Politics in history education in Hong Kong: Towards critical political education

Politics in history education in Hong Kong: Towards critical political education

• Lin, Cong The University of Hong Kong
• Jackson, Liz The University of Hong Kong

Educational Studies in Japan: International Yearbook, (13), 39-54, 2019

Japanese Educational Research Association

2019

• P Social Context of Education
  • PA History of Hong Kong Education
• P Social Context of Education
  • PC Society & Education
• P Social Context of Education
  • PE Law & Education ; Politics & Education

Foreign Countries History Instruction Political Issues Educational Change Curriculum Secondary Education Textbooks Textbook Content Acculturation Political Influences Nationalism Cultural Influences

• Hong Kong

• 1997.7 onwards

• Unknown or Unspecified

The relationship between history education and political education in Asian societies is an underexplored topic. Politics have deeply shaped the development of history education in Hong Kong, as in many other societies around the world. Hong Kong history education reforms have been criticized for providing a new form of national political education. This study examines how politic education can be found in the Hong Kong history curriculum as 'latent content'. To do so, it provides a qualitative content analysis of all textual data used in 'Chinese history' and 'history' textbooks in secondary schools in Hong Kong which discuss or portray political content, focusing particularly on the themes of identity shaping and assimilation. Before focusing on the Hong Kong situation, this paper first explores how history education is a political topic in general. Then Hong Kong's complicated political legacy is described in relation to one of the unique features of history education there: the concurrence of two subjects, 'history' and 'Chinese history'. Current debates about the reform of history education in Hong Kong and the limitations of current history education in Hong Kong are examined in the next part, using data from textbooks. Our analysis shows that 1) national identity is prioritized over local identity in the textbooks, and 2) the textbooks mainly reflect a Mainland-based majority perspective and justify assimilation in history, resulting in a lack of recognition of the many different minority groups of Mainland China, of which Hong Kong people may see themselves as part. Based on the analysis, we argue that history education in Hong Kong provides a narrow political education that can impede some crucial education goals in Hong Kong.
[Copyright of Educational Studies in Japan: International Yearbook is the property of Japanese Educational Research Association.]

• English

Journal Articles

• 18814832

https://bibliography.lib.eduhk.hk/bibs/7270b01c

2020-03-03