Curriculum As Spaces: Aesthetics, Community, And The Politics

Claire Amy Schultz

Book Review: Curriculum as spaces: Aesthetics, community, and the politics of place

Fall 2015

Contributing to the complicated conversation informing curriculum and curriculum theory, Curriculum as Spaces: Aesthetics, Community, and the Politics of Place co-authors David M. Callejo Pérez, Donna Adair Breault, and William L. White (2014) work to reframe major ideas in the field. William Pinar served as the editor and his influence can be detected throughout the themes discussed in Curriculum as Spaces. This work is a theoretical discussion pertaining to education and specifically to the field of curriculum theory in education. The authors challenge readers to engage with curriculum

The authors want the reader to understand space from a cosmopolitan perspective. Curriculum theory should be conceptualized from a specific time and location and consider historical perspective and not in the globalized business model. The authors argue that framing curriculum theory in a local community may still carry some of the engendered problems of the bureaucratic business model. Callejo Pérez et al. (2014) envision the conceptualization of the community couched in a cosmopolitan perspective where there is an understanding of the communities relationship and involvement on a global level while maintaining the local identity(ies) of the individual(s) and smaller

(2014) seems entrenched in similar language used in the work of Pinar (2012) and feels as though it is a more practical based or pedagogical extension of his writing on curriculum theory. While this book heavily relies on theory and offers rich theoretical background, the discussion that is offered on place-based curriculum and transactional pedagogy may in fact be more accessible to practitioners in the field. Curriculum as a complicated conversation should be acknowledged and understood by and through the public discourse on education, curriculum theory, and education reform. Because this is a difficult time for teaching professionals and the field of education, this book offers fresh perspective on the ways in which the complicated conversation can move forward and positively effect