, denying the importance of institutional policies and practices to change the situation.
Copyright (c) 2012 Teresa Carvalho, Özlem Özkanlı, Maria de Lourdes Machado-Taylor https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
Sex education and the views of young people on gender and sexuality in Portuguese schools
This paper draws upon the recognition of sex education as an educational space for the development of youth sexual citizenship and gender equality. Despite the more open political and public debates in Portugal during the last three decades, around the implementation of sex education in schools, the relationship between education and sexuality is still seen as a «problem» and not as a citizenship right. Going beyond the health centred approaches, the paper explores new possibilities for sex education based on sexual and intimate citizenship concepts. Firstly, a brief outline of the advances and setbacks in sex education and gender policies in Portugal is presented to better contextualize this question. Secondly, an interpretation of young people’s views on sexuality, more concretely on sexual pleasure and sexual pressure and the implications of sex education for intimate relationships are taken into account, based on interviews from male and female pupils in Portuguese schools. Finally, the need to rethink sex education is emphasised with consideration of young people’s views for overcoming revealed issues and constraints in order for an educational agenda on equality and citizenship to be created.
Copyright (c) 2012 Sofia A. Santos, Laura Fonseca, Helena C. Araújo https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
Gender doesn’t matter: Why women and gender are ignored in research on elementary level teachers
While it is arguable that gender matters in education, its relevance in educational research on teachers is less clear. Prompted in part by Acker’s (1995-1996) call for additional research focus on gender and women in education, the authors ask «does gender still matter in US-based education with regard to women teachers?». We affirm that gender does matter in a conceptual sense, but our extensive critical review of the research literature suggests the inverse: that US-based scholars doing empirical work in education do not appear to value gender as a category for examining the experiences of female teachers. We concluded that current research foregoes gender in favour of other social categories and emphasizes research on girls and male teachers over research on women teachers. The paper ends with recommendations for a more robust handling of gender in research on women in education.
Copyright (c) 2012 Christine A. Mallozzi, Sally Galman https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
In the past decades, the discussion of gender inequality in education has been developed, becoming part of the research and political agenda of democratic countries. New understandings and insights emerged. Nevertheless, equality of opportunities respecting gender has not been achieved, especially if we consider as an important goal to overcome a «citizenship of subalternity» (Araújo, 2007: 164). Together with the invisibility of women in the official curricula and gender stereotypes in textbooks, with the superficial discussions about girls’ school achievement and boys’ school disaffection, or with difficulties endured by women teachers to have access to decision making positions within the school structure, there is an awareness about the transversality of gender equality in education. We can find new challenges played by gender issues in new contexts and phenomena as violence in school, multiple inequalities or intercultural and migrant topics. To discuss if gender still matters in education is a slightly ironic and unavoidable question to which this special issue of Educação, Sociedade & Culturas tries to answer.
Copyright (c) 2012 Sofia M. Silva, Lucie Jarkovská, Prudencia Gutiérrez Esteban https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
Copyright (c) 2012 Helena C. Araújo https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
O movimento da educação nova e a reinvenção da escola: Da afirmação de uma necessidade aos equívocos de um desejo
Trindade, Rui (2012). O movimento da educação nova e a reinvenção da escola: Da afirmação de uma necessidade aos equívocos de um desejo [The New Education Movement and the reinvention of school: from the affirmation of a need to the misconceptions of a desire]. Porto: U.Porto Editorial.
Da casa da juventude aos confins do mundo: Etnografia de fragilidades, medos e estratégias juvenis
Silva, Sofia Marques (2010). Da casa da juventude aos confins do mundo: Etnografia de fragilidades, medos e estratégias juvenis [From the youth center to the ends of the earth: an ethnography of youth vulnerabilities, fears, and strategies]. Porto: Edições Afrontamento.
Copyright (c) 2012 Pedro Abrantes https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
Practice, theory, and person in teacher education
In this article I will discuss an approach to teacher education that builds on recent insights into teacher behaviour and teacher learning. This approach, called the realistic model, is grounded in research findings showing that much of a teacher’s behaviour is guided by non-rational and unconscious sources, which limits the value of theory as the basis for teaching. I will clarify why reflection is so important for teachers, discuss what aspects are important in promoting reflection. This leads to a specific view on the role of theory in teacher education. The essence of the discussion is that we need a more holistic perspective on teachers and teaching. Using such a holistic perspective, I will introduce a model of levels of reflection that helps to integrate the professional and the personal in teaching.
Copyright (c) 2012 Fred a. J. Korthagen https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
Soft law and the implementation problems of the Bologna process
At European level the implementation of both the Bologna process and of the Lisbon Strategy have been promoting the development of policy implementation tools. In this paper, we discuss the tools of policy implementation and how they contribute to changing the European higher education systems towards the establishment of a European Higher Education Area (EHEA), a goal of the Bologna process. Empirical data is used to assess how far the use of soft law mechanisms has been effective for the implementation of the Bologna process at institutional level, including its coordination capacity.
European policy of regulation/ coordination
Copyright (c) 2012 Amélia Veiga, Alberto Amaral https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
Pedagogy of the earth: the people from rural areas and higher education
In the context of higher education policies and practices, which are more and more linked to market logic, this article aims to point out the type of education that intends to position itself in opposition of such logic: the Pedagogy of the earth. Under the structure of affirmative public policies, and focusing on the people from the rural areas, a special course was constructed in Brazil with singular and proper characteristics, which has called the attention of researchers and civil society. This experience indicates that there are significant elements that aim to define practices and policies in higher education, which are tied with an emancipatory perspective, specifically intended to lower classes.
Copyright (c) 2012 Fernando José Martins https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
Inter/multicultural education in pre-school playgroups
The issue of multicultural societies is common in Social Sciences research. Naturally, scientific research around inter/multicultural aspects of pre-school education cannot ignore these issues. Inter/multicultural education in pre-school playgroups is carried out with children’s books as a resource. However, independent of the «good will» of educators and book producers, the representation of «alterity» contained in books will not necessarily contribute to a real multicultural understanding of the world, free of archaisms, stereotypes or prejudices. Through the analysis of a set of books on the subject of cultural diversity used in Portuguese pre-schools, this article tries to contribute to answer the following question: which types of images of «alterity» are supplied by the available bibliographical materials for families and educators?
Copyright (c) 2012 João Filipe Marques, Mónica Gameira Borges https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0
Education, government and multiculturalism in Brazil
This paper analyses the Law No. 10.639/03 (National Congress, 2003) and the National Curricular Guidelines for the Education of Ethnic-Racial Relations and the Teaching of African-Brazilian and African History and Culture (National Council of Education, 2004), and questions the multicultural discourses and the governing strategies that support these laws. The analysis of the Curricular Guidelines helps to infer that the curriculum is an important pedagogical tool of knowledgepower in the construction of regimes of truth and social subjects, supporting new narratives of identity, even though they do not exceed the boundaries of multiculturalism. Among the criticisms about multiculturalism, we emphasize the existence of an essentialist view of culture and the maintenance of ethnic and cultural frontiers. This view prevents more fruitful intercultural relations in the production of new narratives of identity, built from the perspective of the difference.
Copyright (c) 2012 Mozart Linhares da Silva, Carolina Assmann, Carolina Siqueira https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0