Introduction to Issue 8

Spring/Fall 2004

Gene Diaz and Danielle Georges

Co-editors
Lesley University

As the new co-editors of the Journal of Pedagogy, Pluralism and Practice we are pleased to present this issue as a continuation of the work of the previous editors, Arlene Dallalfar and William Stokes. As Arlene and Bill leave the editorship of the Journal we want to acknowledge their dedication and commitment to the mission of the Journal and to all the authors they have worked with during their years as co-editors. We also recognize, with gratitude, the extraordinary efforts of the JPPP Editorial Board.

The authors included in this issue continue with the mission of the Journal in representing pluralistic approaches to teaching and learning with an emphasis on cultural criticism. As they take us into their classrooms, from first grade to graduate education, they pose questions that can cause us discomfort or create dilemmas with no easy solutions. Education as critical process speaks through all these articles, and we ask you as educators and readers to engage with them in this process.

Sylvia Sensiper offers a view of a first grade classroom to see ways that a photography curriculum promotes technological curiosity and offers students a new mode of self expression, and also bridges the cultural gap between school and community life. Tony Talbert asks us to consider the work of teachers in social science classrooms and the ways in which established curricula celebrate US military dominance and then to consider what might be some alternative historical narratives that lead to a celebration of peace. Sandras Barnes's phenomenological investigation into the connections between racial identity and lived experiences of teachers and their teaching practices in Boston Public Schools grounds her discussion of the social context of teaching in a racialized society. Caroline Brown's reading of F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby as illustrative of racialized text in an undergraduate course on race representation by American authors asks us to take part in a dialogue on racial inscription in literature. Vivian Carlo, with Judith Hudson, Ella Burnett, Mary Ann Gawelek and Mary Huegel discuss specific ways that the practice of teaching in graduate education at Lesley University continues to be transformed through an integration of multicultural perspectives and strategies within classrooms across the campus. We welcome these authors to JPPP.

Our next Journal issue will be focused on arts-based research and guest edited by Shaun McNiff and Philip Speiser. Due to our transition process at the Journal Issue 9 will appear in quick succession to Issue 8. We are grateful for this opportunity to work with the JPPP Editorial Board and with authors who make a difference in education.

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