ABSTRACT

Over the past few decades, a massive amount has been written in what might loosely be called the field of ‘curriculum theory’. And yet, sadly, as Philip Jackson points out on the opening page of the gargantuan Handbook of Research on Curriculum that he edited in 1992:

Indeed, were one to choose a single word to capture both the state of affairs reported on as well as the recurrent mood of those doing the reporting, it would have to be the adjective ‘confused’. ‘Confusion’ is the dominant condition remarked on by observer after observer…. Others speak of a field that is ‘amorphous’ and ‘elusive’.