Teaching terrorism, saving the state? Education and geopolitical imaginations of terrorism in 12 violently challenged states

Ide, T.ORCID: 0000-0001-8401-2372 (2020) Teaching terrorism, saving the state? Education and geopolitical imaginations of terrorism in 12 violently challenged states. Political Geography, 77 . Art. 102125.

Abstract

The role of education in political socialisation and the importance of terrorism discourses in promoting (or silencing) certain interests have long been acknowledged. This study combines both themes by asking: How do school textbooks, sanctioned by states that are violently challenged by internal opposition, discuss the issue of terrorism? I draw on, and contribute to, four distinct, yet related streams of research: critical geopolitics, critical terrorism studies, geographies of education, and young people's geographies. Simultaneously, while most work on the topic focuses on individual cases (typically of Western countries), I conduct the first comparative analysis of twelve countries from different world regions: China, Egypt, India, Kenya, Nigeria, Papua New Guinea, Peru, Philippines, Russia, Spain, Sri Lanka and Turkey. Contrary to recent claims, considerable heterogeneity persists regarding geopolitical imaginations of terrorism, while US-coined discourses are only infrequently adapted. However, there is still recognisable functionalist convergence as the states under analysis utilise their control of the education system in their internal struggles, mainly by portraying their opponents as evil, by ascribing a positive identity to themselves, and by calling for support by their citizens (including restrictions of human rights and democracy).

Item Type:	Journal Article
Publisher:	Elsevier
Copyright:	© 2019 Elsevier Ltd.
URI:	http://researchrepository.murdoch.edu.au/id/eprint/59977

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