Index of Events
The theme of the 2003-04 EOTU Working Group is Globalization and the University. We will devote attention to four issues: (1) international education in U.S. universities; (2) the effects of the global higher education market on U.S. universities; (3) the effects of international students on U.S. universities; and (4) study abroad of U.S. university students.
Globalization and the University will continue the commitment of EOTU to fostering student research that is embedded in larger institutional, political-economic, and representational contexts. Globalization and the University will: (1) train Working Group participants—many of whom will teach EOTU-affiliated courses—in this area; (2) prepare EOTU organizers to be able to include Globalization and the University as a session in the Summer 2004 EOTU Summer Institute (which will train a second generation of faculty to teach EOTU-related courses); and (3) result in a Globalization and the University gateway page on the EOTU website for teachers and students (i.e., an informational clearinghouse that will foster inquiry-based student research that is institutionally and globally embedded).
EOTU appreciates that each of these themes can be easily addressed in student ethnographic research on the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
Globalization and the University looks forward to the following conversations and visitors.
SPRING 2004
March 12 (Lucy Ellis Lounge, Foreign Languages Building), 3-5 p.m.
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William Pinar, St. Bernard LSU Alumni Association Professor of Education, Louisiana State University
Internationalization of Curriculum Studies
There was a time, not so long ago, when internationalism was a key component of proletarian struggles and progressive politics in general.
—Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri (2000, p. 49)
In many faculties of Education, research is focused on teaching or, as many prefer, "instruction." The dominant interest is in learning how to teach more effectively, so that students can learn more quickly, as measured on standardized examinations. Such educational research is a form of social and behavior science. While hardly disinterested in questions of pedagogy, the interdisciplinary field of curriculum studies attends to what knowledge is worth knowing. More influenced by scholarship in the humanities and the arts than by research in the social and behavioral sciences, the field studies the cultural, historical, and political questions that surround and inform the curriculum question: what is knowledge is of most worth?
Like the humanities and the arts, the academic field of curriculum studies is embedded in national culture, a fact underscored in the first international handbook of curriculum research (Pinar 2003). Because school curriculum and curriculum research are embedded in their respective national cultures, in the political present (a different present in different nations and regions), in cultural questions represented in various curricula as well as in curriculum research, and in those public debates and policies surrounding those curricula and research, studying the academic field of curriculum studies locally and globally (as each is embedded in the other) should enable scholars to strengthen and make more sophisticated their critical and intellectual distance from their respective cultures and from those processes of globalization against which several national cultures are now reacting so strongly.
Professor Pinar will discuss the history, present, and future prospects of the internationalization of curriculum studies, including a specific research proposal to study and participate in the process.
References
Hardt, Michael and Negri, Antonio (2000). Empire. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Pinar, William F. (Ed.) (2003). International handbook of curriculum research. Mahwah, N.J.: Lawrence Erlbaum.
April 23 (Lucy Ellis Lounge, Foreign Languages Building), 3-5 p.m.
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PAST SESSIONS
SPRING 2004
March 5 (Lucy Ellis Lounge, Foreign Languages Building), 3-5 p.m.
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Fazal Rizvi, Professor, Educational Policy Studies, UIUC
Internationalizing Higher Education Curriculum
In his talk, Professor Rizvi will discuss some of the ways in which the idea of internationalization of curriculum has been interpreted, variously as involving study abroad, foreign language teaching, area study, global competence, and global literacy. He will argue that many of these interpretations are limited at best, and that a more critical perspective demands viewing internationalization both as an expression of and a complex response to the contradictory processes of contemporary globalization. This is an argument that Rizvi first developed some four years ago in a short paper, and has been extending ever since.
Discussant: Brenda Trofanenko, Assistant Professor, Curriculum and Instruction, UIUC
FALL 2003
September 26 (Lucy Ellis Lounge, Foreign Languages Building), 3-5 p.m.
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Earl Kellogg, Associate Provost for International Affairs and Professor, Agricultural and Consumer Economics, UIUC
Internationalization and the University of Illinois
Homepage for UIUC International Programs and Studies (New window)
October 10 (ACES Library, Heritage Room), 3-5 p.m.
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Philip G. Altbach, Director of the Center for International Higher Education and Professor of Higher Education, Boston College
The Effects of the Global Higher Education Market on U.S. Universities
Higher education is increasingly becoming a global commodity to be bought and sold like any other durable good. Indeed, the World Trade Organization is currently considering proposals that would submit the import and export of higher education to W.T.O. protocols. Many have charged that W.T.O. regulation would pose a severe threat to the integrity and ideals of U.S. universities. At stake in these considerations is the very meaning of national educational systems—and autonomy. Furthermore at stake are educational missions and commitments in the face of the lure of commercialization. As some observers have noted, entrepreneurial strategies do not necessarily translate into academic ones. Professor Altbach, an international expert on higher education across the globe, will lead a session devoted to this topic.
Advance reading:
Philip Altbach, "Why the United States Will Not Be a Market for Foreign Higher Education Products: A Case Against GATS," International Higher Education 31 (Spring 2003). (HTML in new window)
Philip Altbach, "Higher Education and the WTO: Globalization Run Amok," International Higher Education 23 (Spring 2001). (HTML in new window)
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Discussant: Stanley O. Ikenberry, President Emeritus, University of Illinois, and Regent Professor, Educational Organization and Leadership, UIUC
November 14 (Lucy Ellis Lounge, Foreign Languages Building), 3-5 p.m.
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Jane Knight, Comparative, International and Development Education Centre, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, University of Toronto, Canada
Internationalization: Developing an Institutional Self-Portrait
Internationalization is a term that is being used more and more to discuss the international dimension of higher education and more widely post-secondary education. It is a term that means different things to different people and is thus used in a variety of ways. While it is encouraging to see the increased use and attention being given to internationalization, there is a great deal of confusion about what it means. For some people, it means a series of international activities such as academic mobility for students and teachers; international linkages, partnerships and projects; new international academic programs and research initiatives. For others it means the delivery of education to other countries through new types of arrangements such as branch campuses or franchises using a variety of face-to-face and distance techniques. To many, it means the inclusion of an international, intercultural and/or global dimension into the curriculum and teaching learning process. Still others see international development projects and alternatively the increasing emphasis on trade in higher education as internationalization. Finally, there is frequent confusion as to the relationship of internationalization with globalization. Is internationalization the same as globalization? If so—why and how and to what end? If not—how is it different or what is the relationship between these two dynamic processes? Thus internationalization is interpreted and used in different ways, in different countries and by different stakeholders. This reflects the realities of today and presents new challenges in terms of developing a conceptual model that provides some clarity on meaning and principles to guide policy and practice.
Advance reading:
Jane Knight, "Internationalization: Developing an Institutional Self-Portrait" (PDF in new window)
Jane Knight, "Developing an Institutional Self-Portrait Using the Internationalization Quality Review Process Guidelines" (PDF in new window)
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Discussant: Fazal Rizvi, Professor, Educational Policy Studies, UIUC
December 5 (Lucy Ellis Lounge, Foreign Languages Building), 3-5 p.m.
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Nadine Dolby, Professor, Educational Psychology and Foundations, Northern Illinois University
Study Abroad and National Identity: American Undergraduates Around the World
The study abroad experience is often understood through cross-cultural paradigms that stress understanding and appreciating others, different cultures and ways of life. In contrast, I argue in this paper that study abroad—in the American context—is more usefully seen as an encounter with one’s national identity and self. Drawing on a qualitative research study of American undergraduates who studied abroad in Australia, I discuss how students’ American identity is challenged and, in some cases, remade, through their experiences. Some students defend their American identity as property—as James Clifford argues—and suture the state of the “United States” with the nation of “America.” Others, however, reject this conflation of state and nation, and explore the postnational spaces of the American self. Such research suggests that study abroad can potentially play an important role in reinvigorating the public sphere and reshaping notions of citizenship in an increasingly privatized and globalized world.
Advance reading:
Dolby, "Encountering an American Self: Studying Abroad and National Identity" (forthcoming in Comparative Education Review; do not cite without author's permission) (PDF in new window).
December 12 (109A Davenport Hall), 3-5 p.m.
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Nicholas Burbules, Grayce Wical Gauthier Chair and Professor of Educational Policy Studies, UIUC
The Virtual University
Professor Burbules will speak about the “virtual university”—the growth of distance education and the increased use of technologies in the classroom. He will lead participants in asking, How does the rise of the virtual university affect the campus as a teaching/learning space? For an earlier exploration of this subject, see Burbules and Callister (2000).
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