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In the context of lifelong learning, adults are increasingly being viewed from a biographical perspective. This article takes a look at how differently – and in some cases inconsistently – adults are construed as biographical subjects in education policy, in educational practice, and in research on adult education. It argues that to even begin to examine the processes and practices of biographical subjectification that take place in adult and continuing education, biographical research must be …
The article is based on the assumption that there is a dialectical correlation between biography and society. The authors develop an analytical category to better conceptually capture the influence of education policy frameworks through individuals’ professional performance. The main focus will be on the life stories of two figures which are pivotal for the development of the Hessian or even German history of adult education: Walter Korn and Rudi Rohlmann.
Have the European football competitions fostered a European consciousness and European identity? There are unmistakable parallels between the political and economic integration of Europe and the history of European football competitions, but these do not suffice to answer this question in the affirmative. In the run-up to the World Cup, whose slogan is “A Time to Make Friends”, the author discusses integration issues emanating from the naturalisation tests of Federal German Länder from an educa…
In this article, the reactor disaster in Fukushima (March 2011) together with the changes in energy policy following in its wake are used to enquire about reactions in the fields of natural science and technical didactics. The empirical finding is that didactical discourse has been little affected by Fukushima. The reason for this, in the view of the author, is to be found in the theoretical problems associated with specialised didactics, in this case didactics involving technology, as well as …
This paper arguments that if competency assessment is to make any contribution as a potentially “liberating” curriculum strategy for struggles of community development and self-determination then it needs to contest the authoritarianism of the national qualification frameworks that have been established in Australia and New Zealand. This article critiques research and policy efforts, in particular for indigenous learners which seek to merely make authoritarian curriculum and assessment structur…
This article presents the programme “Football for development”, which like the other ASA programmes of InWEnt allows young adults to take part in development policy educational work in Africa, Latin America, Asia and Southeast Europe for three months. The projects establish a regional educational and cultural programme using people’s love of football. At the same time, the participants from Germany develop an appreciation for experience from the “South”, helping dispel the traditional image of …
Meaning and function of the concept "employability" in education-political documents of the European Union After a short reconstruction of the evolvement of the social-political dimension since the 1990s, the textual dimension and the function of the concept of employability in the labour market, employment policy as well as the educational political discourse of the European Union are analysed. Considered are with it the changes of the controlling instruments of European politics with regar…
During the last two decades, widening adult participation in higher education has become a central issue in international and especially European lifelong learning policy debates. At European level this is reflected in the Europe 2020 strategy set out by the European Commission. One headline target is to boost the share of the population aged 30–34 that has completed tertiary or equivalent education to 40 per cent by 2020. In the face of general trends such as the intensive use of ICT, the evol…
