Term of Award

Spring 2025

Degree Name

Doctor of Education in Curriculum Studies (Ed.D.)

Document Type and Release Option

Dissertation (open access)

Copyright Statement / License for Reuse

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Department

College of Education

Committee Chair

Marla Morris

Committee Member 1

Dan Chapman

Committee Member 2

John Weaver

Committee Member 3

Caren Town

Abstract

This dissertation explores the system of the modern public school, particularly at the middle school level, and its deleterious effect on the process of being and becoming a person for students and teachers. The discussion of the self being and becoming an individual is grounded in the religious existentialist philosophy of Soren Kierkegaard and Paul Tillich. For both thinkers, being and becoming an individual involves finding equilibrium between various poles – finitude versus infinitude, and necessity versus possiblity. Michel Foucault’s exploration of the prison system is put in conversation with the discipline practices of middle schools to delineate how power and control are disseminated in the school. Autobiography will be explored as both an academic topic and a method for personal growth with the potential for counteracting the objectifying trends in the system of the school. Teachers have an important role to play as both a model of the reflective self as advocate and facilitator for subjectivity in the school. The English curriculum and classroom offer promising possibilities for the cultivation of the self in the school, including critical media literacy.

Research Data and Supplementary Material

No

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