ABSTRACT
In curriculum studies, as in many other domains of human activity, one of the few constants is change. As a field of academic inquiry, curriculum studies never stands still. Important new theoretical currents emerge each decade, and in any given year fresh insights within established traditions can be identified. In the last three decades of the 20th century, there were significant developments in the study of curricula from Marxist, feminist, existentialist, hermeneutical, phenomenological, spiritual, biographical, and poststructuralist perspectives (Pinar et al., 1995). Curriculum studies lends itself, perhaps more readily than any other body of work within the broader field of education, to a multiplicity of theoretical approaches. Curriculum scholars have responded, often in highly original ways, to new scholarly trends in other disciplines. Thus, to take just one example, the postmodern turn in social theory has found creative expression in the diverse and sometimes conflicting voices of curriculum theorists such as William Doll, Henry Giroux, Peter McLaren, Joe Kincheloe, Shirley Steinberg, Patti Lather, and Bill Green, among others. Of course, these scholars have not merely applied the ideas of others; they have also played an important role in making the postmodern turn what it is. Indeed, a thorough examination of postmodern curriculum scholarship is likely to yield rich results for those seeking to understand what a postmodern perspective might have to offer beyond the curriculum domain. The same might be said of other theoretical approaches in curriculum studies: Many researchers in this area have been innovative and forward looking in responding to, and promoting, change. There is, as Paulo Freire might have said, a healthy level of scholarly restlessness in the field: Intellectual curiosity, a commitment to debate and rigorous investigation, and a determination not to remain too certain of one’s certainties are qualities in abundant supply within the international curriculum studies community.
