Affiliation:
1. Harvard Graduate School of Education, Harvard University, 13 Appian Way, Cambridge MA 02138, USA
2. Peace Research Institute Oslo (PRIO), Hausmanns gate 3 , NO-0186 Oslo, Norway
Abstract
Abstract
Education is one of the key tools of nation-building, as it aims to create future citizens. Yet what happens in seemingly ‘futureless’ contexts where refugees cannot access even social membership, let alone legal citizenship? In this introduction to our special issue on education for refugees, we explore the aspirations and conceptions of possible futures that students, teachers, governments, international non-governmental organizations (INGOs), and funders have when they promote and pursue education as the solution to the liminal position that refugees in protracted refugee situations find themselves in. Based on insights from the articles, we analyse disconnects between aspirations for education and realities of access to quality education and to opportunities after completing education. We argue that to address these disconnects requires us to move beyond temporal and spatial binaries—present vs. future, here vs. there—that are so common in refugee education discourse and policy. Our suggestion is to draw on and support stakeholders’ work, powerfully exemplified in this special issue, to contribute to improved conditions through pedagogies, practices, and policies that address these binaries.
Funder
Research Council of Norway
Publisher
Oxford University Press (OUP)
Subject
Political Science and International Relations,Geography, Planning and Development
Reference49 articles.
1. Against Implications: Ethnographic Witnessing as Research Stance in the Lebanese Conflict Zone;Abu El-Haj;Comparative Education Review,2023
2. Hope against the Odds: Understanding the Aspirations for Resettlement-Based Overseas Scholarships of Refugee Youths in the Dadaab Camps;Aden;Journal on Education in Emergencies,2023
3. From Refugees to Citizens? How Refugee Youth in the Dadaab Camps of Kenya Use Education to Challenge Their Status as Non-Citizens;Aden;Journal of Refugee Studies,2023