Social Justice Education

The Department of Social Justice Education offers a multi- and interdisciplinary graduate program developed from the past programs of History and Philosophy of Education as well as Sociology and Equity Studies in Education. It is an intellectual community committed to producing and advancing knowledge on social justice education in Canada and beyond. Social justice education is a term used in robust ways in the department and this allows for diverse meanings and methodologies.

The department's graduate programs are concerned with both theoretical and empirical problems regarding in/equity in educational spaces, broadly conceived. Faculty and students approach their inquiries from disciplinary (e.g., anthropology, history, philosophy, political science, or sociology) and/or interdisciplinary (e.g., anti-colonial, critical race, disability, feminist, francophone, indigenous, or queer) perspectives. The graduate programs focus on identifying new relationships and making connections by asking significant questions about social justice education within and across disciplines. Hence, they foreground research and teaching in social justice education, pursued through analytical and empirical tools from the humanities and social sciences.

The department enables both graduate students and initial teacher education students to explore questions such as, “What was, what is, and what should be the relationship between education and society?” and “What kinds of knowledge do educators need to answer those questions?” The department aims to provide students with the academic knowledge and skills necessary to raise and engage questions of critical importance to educational theories and practices, and their relationship to individuals, communities, and societies.

Overview of Program

Social Justice Education Program - MA, MEd, EdD, PhD

  • Collaborative specializations: 
    • Comparative, International and Development Education -  MA, MEd, EdD, PhD
    • Development Policy and Power, MA, MEd
    • Diaspora and Transnational Studies - MA, MEd, EdD, PhD
    • Education, Francophonies and Diversity - MA, MEd, EdD, PhD
    • Educational Policy - MA, MEd, EdD, PhD (admissions have been administratively suspended) 
    • Environmental Studies - MA, MEd, EdD, PhD
    • Ethnic, Immigration and Pluralism Studies - MA, MEd, EdD, PhD
    • Indigenous Health - MA, MEd, EdD, PhD (admissions have been administratively suspended) 
    • Sexual Diversity Studies - MA, MEd, EdD, PhD
    • South Asian Studies - MA, MEd, EdD, PhD
    • Women and Gender Studies - MA, MEd, EdD, PhD
    • Workplace Learning and Social Change - MA, MEd, EdD, PhD

NOTE: Please see Bulletin sections below for more information on SJE programs.

 


Social Justice Education

Social Justice Education Overview

Overview

Featuring world-class scholars, the department offers MEd, MA, EdD and PhD degrees. The Social Justice Education Department is committed to graduate studies that provide learners with tools for comprehensive analysis and enacting transformative pedagogies, skills in scholarship and community based research, tools for self-reflexivity, ability to debate in meaningful and constructive ways, and hope that change is possible. Such hope is anchored in politics of mutuality and togetherness that do not erase our differences, as well as the ability to bear the emotional and political discomfort of disagreeing and facing others who are not like us. Areas of focus include, but are not limited to: Black studies, anti-racism, critical race theory, Indigenous studies; decolonization and anti-colonial studies; media studies and communication; feminist, gender and queer studies; francophone studies; disability studies; postcolonial, diaspora and transnational studies; class and poverty studies; cultural, sociological, political and philosophical contexts in education; ethics, democratic theory, citizenship, and critiques of neoliberalism; social change and resistance; nationalism, language, spirituality, development, and social theories in education; youth, migration, land, law, environment, intersectionality and place in research.

Social Justice Education MA

Master of Arts

Master of Arts

Program Description

The Social Justice Education (SJE) program welcomes applicants with diverse, relevant backgrounds. The MA program is a research-based degree program which can be taken on a full-time or part-time basis.

Delivery options: Although not all elective courses are offered in each modality, students may be able to complete the MA degree program through one of three delivery modes:

  • in-person (students will mainly complete their coursework and other program requirements in-person, with up to one-third of their coursework online);
  • hybrid (students will experience a mix of modes of engagement, with some of their coursework and other program requirements in-person and between one-third and two-thirds of their coursework online); and
  • online (students will be able to complete all their coursework and other program requirements online) depending on their choice of a collaborative specialization, or other elective courses.

Note: not all collaborative specializations or courses are offered in each modality. Students should consult with their faculty advisor and/or graduate liaison officer regarding available options.

Minimum Admission Requirements

  • Applicants are admitted under the General Regulations of the School of Graduate Studies. Applicants must also satisfy the department's additional admission requirements stated below.

  • Admission to the MA program requires an appropriate bachelor's degree in a humanities, social science, or cognate discipline from a recognized university, with standing equivalent to a University of Toronto mid-B or better in the final year.

  • Applicants must submit the following though the online application system; incomplete applications may be subject to processing delays or rejection:

    • A careful response to all Faculty questions in the online admissions application that demonstrates intellectual interests and concerns relevant to the humanities, or social sciences, and social justice in education as well as reasons for undertaking a program in the department. Include a statement of preference for one or more faculty members whose research is best matched to the student's research interests.

    • Two letters of reference, preferably from university instructors with whom the applicant has studied or worked.

    • At least one sample of written work that demonstrates engagement with the humanities, or social sciences, and social justice in education.

    • Resumé that provides clear and complete information about the applicant's work or field experience related to their proposed studies.

Program Requirements

  • Coursework. Students must complete 3.0 full-course equivalents (FCEs) as follows:

    • Subject to consultation with a faculty advisor, SJE1903H Major Concepts and Issues in Social Justice Education (0.5 FCE) is recommended.

    • 2.5 other FCEs, of which at least 1.5 FCEs must be SJE courses.

    • Students who are registered in an optional collaborative specialization may apply to have their SJE course requirement reduced by 0.5 FCE.

    • Students must consult with their faculty advisor before enrolling in any out-of-department course for which they wish to receive SJE credit.

    • Additional courses may be required of some students, and some students may be required to take specified courses in research methods and/or theory.

  • Students complete a thesis which may lay the groundwork for doctoral research.

Program Length

6 sessions full-time (typical registration sequence: F/W/S/F/W/S);
10 sessions part-time

Time Limit

3 years full-time;
6 years part-time

Social Justice Education MEd

Master of Education

Master of Education

Program Description

The Department of Social Justice Education (SJE) welcomes applicants with diverse, relevant backgrounds. The Master of Education (MEd) program can be taken on a full-time or part-time basis.

Delivery options: Students may choose to pursue the MEd degree program through one of three delivery modes:

  • in-person (students will mainly complete their coursework and other program requirements in-person, with up to one-third of their coursework online);
  • hybrid (students will experience a mix of modes of engagement, with some of their coursework and other program requirements in-person and between one-third and two-thirds of their coursework online); and
  • online (students will be able to complete all their coursework and other program requirements online) depending on their choice of a collaborative specialization, or other elective courses.

Note: not all collaborative specializations or courses are offered in each modality. Students should consult with their faculty advisor and/or graduate liaison officer regarding available options.

 

MEd Program (Coursework Only Option)

Minimum Admission Requirements

  • Applicants are admitted under the General Regulations of the School of Graduate Studies. Applicants must also satisfy the department's additional admission requirements stated below.

  • Admission to the MEd program requires an appropriate bachelor's degree from a recognized university, with a standing equivalent to a University of Toronto mid-B or better in the final year.

  • Applicants must have the equivalent of 12 months of professional experience.

  • Applicants must submit the following through the online application system; incomplete applications may be subject to processing delays or rejection:

    • A careful response to all Faculty questions in the online admissions application that demonstrates intellectual interests and concerns relevant to the humanities, or social sciences, and social justice in education as well as reasons for undertaking a program in the department. Include a statement of preference for one or more faculty members whose research is best matched to the student's research interests.

    • Two letters of reference, preferably from university instructors with whom the applicant has studied or worked; the second letter of reference may be written by a work or community-based supervisor.

    • At least one sample of written work that demonstrates engagement with the humanities or social sciences, and social justice in education.

    • Resumé that provides clear and complete information about the applicant's work or field experience related to their proposed studies.

Program Requirements

  • Coursework. Students must complete 5.0 full-course equivalents (FCES) including:

    • Subject to consultation with a faculty advisor, SJE1903H Major Concepts and Issues in Social Justice Education (0.5 FCE) is recommended.

    • At least half of the FCEs in an MEd program must be SJE courses.

    • Students who are registered in an optional collaborative specialization may apply to have their SJE course requirement reduced by 0.5 FCE.

    • Students must consult with their faculty advisor before enrolling in any out-of-department course for which they wish to receive SJE credit.

Program Length

4 sessions full-time (typical registration sequence: F/W/S/F);
10 sessions part-time

Time Limit

3 years full-time;
6 years part-time

 

MEd Program (Coursework Plus Major Research Paper Option)

Minimum Admission Requirements

  • Applicants are admitted under the General Regulations of the School of Graduate Studies. Applicants must also satisfy the department's additional admission requirements stated below.

  • Admission to the MEd program requires an appropriate bachelor's degree from a recognized university, with a standing equivalent to a University of Toronto mid-B or better in the final year.

  • Applicants must have the equivalent of 12 months of professional experience.

  • Applicants must submit the following through the online application system; incomplete applications may be subject to processing delays or rejection:

    • A careful response to all Faculty questions in the online admissions application of intellectual interests and concerns relevant to the humanities or social sciences, and social justice in education as well as reasons for undertaking a program in the department. Include a statement of preference for one or more faculty members whose research is best matched to the student's research interests.

    • Two letters of reference, preferably from university instructors with whom the applicant has studied or worked; the second letter of reference may be written by a work or community-based supervisor.

    • At least one sample of written work that demonstrates engagement with the humanities or social sciences, and social justice in education.

    • Resumé that provides clear and complete information about the applicant's work or field experience related to their proposed studies.

Program Requirements

  • Coursework. Students must complete 4.0 full-course equivalents (FCES) including:

    • Subject to consultation with a faculty advisor, SJE1903H Major Concepts and Issues in Social Justice Education (0.5 FCE) is recommended.

    • At least half of the FCEs in an MEd program must be SJE courses.

    • Students who are registered in an optional collaborative specialization may apply to have their SJE course requirement reduced by 0.5 FCE.

    • Students must consult with their faculty advisor before enrolling in any out-of-department course for which they wish to receive SJE credit.

  • Major Research Paper (MRP): SJE2001Y0Major Research Paper.

Program Length

5 sessions full-time (typical registration sequence: F/W/S/F/W);
10 sessions part-time

Time Limit

3 years full-time;
6 years part-time

0 Course that may continue over a program. The course is graded when completed.

Social Justice Education MA, MEd Courses

MA, MEd Courses

Not all courses are offered every year. Please consult the course schedule on the Registrar’s Office and Student Experience website.

Master's Level

Course Code Course Title
Introduction à la sociologie de l'éducation
Introduction to Sociology in Education
Introductory Sociological Research Methods in Education
Major Concepts and Issues in Social Justice Education
Qualitative Research Methods for Social Justice
Environmental Sustainability and Social Justice 1
Foucault and Research in Education and Culture: Discourse, Power, and the Subject
Advanced Topics in Environmental Justice Education
The Principles of Anti-Racism Education
Sociology of Race and Ethnicity
Racism, Violence, and the Law: Issues for Researchers and Educators
Modernization, Development, and Education in African Contexts
Indigenous Knowledge and Decolonization: Pedagogical Implications
Savoir indigène et décolonization
Race, Space, and Citizenship: Research Methods
SJE1927H Migration and Globalization
Theorizing Asian Canada
Race, Indigeneity, and the Colonial Politics of Recognition
Centering Indigenous-Settler Solidarity in Theory and Research
SJE1932H Decolonization, Settler Colonialism, and Antiblackness
(Exclusion: SJE5024H.)
SJE1933H Participatory Action Research and Community Based Research
(Exclusion: SJE5011H.)
L'école, la participation parentale et la communauté
The School and the Community
Marginality and the Politics of Resistance
Social Relations of Cultural Production in Education
Disability Studies: An Introduction
The Cultural Production of the Self as a Problem in Education
Spirituality and Schooling
Applied Ethics in Higher Education
Identity and Education
Contemporary Ethical Issues in Schooling and Education
Liberalism and its Critics
Truth Commissions Reconciliation and Indian Residential Schools
Indigenous Settler Relations Issues for Teachers
Critical Media Literacy Education
Sociology of Indigenous and Alternative Approaches to Health and Healing Practices: Implications for Education
Sexual, Racial, and Gender-Based Violence Prevention in Higher Education
Race, Gender, and Empire in Socialist States
SJE1980H Introduction to Research Methods for Social Justice: Master of Education
SJE1982H Women, Diversity, and the Educational System
Black Feminist Thought
Militarism and Sustainability: Concepts of Nature, State, and Society
Major Research Paper
SJE2030H Disability Studies and the Human Imaginary
(Exclusion: SJE5004H.)
SJE2929H Disability Studies — Interpretive Methods — RM
(Exclusion: SJE3929H.)
Bourdieu: Theory of Practice in Social Sciences
Individual Reading and Research in Social Justice Education: Master's
Special Topics in Social Justice Research in Education: Master's Level
SJE5001H Special Topics in Social Justice Research in Education: Master's Level
SJE5017H Special Topics in Social Justice Research in Education: Master's Level
SJE5018H Special Topics in Social Justice Research in Education: Master's Level
SJE5020H Special Topics in Social Justice Research in Education: Master's Level
Language, Culture, and Education / Langue, culture, et éducation

0 Course that may continue over a program. The course is graded when completed.

Social Justice Education EdD

Doctor of Education

Doctor of Education

Program Description

The Doctor of Education (EdD) degree program is distinct from the PhD in that students are encouraged to orient towards applied and theoretical dimensions of professional educational practice understood as knowledge, teaching, and learning which takes place within or beyond schooling.

The EdD in Social Justice Education (SJE) is ideal for those with an interest in professional and/or voluntary practice in relevant field domains, where there is a relation between theory and practice and where the skills and commitment of dedicated and research-informed practitioners are pivotal to outcomes. Those interested in the degree program will be professionals including teachers, school and community leaders, health and legal professionals, and those working, volunteering, or seeking employment in related fields in social justice education.

The Department of Social Justice Education welcomes applicants with diverse, relevant backgrounds. The EdD program can be taken on a full-time or part-time basis.

Students cannot transfer between the EdD and PhD programs.

Delivery options: EdD programs are delivered in-person with the possibility of completing the program requirements through a hybrid delivery mode — students will experience a mix of modes of engagement with some of their coursework and other program requirements in-person, and between one-third and two-thirds of their coursework online.

Minimum Admission Requirements

  • Applicants are admitted under the General Regulations of the School of Graduate Studies. Applicants must also satisfy the department's additional admission requirements stated below.

  • Admission to the EdD program requires a University of Toronto MEd or MA in education, or its equivalent from a recognized university, in the same field of specialization proposed at the doctoral level, completed with a standing equivalent to a University of Toronto B+ or better in master's courses.

  • Applicants must have the equivalent of 12 months of professional experience.

  • Applicants must submit the following through the online application system; incomplete applications may be subject to processing delays or rejection:

    • A careful response to all Faculty questions in the online admissions application that demonstrates intellectual interests and concerns relevant to the humanities or social sciences, and social justice in education as well as reasons for undertaking a program in the department. Include a statement of preference for one or more faculty members whose research is best matched to the student's research interests.

    • Two letters of reference, preferably from university instructors with whom the applicant has studied or worked; the second letter of reference may be written by a work-based supervisor.

    • At least one sample of written work that demonstrates engagement with the humanities or social sciences, and social justice in education.

    • Resumé that provides clear and complete information about the applicant's work or field experience related to their proposed studies.

Program Requirements

  • Coursework. Students must complete 4.0 full-course equivalents (FCEs) as follows:

    • Required half course (0.5 FCE): SJE3997H Practicum in Social Justice Education (72 hours).

    • Subject to consultation with a faculty advisor, SJE3905H Interdisciplinary Approaches to Research: Theory and Praxis (0.5 FCE) is recommended.

    • Students who have completed the recommended course SJE3905H must take 3.0 other FCEs, of which at least 1.5 FCEs must be SJE courses.

    • Students who are registered in an optional collaborative specialization may apply to have their SJE course requirement reduced by 0.5 FCE.

    • Students must consult with their faculty advisor before enrolling in any out-of-department course for which they wish to receive SJE credit.

  • Thesis (dissertation in practice). Students submit a thesis and defend it at a Doctoral Final Oral Examination. The thesis (dissertation in practice) is the culminating component of the EdD degree in Social Justice Education that shall include an identification and investigation of a problem of practice, the application of theory and research to the problem of practice, and a design for action to address the problem of practice. Specifically, the thesis (dissertation in practice) is expected to be the product of original research, designed and implemented in the form of an innovative, impactful, and potentially sustainable plan, policy, guideline, advocacy or activism model, relevant to an educational setting, broadly defined, and aimed at improving practice on a local, regional, national or international scale.

  • Students may begin their studies on a part-time basis. However, they must register full-time for a minimum of two consecutive sessions, not including Summer, of on-campus study. Once enrolled full-time, students must maintain continuous registration full-time and pay full-time fees until all degree requirements, including the thesis, are completed.

Program Length

4 years full-time; 6 years part-time

Time Limit

6 years full-time; 6 years part-time

Social Justice Education PhD

Doctor of Philosophy

Doctor of Philosophy

Program Description

The PhD degree program is designed to provide opportunities for advanced study, original research, and theoretical analysis. The PhD program can be taken on a full-time or flexible-time basis. The Department of Social Justice Education (SJE) welcomes applicants with diverse, relevant backgrounds.

The flexible-time PhD degree is designed to accommodate demand by practising professionals for a PhD degree that permits continued employment in areas related to their areas of research. Degree requirements for the flexible-time and full-time PhD programs are the same. Flexible-time PhD students register full-time during the first four years and part-time during subsequent years of the program.

Delivery options: PhD programs are delivered in-person with the possibility of completing the program requirements through a hybrid delivery mode — students will experience a mix of modes of engagement with some of their coursework and other program requirements in-person, and between one-third and two-thirds of their coursework online.

PhD Program

Minimum Admission Requirements

  • Applicants are admitted under the General Regulations of the School of Graduate Studies. Applicants must also satisfy the department's additional admission requirements stated below.

  • PhD students who are admitted without sufficient previous study in a humanities, social science, or a cognate discipline may be required to take additional courses.

  • Applicants must submit the following through the online application system; incomplete applications may be subject to processing delays or rejection:

    • A careful response to all Faculty questions in the online admissions application that demonstrates intellectual interests and concerns relevant to the humanities or social sciences, and social justice in education as well as reasons for undertaking a program in the department. Include a statement of preference for one or more faculty members whose research is best matched to the student's research interests.

    • Two letters of reference, preferably from university instructors with whom the applicant has studied or worked.

    • At least one sample of written work that demonstrates engagement with the humanities or social sciences, and social justice in education.

    • Resumé that provides clear and complete information about the applicant's work or field experience related to their proposed studies.

Program Requirements

  • Coursework. Students must complete 3.0 full-course equivalents (FCEs) including:

    • Subject to consultation with a faculty advisor, SJE3905H Interdisciplinary Approaches to Research: Theory and Praxis (0.5 FCE) is recommended. Additional courses may be required, and some students may be required to take other specified courses in research methods and/or theory.

    • At least 2.0 FCEs must be taken within SJE.

    • Students who are registered in an optional collaborative specialization may apply to have their SJE course requirement reduced by 0.5 FCE.

    • Students must consult with their faculty advisor before enrolling in any out-of-department course for which they wish to receive SJE credit.

  • Comprehensive examination:

    • Students are encouraged to take, as part of their program requirements, one half course (0.5 FCE) focused on the substantive area on which they will be examined.

    • Students choose one of the following:

      • a major paper (30 to 40 pages); or

      • a substantive course outline (30 to 40 pages) for a topic of interest to the student within the area of social justice education; or

      • a solid draft of a scholarly article.

    • The option selected and the date for the comprehensive exam will be decided by the student and the supervisor. The comprehensive exam should be taken no later than the end of Year 3.

    • A student who fails the comprehensive exam will be permitted one additional attempt to pass. A second failure will result in the recommendation for termination of the student's registration.

    • Comprehensive exams will be graded on a pass or fail basis.

  • Students must submit a thesis and defend it at a Doctoral Final Oral Examination. The thesis must embody the results of original investigation conducted by the student under the direction of an OISE thesis committee. The thesis must constitute a significant contribution to the knowledge of the field of study. The student must have an approved thesis topic, supervisor, and an approved thesis committee by the end of Year 3, and must have completed all other program requirements.

  • PhD students must register continuously and pay the full-time fee until all degree requirements have been fulfilled.

  • Students cannot transfer between the full-time and flexible-time PhD options.

  • Students cannot transfer between the EdD program and PhD programs.

Program Length

4 years

Time Limit

6 years

 

PhD Program (Flexible-Time)

Minimum Admission Requirements

  • Applicants are admitted under the General Regulations of the School of Graduate Studies. Applicants must also satisfy the department's additional admission requirements stated below.

  • PhD students who are admitted without sufficient previous study in a humanities, social science, or a cognate discipline may be required to take additional courses.

  • Applicants must submit the following through the online application system; incomplete applications may be subject to processing delays or rejection:

    • A careful response to all Faculty questions in the online admissions application that demonstrates intellectual interests and concerns relevant to the humanities or social sciences, and social justice in education as well as reasons for undertaking a program in the department. Include a statement of preference for one or more faculty members whose research is best matched to the student's research interests

    • Two letters of reference, preferably from university instructors with whom the applicant has studied or worked

    • At least one sample of written work that demonstrates engagement with the humanities or social sciences, and social justice in education.

    • Resumé that provides clear and complete information about the applicant's work or field experience related to their proposed studies.

  • Applicants must demonstrate that they are currently employed and are active professionals engaged in activities related to their proposed program of study.

Program Requirements

  • Coursework. Students must complete at least 3.0 full-course equivalents (FCEs) including:

    • At least 2.0 FCEs taken in SJE, with the possibility to apply for a reduction of 0.5 FCE in the SJE course requirement if the student is also registered in an optional collaborative specialization.

    • Subject to consultation with a faculty advisor, SJE3905H Interdisciplinary Approaches to Research: Theory and Praxis (0.5 FCE) is recommended.

    • Students must consult with their faculty advisor before enrolling in any out-of-department course for which they wish to receive SJE credit.

  • Comprehensive examination:

    • Students are encouraged to take, as part of their program requirements, one half course (0.5 FCE) focused on the substantive area on which they will be examined.

    • Students choose one of the following:

      • a major paper (30 to 40 pages); or

      • a substantive course outline (30 to 40 pages) for a topic of interest to the student within the area of social justice education; or

      • a solid draft of a scholarly article.

    • The option selected and the date for the comprehensive exam will be decided by the student and the supervisor. The comprehensive exam should be taken no later than the end of Year 4.

    • A student who fails the comprehensive exam will be permitted one additional attempt to pass. A second failure will result in the recommendation for termination of the student's registration.

    • Comprehensive exams will be graded on a pass or fail basis.

  • Students must submit a thesis and defend it at a Doctoral Final Oral Examination. The thesis must embody the results of original investigation conducted by the student under the direction of an OISE thesis committee. The thesis must constitute a significant contribution to the knowledge of the field of study. The student must have an approved thesis topic, supervisor, and an approved thesis committee by the end of Year 3, and must have completed all other program requirements.

  • Students must register continuously until all degree requirements have been fulfilled. Students register full-time during the first four years and may continue as part-time thereafter, with their department's approval.

  • Students cannot transfer between the full-time and flexible-time PhD options.

  • Students cannot transfer between the EdD and PhD programs.

Program Length

6 years

Time Limit

8 years

Social Justice Education EdD, PhD Courses

EdD, PhD Courses

Not all courses are offered every year. Please consult the course schedule on the Registrar’s Office and Student Experience website.

Doctoral Level

Course Code Course Title
SJE1403H History of Education in Canada
SJE1440H An Introduction to Philosophy of Education
SJE1956H Social Relations of Cultural Production in Education
Race, Gender, and Empire in Socialist States
SJE1993H Militarism and Sustainability: Concepts of Nature, State, and Society
SJE2929H Disability Studies — Interpretive Methods — RM
(Exclusion: SJE3929H.)
Research Seminar in Feminist Criticism, Aesthetics, and Pedagogy
SJE Learning to Succeed in Graduate School
Interdisciplinary Approaches to Research: Theory and Praxis
Cultural Knowledges, Representation, and Colonial Education
Race and Knowledge Production: Research Methods
Anti-Colonial Thought and Pedagogical Challenges
Franz Fanon and Education
Women in Leadership Positions: Intersectionalities and Leadership Practices; Sociological Implications in Education
SJE3917H Indigenous Land Education and Black Geographies
(Prerequisite: any prior Indigenous and/or Black Studies course(s). Exclusion: SJE5007H.)
Globalisation and Transnationality: Feminist Perspectives
SJE3934H Advanced Indigenous Feminist Research
(Prerequisite: prior coursework in Indigenous studies, women and gender studies. Exclusion: SJE6000H.)
SJE3935H African Classics: Decolonial Thought in Education
(Exclusions: SJE5017H, SJE6003H.)
Practicum in Social Justice Education
Individual Reading and Research in Sociology Justice Education
SJE5042Y Special Topics in Social Justice Research in Education: Master's Level
Special Topics in Social Justice Research in Education: Doctoral Level
SJE6001H Special Topics in Social Justice Research in Education: Doctoral Level
SJE6005H Special Topics in Social Justice Research in Education: Doctoral Level
Language, Nationalism, and Post-Nationalism

 

Social Justice Education Courses

JSA5147H - Language, Nationalism, and Post-Nationalism

Credit Value: 0.50

The purpose of this course is to examine the relationship between ideologies and practices of language and nation, from the period of the rise of the nation-State in the 19th century to current social changes related to the globalized new economy which challenge prevailing ideas about language and nation. We will focus in particular on language as a technique of regimentation, which helps produce and police populations; and as a terrain of struggle over access to and legitimation of relations of authority, power and inequality. We will examine European nationalism and its ties to colonialism, industrial capitalism, liberal democracy and modernity. We will then move to reactions to it in the form of linguistic minority movements, international auxiliary languages, fascism (in particular Nazism), and Communism. We will then touch briefly on the post WWII period, and focus the rest of the course on contemporary conditions of late capitalism, since the late 1980s, with a focus on the commodification of language and identity in the current economy; language and globalization; and current debates on the ecology of language and language endangerment. Throughout we will also examine the role of linguists, anthropologists and other producers of discourse about language, nation and State in the construction of theories of nation, ethnicity, race and citizenship.

JTE1952H - Language, Culture, and Education / Langue, culture et éducation

Credit Value: 0.50

The anthropological perspective of the ethnography of communication will be adopted to study the relationship between language use, social relations, culture and learning in and out of schools. The course will deal with the nature and origin of cultural differences in language use and patterns and social interactional styles; with the consequences of those differences for school performance; and with the usefulness of the ethnography of communication as both a research and a pedagogical tool in the development of curricula and teaching practices that account for such differences. The ethnography of communication will also be interpreted in the light of political economic perspectives on the issue of sociolinguistic diversity and educational success.

SJE1432H - Knowledge, Mind, and Human Beings

Credit Value: 0.50

This course investigates knowledge, knowing, and knowing subjects as they are represented in modern and postmodern educational theory and practices. The course is designed to facilitate educators' self-reflection on questions of learning and teaching, constructions of knowledge and knowers, and the implications of power/knowledge. Selected topics include: the impact of constructivism on teaching; problems of epistemic dominance and marginalization (Whose knowledge counts?); and representations of learning (styles; ability/disability).

Exclusion: SJE1912H

SJE1440H - An Introduction to Philosophy of Education

Credit Value: 0.50

This course is an overview of the field of philosophy of education. It focuses on selected major thinkers, such as Plato, Rousseau, Wollenstonecraft, Dewey, Peters, and Martin, with attention given both to classic texts and to contemporary developments, critiques, and uses of ideas from these texts. Emphasis is placed on the kinds of epistemological, ethical, and political questions that comprise the core of philosophy of education and that need to be addressed to the classic and contemporary literature.

SJE1465H - Special Topics in Philosophy of Education

Credit Value: 0.50

This course examines in depth a topic of particular relevance not already covered in the regular course offerings in the department. The topics will be announced each spring in the Winter Session and Summer Session schedules.

SJE1900H - Introduction to Sociology in Education / Introduction à la sociologie de l'éducation

Credit Value: 0.50

An examination of the possibilities, promises, and problems with which sociological perspectives can enliven and enrich the understanding of the educational process. This course provides an introduction to and integration of theoretical and practical aspects of sociology in education.

SJE1902H - Introductory Sociological Research Methods in Education

Credit Value: 0.50

An introduction to basic research methods appropriate for teachers and other students of sociology in education. General consideration will be given to technical problems with emphasis on the underlying research process and its practical implications for schools.

SJE1903H - Major Concepts and Issues in Education

Credit Value: 0.50

This course will serve as an introduction to the major concepts and issues in education from both a multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary approach, that values social justice education. Students will be introduced to major questions and debates in educational theory and praxis, focusing specifically on issues that define the areas of emphases in SJE: anti-racism, critical race theory and Indigenous studies; feminism, gender, and queer studies; cultural and philosophical contexts in education (including francophone studies); aesthetics, communication and media studies; and democracy, ethics, disability studies, and social class. The course, which is normally taken in the beginning of a master level program in SJE, will assist students to understand how a multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary approach from the humanities/social sciences perspective that honors social justice education, contrasts with other disciplinary approaches and what this perspective contributes to the examination of major educational concepts and issues. Students will develop an understanding of the central questions, debates, and controversies from diverse intellectual traditions of the humanities and social sciences, and explore multi- and interdisciplinary studies in education, with a focus on history, philosophy, sociology and social justice education.

SJE1905H - Qualitative Research Methods for Social Justice

Credit Value: 0.50

Qualitative research is a mode of systemic inquiry that utilizes various interpretive and critical genres to understand- and often change- complex social phenomena. This course examines the field of qualitative inquiry focusing on the epistemological and practical aspects of a plethora of data gathering techniques such as ethnography, phenomenology, oral history, participatory action research, focus groups, program evaluation and personal interviews. The course further introduces students to critical data interpretive approaches involving data coding and analyses rooted in social justice education: postcolonial, postmodern, and decolonizing frames, feminist theory and praxes, Indigenous knowledges, critical discourse analysis, critical race theory and queer analysis. This is a writing and data gathering intensive course.

SJE1909H - Environmental Sustainability and Social Justice 1

Credit Value: 0.50

The premise on which this course is based is that social equity and environmental sustainability are necessarily and inextricably intertwined. After clarifying key concepts such as environmental justice, we will analyze the current unsustainable way in which Canada as a society, as well as the world as a whole, are organized, including climate change, water and food access and quality, energy generation and consumption, BMO,s, population growth. We will also explore positive examples of how to deal with these issues.

SJE1912H - Foucault and Research in Education and Culture: Discourse, Power and the Subject

Credit Value: 0.50

This course will introduce students to central approaches, themes and questions in the work of Michel Foucault. We will discuss the relevance and utility of his work by examining how a number of researchers in education have made use of it. Students will also be able to explore the implications and usefulness of Foucault's work for their own research.

Exclusion: SJE1432H

SJE1919H - Advanced Topics in Environmental Justice Education

Credit Value: 0.50

This course builds on the assumption that social justice and environmental sustainability are intertwined. It explores the interconnections among environmental problems and capitalism, patriarchy, racism, and other forms of domination. Participants will be encouraged to analyze the social, economic, and environmental dimensions of (in)justice in diverse contexts within frameworks that recognize the salience of social identities, including but not limited to class, race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality and ability. Participants critically examine contrasting theoretical perspectives, practices, and examples of environmental justice advocacy and action. These investigations will assist course participants to deepen their understandings and hone their practical abilities to respond to social, economic, and environmental issues in multiple institutional contexts -- schools, workplaces, unions, social service agencies, NGOs, and so on.

SJE1921Y - The Principles of Anti-Racism Education

Credit Value: 1.00

The first half of the course provides a theoretical analysis of anti-racism and anti-oppression education and issues for students, educators, and staff interested in the pursuit of anti-racism and anti-oppression education in the schools. The second half focuses on practical anti-racism strategies aimed at institutional change in schools, classrooms, and other organizational settings. The intention is to ground theoretical principles of anti-racism education in the actual school practices of promoting educational inclusion, social change and transformation.

SJE1922H - Sociology of Race and Ethnicity

Credit Value: 0.50

This seminar reviews selected sociological theories and perspectives on race and ethnicity. The emphasis is on emerging debates and investigations on the interrelation and interstices of race, gender, sexuality, [dis]ability, and class in the construction of social and historical realities and identities. It explores the implications of these advances for curriculum and pedagogical practices.

SJE1923H - Racism, Violence, and the Law: Issues for Researchers and Educators

Credit Value: 0.50

This course explores the extent of racialized violence, provides a theoretical approach for understanding it, and considers appropriate anti-violence strategies. How should educators respond to the world post 911? Are we in a new age of empire? What is the connection between historical moments of extraordinary racial violence and our everyday world? How do individuals come to participate in, remain indifferent to or approve of violence? This course offers researchers and educators an opportunity to explore these broad questions through examining historical and contemporary examples of racial violence and the law.

SJE1924H - Modernization, Development, and Education in African Contexts

Credit Value: 0.50

This seminar explores the significance and implication of education (as broadly defined) to the discourse of modernization and development in Africa. The course begins with the interrogation of 'African development' from an African-centred perspective. There is an examination of various theoretical conceptions of 'development' and the role of education and schooling in social change. A special emphasis is on the World Bank/IMF induced educational reform initiatives and the implications of 'authentic'/alternative development. The seminar will attempt to uncover the myriad interests and issues about Africa, including contemporary challenges and possibilities. The course critically engages the multiple ways of presenting current challenges of 'development', the interplay of tradition and modernity, contestations over knowledge production in 'post-colonial' Africa, and the roles and significance of Indigenous/local cultural resource knowledges, science, culture, gender, ethnicity, language, and religion for understanding African development. Other related questions for discussion include social stratification and cultural pluralism, formulation of national identity, political ideology and the growth of nationalism, and the search for peace, cooperation and social justice. Although the course basically uses African case material, it is hoped our discussions will be placed in global/transnational contexts, particularly in looking at themes common to many Southern peoples contending with, and resisting, the effects of [neo] colonial and imperial knowledge.

SJE1925H - Indigenous Knowledge and Decolonization: Pedagogical Implications

Credit Value: 0.50

This seminar will examine Indigenous and marginalized knowledge forms in global and transnational contexts and the pedagogical implications for decolonized education. It begins with a brief overview of processes of knowledge production, interrogation, validation and dissemination in diverse educational settings. There is a critique of theoretical conceptions of what constitutes 'valid' knowledge and how such knowledge is produced and disseminated locally and externally. A particular emphasis is on the validation of non-Western epistemologies and their contributions in terms of offering multiple and collective readings of the world. Among the specific topics to be covered are the principles of Indigenous knowledge forms; questions of power, social difference, identity, and representation in Indigenous knowledge production; cultural appropriation and the political economy of knowledge production; Indigenous knowledges and science education; Indigenous knowledges and globalization; change, modernity, and Indigenous knowledges. The course uses case material from diverse social settings to understand different epistemologies and their pedagogical implications. Indigenous knowledge is thus defined broadly to local cultural resource knowledge and the Indigenous philosophies of colonized/oppressed peoples. The focus on local Indigenousness, that is, a knowledge consciousness that emerges from an understanding of the society-nature-culture nexus or interface.

SJE1926H - Race, Space and Citizenship: Research Methods

Credit Value: 0.50

How do we come to know who we are and how is this knowledge emplaced, raced and gendered? For educators, these questions underpin pedagogy. In focusing on the formation of racial subjects and the symbolic and material processes that sustain racial hierarchies, educators can consider how dominance is taught and how it might be undermined. Drawing on recent scholarship in critical race theory, critical geography, history and cultural studies, the course examines how we learn who we are and how these pedagogies of citizenship (who is to count and who is not) operate in concrete spaces--bodies, nations, cities, institutions. This course is about the production of identities--dominant ones and subordinate ones in specific spaces. It is taught from an educator's and a researcher's viewpoint. As an educator, the compelling question is how we might interrupt the production of dominant subjects. As a researcher, the question is how to document and understand racial formations, and the production of identities in specific spaces. The course begins by exploring the racial violence of colonialism, of periods of racial terror (lynching, the Holocaust), and of the New World Order (in particular, the post 911 environment, and the violence of peacekeeping and occupations) as well as state violence. In all these instances, law often has a central role to play in producing and sustaining violence. It is through law, for example, that nations are able to legally authorize acts of racial violence and legal narratives often operate to secure social consent to acts of racial terror. Through a feminist and anti-racist framework, we explore how racial violence is sexualized and gendered, and how it operates as a defining feature of relations between dominant and subordinate groups. The course examines how racial violence is linked to empire and nation building, and how individuals come to participate in these racial and gendered social arrangements.

SJE1927H - Migration and Globalization

Credit Value: 0.50

This course will tackle three broad themes: (1) migration, nation, and subjectivity; (2) globalization and its discontents; (3) empire and subalternity. It will engage with theoretical and empirical studies of discourses and structures that constitute the formations and relations of subjects, cultures, spaces, institutions, and practices. The analytical and methodological approach will be both disciplinary and inter-disciplinary, drawing from the fields of sociology, history, geography, anthropology, and education, while mobilizing insights from ethnic, feminist, queer, cultural, and postcolonial studies. The interpretive lens will be simultaneously panoramic, comparative, and focused that will attend to the shared and unique conditions of local-global, north-south transactions.

SJE1929H - Theorizing Asian Canada

Credit Value: 0.50

The course offers interdisciplinary approaches to critical inquiries into the historical, socio-cultural, and political forces that shape our knowledge about peoples of Asian heritage in Canada and in the diaspora. It foregrounds the intersections of race and ethnicity with other indices of difference, such as gender, class, migration, sexuality, ability, language, and spirituality in local, national, and global contexts. It engages with theoretical, empirical, and methodological issues related to inquiries on Asian Canadians, and draws out implications for intellectual, educational, and policy arenas.

SJE1930H - Race, Indigeneity, and the Colonial Politics of Recognition

Credit Value: 0.50

This course explores histories of racism, displacement and legal disenfranchisement that create citizenship injustices for Indigenous peoples in Canada. It aims to highlight a set of decolonizing perspectives on belonging and identity, to contest existing case law and policy, and to deconstruct the normative discourses of law, liberalism and cultural representation that govern and shape current nation-to-nation relationships between Ongwehoweh (real people) and colonial-settler governments. The course is centered on exploring the possibilities, challenges and contradictions raised by resurgence strategies and reparation involving citizenship injustice from an anti-racist, anti-colonial and indigenous-centered perspective.

SJE1931H - Centering Indigenous-Settler Solidarity in Theory and Research

Credit Value: 0.50

What sets of intellectual and intercultural relationships exist between settler, diasporic, and Indigenous populations in Canada, and what possibilities, challenges, and limitations surround the building of these alliances in both theory and research? This course will examine these questions by exploring scholarly, theoretical, and research-based frameworks centred on the creation, maintenance, and rejuvenation of Indigenous-settler relationships and organizing. The objective is to engage with and assess these frameworks from a critical, Indigenous, and anticolonial perspective, and to understand the strengths, divergences and interconnections surrounding each of them. Through films, readings, group discussions, and guest speakers, emphasis will be placed on current and future research and mobilizing, considering in turn the implications for political, historical, and educational change.

SJE1932H - Decolonization, Settler Colonialism, and Antiblackness

Credit Value: 0.50

This course examines settler colonialism and antiblackness as entwined historical and contemporary social structures. Appraises lived consequences for Indigenous peoples, Black peoples, European settlers, and other arrivals. Considers theories of decolonization and abolition within settler colonial contexts.

Exclusion: SJE5024H

SJE1933H - Participatory Action Research and Community Based Research

Credit Value: 0.50

This course engages participatory research approaches as an important intervention to the politics of knowledge and knowing that otherwise typify academic knowledge production. It considers the settler colonial harms of research alongside the resistance and refusals by communities to allow such harms to continue. Course readings and assignments are designed to support students in crafting meaningful forms of participation in a wide array of social science and humanities approaches to inquiry.

Exclusion: SJE5011H

SJE1951H - The School and the Community / L'école, la participation parentale et la communauté

Credit Value: 0.50

This course investigates changing relations within and between schools and communities (however defined). We will review sociological and historical studies of community and discuss the ways in which different notions of ''community'' and forms of diversity have been employed by parents, teachers, administrators, trustees and others in struggles over the form, content, and outcomes of schooling. Students are encouraged to draw on their own experiences as parents, teachers, students, trustees and/or community activists.

SJE1954H - Marginality and the Politics of Resistance

Credit Value: 0.50

This course examines the processes through which certain groups are marginalized and explores some strategies for resistance. The first section explores: the meaning of subjectivity and its relationship to political practice, experience, knowledge, and power. Section two looks more closely at gender, sexuality and race, exploring here both the concepts we have used to understand domination and the practices of marginalization themselves. Section three considers three strategies of resistance: writing, cultural production, and politics.

SJE1956H - Social Relations of Cultural Production in Education

Credit Value: 0.50

This course will analyse how cultural meanings are produced, interpreted, legitimated, and accepted and/or rejected in educational settings, including but not limited to schools. Critical perspectives from feminism, Marxism, and poststructuralism will be explored to consider how culture has been investigated and taken up in/through sociology, cultural studies, and studies of education and schooling.

SJE1957H - Disability Studies: An Introduction

Credit Value: 0.50

''Doing Disability'' brings us to a central premise of disability studies--disability is a space of cultural practices done by and to people. From this premise, it follows that we are never alone in our bodies and so disability represents the material fact that bodies, minds, and senses always appear in the midst of people. Assuming that disability is done and re-done through everyday discursive practices, disability studies turns to a range of interdisciplinary work that enriches the potential to challenge our taken-for-granted understandings of social and political life. Theorizing how we do disability, even in the everyday of the (our) classroom, provides the occasion to critically engage contexts, such as education, mass media, and the built environment, as they intersect with issues of identity and difference; embodiment; narrative; the constitutive structuring of ordinary, agentive, viable, life at their opposites. Orienting to disability as a social accomplishment of everyday life is a way to examine how versions of what counts as human are culturally organized and governed. Made by culture, disability is a key space of practices where we might theorize culture's makings. In this course, we explore social models and theories of disability, so as to develop a critical understanding of disability's appearance in everyday life and to work to open ourselves to question how these new non-medicalized ways of knowing disability might influence pedagogical structures and practices.

SJE1958H - The Cultural Production of the Self as a Problem in Education

Credit Value: 0.50

This course explores socio-cultural theories of the self and subjectivity. Turning to interpretive sociology, informed by cultural and disability studies, we will theorize the self as social and as located in educational scenes of its appearance, including its appearance in empirical studies that regard the self as a problem. Through lecture and seminar discussions, we will uncover taken-for-granted conceptions of the self-as-a-problem in education. The course aims to reveal the complex version of self as a cultural production while questioning individualized versions of self currently produced by dominant fields' of inquiry in education such as developmental and epigenetic psychology.

SJE1959H - Theoretical Frameworks in Culture, Communications and Education

Credit Value: 0.50

This course examines a range of arguments concerning the ways in which theories of culture, communication and education impact our understanding of the everyday world. The course attempts to survey literature which place discussions of culture, communication and education in the foreground. The course will attend to the ways in which culture, communication and education are not settled terms but are terms deeply implicated in how we maneuver the everyday social world.

SJE1961H - Spirituality and Schooling

Credit Value: 0.50

Exploring spirituality within the context of education will create new pathways of understanding for educators and students. By weaving spirituality into learning and knowledge creation discourse, educators and learners can foster spiritual growth while strengthening the connections between knowledge and the process of schooling. The main objective of this course, therefore, will be to create an educational space that develops students' spiritual interconnectedness in relation to learning, schooling and the community at large. Spirituality is very important in many people's lives, and valuing the spirituality of students means valuing their uniqueness as individuals, regardless of race, gender, creed, sexuality or ability. Spirituality has been silenced and marginalized as a discourse or embodied knowledge in the academy. The course will survey the literature that examines spirituality and knowledge production from a wide range of perspectives, such as from various Eastern, African, indigenous traditions, and from both religious and secular traditions. The course will examine the intersections between issues of spirituality and environment, health, colonialism, gender, sexuality, the body and so on.

SJE1970H - Applied Ethics in Higher Education

Credit Value: 0.50

Applied ethics is the study of questions that result from real-life moral situations, usually in specific domains such as medicine, business, and education. The institution of higher education (primarily universities) has always raised applied ethical questions, such as those regarding freedom of speech and research, compensation for intellectual work, choices in student admissions, obligations to the larger society, and academic integrity. Contemporary influences on higher education are also introducing a raft of new ethical quandaries: changes to the conduct and dissemination of research, free massive online courses, distance education, corporate university partnerships, restructuring of academic positions, rising tuition, and the dilution of degree integrity due to such phenomena as for-profit universities, just to name a few. How do we address these ethical questions? What concepts of value and morality can be brought to bear on higher education? This course will examine these ethical issues using a blend of empirical and theoretical, academic and non-academic literature. No background in philosophy is necessary to take this course.

SJE1971H - Identity and Education

Credit Value: 0.50

This course is about identity and its relationship to education. We all have beliefs about identity – our own, and others' as well – but when we start to investigate these beliefs, many questions arise. What is essential to one's identity? How much could you change about yourself and still be the same person? Were you born with an identity? How do children develop their identities? Where are the lines between individual identity and group identity?

These questions have major implications for education. On one level, we may assume implicitly that education should accord in some way with one's identity. One should not be educated to have an identity that is vastly different from one's own family or culture, or worse, to alienate one from these identities. Many types of schooling are explicitly concerned with instilling or nurturing certain identities in children - most commonly religious, ethnic, or national – so that they grow up with a sense of heritage and belonging. Yet we also think of education as liberating, as feeding the autonomy that allows individuals to "come into their own" identities, whatever these may be. Sometimes these purposes may seem to be at odds.

Teachers have identities, too, and who a teacher is affects how she will teach, and consequently what the students may come to understand of their own identities. Teachers can subtly reinforce or subvert dominant narratives about individual and group identities, shaping the way in which students come to see themselves in an educational setting and beyond. Teacher identities, student identities, and the identities of the wider community in which they learn are all very much entangled.

The readings in this course are drawn from philosophy and other disciplines. We will consider some of the contributions made to our understanding of identity by Western liberal thought, psychoanalysis, feminist and queer theory, anti-racist education, and more. Film and other source materials will also be used.

SJE1972H - Contemporary Ethical Issues in Schooling and Education

Credit Value: 0.50

The course offers an opportunity to inquire ethically into timely, controversial educational issues, focusing on K-12 schooling in Ontario. We will be guided by questions about the purpose of education, the responsibilities of the state, the rights of parent, children, and minority groups, and the functions of teachers. Each week will focus on one general topic, such as ethnocentric segregated schools, standardization and standardized testing, sexual minorities in religious schools, and so on.

No background in philosophy is required, but we will continually reinforce the methods of ethical inquiry and steer away from other approaches. We will use a variety of sources, including scholarly articles, various news media, and policy documents.

This course is open to Master of Teaching students.

Exclusion: SJE1471H (Critical Issues in Education: Philosophical Perspectives)

SJE1973H - Liberalism and its Critics

Credit Value: 0.50

Liberalism is a crucial influence on the Western philosophical and political traditions, and a framework for understanding many contemporary debates about education. This course will engage with selected foundational texts in liberal thought, with a focus on Rawls' Theory of Justice, as well as some of the critiques (e.g. communitarian, feminist) that have shaped political discourse in recent years.

There are many versions of liberalism, and countless unsettled debates within the liberal tradition. What intellectual and political developments are central to contemporary liberalism? What is the liberal vision of a socially just state? Can the state be neutral with respect to views about the good life? How should individual rights be conceptualized in a diverse society? What is the value of community membership? Does liberalism place too much importance on autonomy or reason? How should liberal societies deal with illiberal views? How does our present society embody, and fail to embody, various theories of liberal justice? What is the relationship between liberalism and neoliberalism?

We will engage with these questions via close readings of liberal theorists and their critics, and by examining the formidable influence of liberal ideas on contemporary schooling. We will also examine specific debates about liberalism in education, including the importance of educating for autonomy and the legitimacy of state-initiated educational policies.

SJE1974H - Truth Commissions Reconciliation and Indian Residential Schools

Credit Value: 0.50

This course considers, in part comparatively and internationally, the content and implications of Truth Commissions, especially Canada's Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) in terms of delivering colonial reparations and redress. In June 2015, following six years of investigation and hearings across Canada, the TRC released its findings to the public. The findings were based largely on testimonies of over 6000 witnesses, mostly adult survivors of residential schools. The TRC concluded that the residential schools were based on a policy of "cultural genocide", enforced as part of the very foundation of the Canadian state and sustained for over a century. Canada's TRC documented crimes exclusively targeting children, and an attack on Indigenous sovereignty. It also identified education as an avenue for reconciliation.

The course in general addresses histories of settler colonialism in Canada, historically and at present. It also works in particular to make comparisons with other Truth Commissions and cases of apology and redress. Attention is paid to recommendations for social justice related, political, and educational reform and practice; as well as their implications for settler/indigenous relationships-building and -rejuvenation.

The readings in this course are drawn from Critical Indigenous Studies, History, as well as other disciplines. Films, guest speakers, and other source materials are used.

SJE1975H - Indigenous Settler Relations Issues for Teachers

Credit Value: 0.50

This course names and considers the role of Canadian educators in transforming classroom-based, pedagogical, research-oriented, and programmatic initiatives aimed at settler, arrivant, and migrant/ Indigenous relationships-building and -rejuvenation. It invites teachers and administrators in particular to mobilize recent calls by the Association of Canadian Deans of Education (2010) and the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (2015) to address the possibilities of colonial reparations and reconciliation. Issues addressed include: the 'Non-Indigenous Learner and Indigeneity,' and how to 'build student capacity for intercultural understanding, empathy, and mutual respect.'

The course addresses scholarly criticisms regarding the invitation to 'cultural competence' and 'sensitivity training' in services delivery and educational contexts. It also addresses current and past histories of settler colonialism, multiculturalism, and Indigenous education in Canada. Attention is paid to anticolonial pedagogy and practice, as well as Indigenous perspectives on sovereignty, relationships and governance.

The readings in this course are drawn from Critical Indigenous Studies, Critical Pedagogy, as well as other disciplines. Films, guest speakers, and other source materials are used.

SJE1976H - Critical Media Literacy Education

Credit Value: 0.50

This course positions students for successful teaching and curriculum design in the area of critical media literacy education. The course introduces students to major theoretical paradigms in the field, illuminating shifting debates, changing pedagogical and political objectives, and the growth of the field over time. The course explores important concepts and theories related to media usage and media production in relation to teaching and pedagogical practice. These include media psychology in the classroom, the links between media-based creativity, education and social forms, the politics of media production, and the role of decolonization, internationalization and globality in this field. The course will introduce multiple and diverse approaches used by media literacy educators and teachers and engage students in critical media literacy curriculum design, as well as anti-hegemonic media productions that could support transformative media-based education across the humanities and social sciences.

SJE1977H - Sociology of Indigenous and Alternative Approaches to Health and Healing Practices: Implications for Education

Credit Value: 0.50

The intent of this course is to develop and understand the philosophical basis of Indigenous Health and Healing Practices: Implication for Education by reviewing educational and research initiatives in this area. The course will also broaden students' understanding of holistic methods of health and healing practices in the context of education and schooling. Given the impacts of globalization, different communities are faced with a myriad of physical/economic, psychological, mental and community distresses. A course on Sociology of Indigenous Health and Healing Practices and its Implication for Education create a space for dialogue and critical evaluation of the importance of good health (physical, mental and emotional) for learning, researching and teaching. The resurgence of alternative health and healing practices is crucial at this time when different communities both from mainstream and Indigenous communities are searching for holistic methods of health and healing. Indigenous healing practices are unique because all physical, mental and spiritual phenomena are studied, understood, and practiced and taught to its whole community (Afrika, 2004, Battiste, 2000; Dei, Hall & Rosenburg, 2000; Waterfall, 2002; Wane, 2005). Some of the questions that will be addressed through discussion, readings and guest speakers are: What is healing? What are the different modes of healing outside contemporary healing practices and what are their implication to knowledge production and dissemination? Why do we deal with inbuilt tensions between and among different modes of healing and their implication to education? Healing is more than just keeping and restoring one's health. It is also about the relationship with others, other creatures (animate/inanimate, visible/invisible), and the universe; what has this got to do with sociology of education?

SJE1978H - Sexual, Racial and Gender-based Violence Prevention in Higher Education

Credit Value: 0.50

This course addresses manifestations of sexual, gender-based and racial violence against participants in higher education on university and college campuses as global, historical and interlocked occurrences in high, low and middle-income countries in the global North and South. The course explores root causes, modes, prevalence of such forms of violence impacting disproportionally women, transgender, queer, Indigenous, racialized and disabled students from the perspective of transnational and feminist theories relating violence to 'gender' and 'sex' constructs, power inequalities, patriarchal structures, state ideologies, colonization, organization of institutions, and socialization of individuals and social groups. The course connects feminist knowledges pertaining to violence to the material and cultural realities of higher education in countries around the world, including Canada, the United States, Japan, Australia, Russia, Nigeria, Chile, South Africa, and Spain. The course examines further the cultural, political and ideological properties of widely-implemented violence prevention programs on college and university campuses worldwide, inviting students to assess critically the successes and limitations of these programs against student and faculty needs and in relation to the root causes of sexual, racial and gender-based violence. The course further introduces students to under-studied and undertheorized forms of institutional violence in higher education such as lack of supports for mothers, emotional labour of social workers investigating incidents of violence and supporting survivors, as well as the debated issue
of universities' responsibility for students subjected to domestic violence.

Along the way, the course explores positive practices in research on sexual and gender-based violence in education linking research on prevalence and prevention to international bodies and practices such as the United Nations and the World Health Organization.

The course readings and assignments will position graduate students specializing in social justice education for successful research and writing in this area of study, encouraging especially studies of novel and evidence-based violence prevention paradigms that support safe higher education where all learners prosper.

SJE1979H - Race, Gender and Empire in Socialist States

Credit Value: 0.50

How have former and present socialist countries treated women, Indigenous groups and ethnic, racial and sexual minorities within their borders? How have socialist economies shaped culture, education and social relations in these countries? The course explores these questions historically in former socialist countries in the Soviet Union, Central and Eastern Europe and the Balkans, as well as socialist political formations in Africa and Latin America, and contemporary socialist states such as China and Cuba. The course readings chart a heterogeneous globalized milieu of socialist ideologies, state instrumentalities, social relations, cultural productions, and individual and group identities underlining the failures and/or prosperity of socialist societies and states.

The course will position students for historical, critical and comparative research and theorizing of the realities, limitations and possibilities of both state socialism(s) and capitalism(s). It introduces students to these formations from the perspective of the emerging international field of Postsocialist Studies, focusing especially on race, gender, (post)coloniality, education, global capitalism, culture, and nation-building in former and current socialist states and societies.

SJE1980H - Introduction to Research Methods for Social Justice: Master of Education

Credit Value: 0.50

This course is open to master-level students enrolled in course-based programs. The course is designed to provide these students with practical skills in research design and quantitative and qualitative data collection methods focusing especially on interviews, focus groups and surveys. Considering the diverse professional trajectories of MEd students, the course highlights these three methods because they are widely used across disciplines such as educational studies, health care, business, social work, community services, media and communication studies and other professional fields that MEd students pursue. The course will further introduce students to the ethical implications of research, including relationship-building between researcher and study participants, differentiating between institutions who sponsor research and institutions as sites of research, and continually reflecting on the role of the researcher in relation to the research questions being asked.

SJE1982H - Women, Diversity, and the Educational System

Credit Value: 0.50

This course examines the impact of the changing situation of women in society on educational processes and curriculum. Gender is understood to operate together with a range of other 'diverse' identities such as race, class and age. Among topics covered are gender, biography, and educational experience; patterns of educational access and achievement; gender as an organizing principle in school and classroom practices and peer relations; teachers' careers; feminist pedagogies and strategies for change.

SJE1989H - Black Feminist Thought

Credit Value: 0.50

Various discourses, theoretical frameworks and ideological proclamations have been employed to analyze, criticize and interrogate everyday lived experiences of black peoples. This course examines the multiple oppressions and social representations of black women using a black feminist theoretical framework. Part of the course will be devoted to black feminist theory -- a theory developed out of black women's experiences and rooted in their communities. The course will also examine the following issues among others: strands of feminisms with particular emphasis on feminisms as advocated by the visible minorities; the divergences and similarities of black feminisms; and the heterogeneous nature of black women's experiences. The course will be sociological and historical in nature and will examine the intersections of race, class, gender and homophobia.

SJE1993H - Militarism and Sustainability: Concepts of Nature, State and Society

Credit Value: 0.50

Militarism is and has been an ongoing part of civilization and state formation throughout much of recorded history. The devastating effects of war on the environment, individual human and group life, and the disruption of any sense of normal lawful or civil society are well documented. It is difficult to find any political group who advocates or see war as a preferred means of conflict or social resolution. Yet war, militarism, and the quest for dispute resolution and ordination of one group over another is a central part of human history. In many accounts of history and what G. H. Mead called human group life war and militarism is all but a code word for what we label as history.

SJE2030H - Disability Studies and the Human Imaginary

Credit Value: 0.50

This course theorizes the meaning of “human.” It does so by developing conversations between disability studies and key theorists who have raised the question of the human imaginary, herein regarded as culturally structured images that govern people’s interactions. As a way to guide our understanding of the restricted character of the human imaginary resulting from colonial/settler power, we turn to various scholars (including Sylvia Wynter, Thomas King, Frantz Fanon, W.E.B. DuBois, Audre Lorde, Paul Gilroy, Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Harold Vizenor, Hannah Arendt, Edward Said, Ralph Ellison, Austin Clarke, Octavia Butler). Bringing disability studies praxis into conversation with these writers, the course will trace the meaning made of the human through two questions. First, what consequences has a restricted human imaginary imposed on the practices and institutions enacting disability in everyday life? Second, what place does disability occupy in the work of those who have theorized a restricted human imaginary? Working with these two questions, the overall aim of the course is to consider how social justice education might better attune itself to Fanon’s (1967) provocation, “Oh my body, make of me always a [hu]man who questions!”

Exclusion: SJE5004H

SJE2929H - Disability Studies – Interpretive Methods [RM]

Credit Value: 0.50

The social act of interpretation is the abiding concern of this course. It pursues methods of examining the material fact of interpretation as it forms the meaning of disability in contemporary times. We will learn phenomenologically oriented methods from Black, Indigenous, Queer, Feminist and Disability Studies scholars. The purpose of this course is to learn how to engage interpretations of physical, sensory, mental, emotional variations to critical inquiry. We will pursue interpretive methods of reading and writing that explore the complex social significance of embodied diversity within various social arenas, such as medicine and education. The course will pursue interpretive methods while engaging the question. “How is studying the act of interpretation important to social change?”

Prerequisite: Prior disability studies course recommended

SJE2941H - Bourdieu: Theory of Practice in Social Sciences

Credit Value: 0.50

This course provides a theoretical examination of how social inequities are being (re)produced in everyday life, namely through education. It will focus on the work and influence of sociologist Pierre Bourdieu. It will also introduce students to scholars who have since used his concepts and methodology and/or have critiqued Bourdieu. Questions of inequities are being in vivo, unveiling complex processes of inequalities taking shape through the structuring of formal education as well as through race, class, gender and other interlocking systems of oppression.

SJE2998H - Individual Reading and Research in Social Justice in Education: Master's Level

Credit Value: 0.50

Specialized study, under the direction of a staff member, focusing on topics of particular interest to the student that are not included in available courses. This study may take the form of a reading course combined with fieldwork in community groups and organizations, or independent study of any type. While credit is not given for a thesis investigation proper, the study may be closely related to a thesis topic.

SJE2999H - Special Topics in Sociological Research in Education

Credit Value: 0.50

Courses that will examine in depth topics of particular relevance not already covered in regular course offerings in the department. The topics will be announced and described in the schedule of courses.

SJE3417H - Research Seminar in Feminist Criticism, Aesthetics, and Pedagogy

Credit Value: 0.50

This course will explore progressive, critical, feminist, and other radical pedagogies in their theoretical and historical contexts. The seminar will examine diverse contemporary debates regarding pedagogical questions surrounding such notions as ''voice'', ''empowerment'', and ''dialogue'' that have been advocated and contested within critical educational theory.

SJE3905H - Interdisciplinary Approaches to Research: Theory and Praxis

Credit Value: 0.50

This course will provide students with an introduction to diverse disciplinary and interdisciplinary approaches to conducting educational research in the humanities and social sciences. The course will simultaneously examine 1) methodological issues in disciplinary and interdisciplinary research, 2) content that is of common interest to multiple disciplines and reflects the scholarship of the SJE faculty, and 3) the relationship between research and praxis in various disciplines. The individual disciplines reflected in the course will include sociology, philosophy, history, anthropology, geography, and political science. Some of the topics to be examined may include the sociology of knowledge, the politics of truth claims, the impact of technology and media, and debates regarding knowledge production and authority. We will approach these questions through different lenses and frameworks that transcend individual disciplines, such as critical race, postcolonial, feminist, and postmodern theories. While engaging with the methods and assumptions of various fields of research, the overriding inquiry in this course will be epistemological, derived from the philosophical study of how knowledge is acquired, verified, produced, and transmitted.

SJE3911H - Cultural Knowledges, Representation and Colonial Education

Credit Value: 0.50

With the advent of colonialism, non-European traditional societies were disrupted. A starting point is an appreciation of the vast array of cultural diversity in the world. The course interrogates how various media have taken up these knowledge systems, presented to the world in the form of texts, films, and educational practices, and examines how colonial education sustains the process of cultural knowledges fragmentation. Our analysis will serve to deepen insights and to develop intellectual skills to cultivate a greater understanding of the dynamics generated through representations and the role of colonial education in sustaining and delineating particular cultural knowledge. We will also explore the various forms of resistance encountered in the process of fragmentation and examine how certain groups of people in various parts of the world have maintained their cultural base, and how this has been commodified, commercialized and romanticized. The course makes use of forms of cultural expressions such as films and critical theories on race, gender, sexuality, and class.

Prerequisite: Masters students need approval of instructor

SJE3912H - Race and Knowledge Production: Research Methods

Credit Value: 0.50

As a qualitative research course for masters and doctoral students who already possess some familiarity with postmodern, feminist and critical race theories, the course will consist of readings that explore the following question: how is knowledge production racialized? A related question is: how can we understand the operation of multiple systems of domination in the production of racialized knowledge? How can intellectuals challenge imperialist and racist systems through their research and writing? This course is built around the idea that responsible research and writing begins with a critical examination of how relations of power shape knowledge production. What explanatory frameworks do we as scholars rely on when we undertake research? How do we go about critically examining our own explanations and others when the issue is race? To examine these themes in depth, historically as well as in the present, the course will focus on colonialism, imperialism, racism and knowledge production. Specifically, the course explores three defining imperial constructs: indianism, orientalism and africanism. We consider how the legacy of imperial ideas shaped racial knowledge and the disciplines, positioning us as scholars as active participants in the imperial enterprise. In part two of the course, we explore interlocking systems of oppression: how imperial knowledge simultaneously upholds and is upheld by capitalism and patriarchy. For the third part of the course, we examine how we understand the immigrant's body, the citizen, the migrant and what it means to produce knowledge as a post-colonial scholar.

SJE3914H - Anti-Colonial Thought and Pedagogical Challenges

Credit Value: 0.50

This advanced seminar will examine the anti-colonial framework as an approach to theorizing issues emerging from colonial and colonized relations. It will use radical/subversive pedagogy and instruction as important entry points to critical social praxis. Focussing on the writings and commentaries of revolutionary/radical thinkers like Memmi, Fanon, Cesaire, Cabral, Gandhi, Machel, Che Guevera, Mao Tse-Tung, Nyerere, Toure and Nkrumah, the course will interrogate the theoretical distinctions and connections between anti-colonial thought and post-colonial theory, and identify the particular implications/lessons for critical educational practice. Among the issues explored will be: the challenge of articulating anti-colonial theory as an epistemology of the colonized anchored in the indigenous sense of collective and common colonial consciousness; the conceptualization of power configurations embedded in ideas, cultures and histories of marginalized communities; the understanding of Indigeneity as pedagogical practice; the pursuit of agency, resistance and subjective politics through anti-colonial learning; the investigation of the power and meaning of local social practice/action in surviving colonial and colonized encounters; and the identification of the historical and institutional structures and contexts which sustain intellectual pursuits. Students and instructor will engage in critical dialogues around intellectual assertions that the anti-colonial is intimately connected to decolonization, and by extension, decolonization cannot happen solely through Western scholarship. We will ask: How can educators provide anti-colonial education that develop in learners a strong sense of identity, self and collective respect, agency, and the kind of individual empowerment that is accountable to community empowerment? How do we subvert colonial hierarchies embedded in conventional schooling? And, how do we re-envision schooling and education to espouse at its centre such values as social justice, equity, fairness, resistance and decolonial responsibility?

SJE3915H - Franz Fanon and Education

Credit Value: 0.50

What accounts for the ''Fanon Renaissance''? Why and how is Fanon important to schooling and education today? This upper level graduate seminar will examine the intellectual contributions of Franz Fanon as a leading anti-colonial theorist to the search for genuine educational options and transformative change in contemporary society. The complexity, richness and implications of his ideas for critical learners pursuing a subversive pedagogy for social change are discussed. The course begins with a critical look at Fanon as a philosopher, pedagogue and anti-colonial practitioner. We draw on his myriad intellectual contributions to understanding colonialism and imperial power relations, social movements and the politics of social liberation. Our interest in Fanon will also engage how his ideas about colonialism and its impact on the human psyche help us to understand the process of liberation within the context of contestations over questions of identity and difference, and our pursuit of race, gender, class and sexual politics today. Class discussions will broach such issues as the contexts in which Fanon developed his ideas and thoughts and how these developments subsequently came to shape anti-colonial theory and practice, the limits and possibilities of political ideologies, as well as the theorization of imperialism and spiritual 'dis-embodiment', particularly in Southern contexts. Specific subject matters include Fanon's understanding of violence, nationalism and politics of identity, national liberation and resistance, the 'dialectic of experience', the psychiatry of racism and the psychology of oppression, the limits of revolutionary class politics, and the power of 'dramaturgical vocabulary', and how his ideas continue to make him a major scholarly figure. The course will also situate Fanon in such intellectual currents as Marxism and Neo-marxism, existentialism and psychoanalysis, Negritude, African philosophy and anti-colonialism, drawing out the specific implications for education and schooling.

SJE3916H - Women in Leadership Positions: Intersectionalities and Leadership Practices; Sociological Implications in Education

Credit Value: 0.50

Exploring women in leadership positions within the context of education will create new pathways of understanding intersectionalities and leadership practices. By weaving women’s leadership practices into learning, knowledge creation discourse, educators as well as learners will have a better understanding of how gender plays out in leadership. The main objective of this course will be to explore different leadership models from a feminist & anti-colonial thought framework in order to create an educational space that develops learners and educators' consciousness in relation to: What is leadership? Does one need to be in a position of authority to be a leader? What does it mean to be a leader from marginalized communities? We shall also examine strategies that different women employ when they find themselves in positions of leadership. In this course, we will explore the questions and issues of women and leadership and how that intersects with schooling from diverse perspectives. Ngunjiri (2010), suggests that women can transform their communities and organizations from within by choosing to work with all stakeholders by navigating through the cultural and organizational challenges, in order to bring a shift of consciousness in communities or organizations. This course seeks to further these analyses and offers insights into how spiritual discourse informs women educators’ everyday leadership practices. The course will concentrate on literature that examines women & leadership; gender and leadership; women in positions of authority etc and knowledge production from historical and contemporary perspectives as well as from a local and global perspective.

SJE3917H - Indigenous Land Education and Black Geographies

Credit Value: 0.50

This course attends to research approaches coming out of two distinct literatures: Indigenous land education or pedagogy, and Black feminist geographies. Texts and assignments will focus on empirical and conceptual research projects which can be informed by critical Indigenous studies and Black studies engaging place and land.

Prerequisite: Any prior Indigenous and/or Black Studies course(s)
Exclusion: SJE5007H (Special Topics)

SJE3933H - Globalisation and Transnationality: Feminist Perspectives

Credit Value: 0.50

This course seeks to critically interrogate notions of the transnational found in recent feminist theorizing. 'Transnational' has been invested with a variety of meanings and political attributes, from descriptions of global capital to the politics of alliance and coalition-building, from the creation of subjectivities through to the reconfiguration of imperialist ideologies and practices in the contemporary conjuncture. It is about linkages and unequal connections. By engaging a broad and necessarily interdisciplinary spectrum of work, this course seeks to trace the variety of methods and investments that feminists have brought to bear on their engagement with transnationality. What are some of the implications for theory, for activism, for imaginative and pedagogical practices?

SJE3934H - Advanced Indigenous Feminist Research

Credit Value: 0.50

This course engages Indigenous feminist approaches to research, and the application of theories of refusal to academic knowledge production.

Prerequisite: Prior coursework in Indigenous studies, women and gender studies
Exclusion: SJE6000H

SJE3935H - African Classics: Decolonial Thought in Education

Credit Value: 0.50

The continent of Africa has a fundamentally rich and dynamic history, dating at least as far back as the Nubian civilization, pre-dynastic Egyptian systems of thought through to the many diverse philosophical traditions found around the continent today. Contemporarily, many Pan-Africanist thought scholars have made the argument that the West’s exclusive claims on knowledge have complicated the rationality of non-Western peoples, most especially those of African descent. “African Classics: Decolonial Thought in Education” will engage students in critically examining the relevance and importance of comprehending the African Philosophy, gender, economics, governance, politics, spirituality, phenomenology, ontology, and epistemology. This course involves the development of a framework to map the geographical beginnings in the context of African decolonial thought in education. These connections are aimed at providing context for students’ engagement in the philosophical foundations of African ways of theorizing and practise. Through this, students will be able to engage in critical self-reflection. Students in this course will make sense of the role played by discourses around the construction and reconstruction of African decolonial systems of thought.

Exclusion: SJE5017H; SJE6003H

SJE3997H - Practicum in Social Justice Education

Credit Value: 0.50

Practical experience in an area of the humanities, social sciences and/or social justice education fieldwork is a vital element of the development of skills in the application of knowledge from theory and research. In consultation with the SJE departmental Practicum Liaison person, the student shall establish a practicum supervisor and a suitable placement in consultation with her/his practicum supervisor, signaled by completion of an EdD 'Practicum Agreement Form' (SJE website, 'Students', 'Dept. Specific Forms'). For successful completion of this course, the student is required to: a) spend 72 hours in active educational fieldwork; b) have regular contact with their individual practicum supervisor; c) submit an interim report of approximately 1500 words to the Practicum Supervisor; and submit a final paper of approximately 8000 words to the Practicum Supervisor offering a final synthesis of specific field experiences & their relationship to a relevant body of academic and sociological literature which shall be graded on a Pass/Fail basis. Examples of relevant educational placements include but are not limited to school boards, community organizations, social service organizations, unions, cultural organizations and other organizations with relevant educational functions, broadly conceived.

SJE3998H - Individual Reading and Research in Social Justice Education: Doctoral Level

Credit Value: 0.50

Course description same as SJE2998H.

SJE5000H - Special Topics in Social Justice Research in Education: Master's Level

Credit Value: 0.50

Courses that will examine in depth topics of particular relevance not already covered in regular course offerings in the department. The topics will be announced and described in the schedule of courses.

SJE6000H - Special Topics in Social Justice Research in Education: Doctoral Level

Credit Value: 0.50

Course description same as SJE5000H, but at the doctoral level.


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