ABSTRACT
To investigate the apparent contradiction between the rhetoric and practice of equal educational opportunity, this chapter conducts a preliminary analysis of the 1979 policy report which legitimised streaming based on recognising different capabilities of learners. In August 1978, then Deputy Prime Minister Goh Keng Swee was tasked to lead a study team of systems engineers to identify problems in Singapore’s education system and propose solutions for reform. The concept of ‘power/knowledge’ spans Foucault’s work in its entirety, from his ‘archaeological’ and ‘genealogical’ works to his ‘ethical’1 works. It outlines a synthesis of relevant critical discourse analysis approaches, designed to operationalise the field of power-knowledge-truth as the guiding principle for the discursive construction of subjects. The theme explores the ways in which the text constructs the subjectivities of school pupils as learners: how the text positions and defines pupils as learners and what specific claims have been made in relation to these positions.
