Human rights teaching: snapshots from four countries
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3724Abstract
This article examines how some schools with ethnically diverse student populations are teaching about, for, and through human rights. The author conducted a secondary analysis of qualitative data from a multi-site study, which included secondary schools serving students from immigrant backgrounds in four countries: Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom (England and Scotland). The author found that schools taught about the history of human rights, rights in terms of national constitutions, and violations of human rights in the Global South; she observed fewer examples of human rights discourse addressing national and local issues. Across schools, students experienced respect of their human rights, through voicing their opinions and contributing to school-level decisions primarily on school councils. Some students developed knowledge, skills, and dispositions for exercising their rights and respecting others’ rights as they deliberated issues and took civic action locally and globally.
Downloads
Metrics
References
Bajaj, M. (2011). Human rights education: Ideology, location, and approaches, Human Rights Quarterly, 33(2), 481-508. https://doi.org/10.1353/hrq.2011.0019 https://doi.org/10.1353/hrq.2011.0019
Barton, K. (2020). Students' understanding of institutional practices: The missing dimension in human rights education. American Educational Research Journal, 57(1), 188-217. https://doi.org/10.3102/0002831219849871 https://doi.org/10.3102/0002831219849871
Bron, J. & Thijs, A. (2011). Leaving it to schools: Citizenship, diversity, and human rights education in the Netherlands, Educational Research, 53(2), 123-136. https://doi.org/10.1080/00131881.2011.572361 https://doi.org/10.1080/00131881.2011.572361
Council of Europe. (2010). Charter on education for democratic citizenship and human rights education. Strasbourg, FR: Council of Europe. Retrieved from https://coe.int/16803034e5
Decara, C. (2013). Mapping of human rights education in Danish schools. Copenhagen: The Danish Institute for Human Rights.
Eksner, H. J. & Cheena, S. N. (2017). "Who here is a real German?" German Muslim youths, othering, and education. In J. A. Banks (Ed.), Citizenship education and global migration: Implications for theory, research, and teaching (pp. 161-183). Washington, D.C.: American Educational Research Association.
Gaudelli, W. (2016). Global citizenship education: Everyday transcendence. New York, NY: Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315683492 https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315683492
Hahn, C. L. (1984). Promise and paradox: Challenges to global citizenship. Social Education, 48(4), 240-243, 297-299.
Hahn, C. L. (1985). Human rights: An essential part of the social studies curriculum, Social Education, 49(6), 480-483.
Hahn, C. L. (1998). Becoming political: Comparative perspectives on citizenship education. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press.
Hahn, C. L. (2005). Diversity and human rights learning in England and the United States. In A. Osler (Ed.), Diversity and human rights teaching (pp. 23-40). London: Trentham Books.
Hahn, C. L. (2020). Educating citizens in an age of globalization, migration, and transnationalism: A study in four European democracies. Theory & Research in Social Education, 48(2), 244-284. https://doi.org/10.1080/00933104.2019.1707139 https://doi.org/10.1080/00933104.2019.1707139
Jerome, L. (2013, June 28). Getting rights wrong in citizenship education. Paper presented at the annual conference of the International Centre for Education for Democratic Citizenship (ICEDC), Birkbeck: University of London.
Lister, I. (1981). Reflections on the Council of Europe's seminar on human rights education held at Bergen, Norway. Unpublished paper. York, UK: Department of Education, University of York.
Meyer, J. W., Bromley, P., & Ramirez, F. O. (2010). Human rights in social science textbooks: Cross-national analyses, 1970-2008. Sociology of Education, 83(2), 111-134. https://doi.org/10.1177/0038040710367936 https://doi.org/10.1177/0038040710367936
Oomen, B. (2013a). The rights for others: The contested homecoming of human rights in the Netherlands. Netherlands Quarterly of Human Rights, 31(1), 41-73. https://doi.org/10.1177/016934411303100103 https://doi.org/10.1177/016934411303100103
Oomen, B. (2013b). Waving with treaties? The politics of implementing human rights education in the Netherlands. Human Rights Practice, 5(2), 1-27. https://doi.org/10.1093/jhuman/hut010 https://doi.org/10.1093/jhuman/hut010
Osler, A. (2008). Human rights education: The foundation of education for democratic citizenship in our global age. In J. Arthur, I. Davies, & C. Hahn (Eds.), The SAGE handbook of education for citizenship and democracy (pp. 455-467). London: Sage Publications. https://doi.org/10.4135/9781849200486.n36 https://doi.org/10.4135/9781849200486.n36
Osler, A. (2015). Human rights education, postcolonial scholarship, and action for social justice. Theory & Research in Social Education, 43(2), 244-274. https://doi.org/10.1080/00933104.2015.1034393 https://doi.org/10.1080/00933104.2015.1034393
Osler, A. (2016). Human rights and schooling: An ethical framework for teaching for social justice. New York, NY: Teachers College Press.
Parker, W. C. (2018). Human rights education's curriculum problem, Human Rights Education Review, 1(1), 1-24. https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2450 https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2450
Russell, S. G. (2018). Global discourses and local practices: Teaching citizenship and human rights in post-genocide Rwanda, Comparative Education Review, 62(3), 385-408. https://doi.org/10.1086/698305 https://doi.org/10.1086/698305
Skinner, N. & Bromley, P. (2019). Individual and collective social justice education: Comparing emphases on human rights and social movements in textbooks worldwide. Comparative Education Review, 63(4), 502-528. https://doi.org/10.1086/705428 https://doi.org/10.1086/705428
Starkey, H. (2018). Fundamental British values and citizenship education: Tensions between national and global perspectives. Geografia Annaler: Series B, Human Geography, 100(2), 149-162. https://doi.org/10.1080/04353684.2018.1434420 https://doi.org/10.1080/04353684.2018.1434420
Stone, N. (2020). Learning to belong? An analysis of Germany's migrant orientation programme from an HRE perspective. Human Rights Education Review, 3(1), 1-18. https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3694 https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.3694
Torney-Purta, J., Wilkenfeld, B. & Barber, C. (2008). How adolescents in 27 countries understand, support, and practice human rights. Journal of Social Issues, 64(4), 857-880. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-4560.2008.00592.x https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-4560.2008.00592.x
United Nations (2011). United Nations Declaration on Human Rights Education and Training. Retrieved from https://undocs.org/en/A/RES/66/137 .
Vesterdal, K. (2019). Championing human rights close to home and far away: Human rights education in light of national identity construction and foreign policy in Norway, Human Rights Education Review, 2(1), 6-18. https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2907 https://doi.org/10.7577/hrer.2907
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2020 Carole L Hahn
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Authors who publish with Human Rights Education Review agree to the following terms:
- Authors retain copyright and grant the journal right of first publication with the work simultaneously licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgement of the work's authorship and initial publication in this journal.
- Authors are able to enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the non-exclusive distribution of the journal's published version of the work (e.g., post it to an institutional repository or publish it in a book), with an acknowledgement of its initial publication in this journal.
- Authors are permitted and encouraged to post their work online (e.g., in institutional repositories or on their website) prior to and during the submission process, as it can lead to productive exchanges, as well as earlier and greater citation of published work (See The Effect of Open Access).
Cited by
