Tacit Positivism in the Common Core Standards

• In Event: Roundtable Session 11
  In Roundtable Session: Marxian Analysis of Society, Schools, and Education SIG Roundtable

Abstract

It has been argued recently that while positivism has been formally rejected in philosophy, a tacit version of it persists in, for example, Scientific Research in Education (2002) and related documents. This paper argues that a tacit form of positivism is also codified in the Common Core Readiness Anchor Standards for Reading (CCRASR). This means that the “logic” of positivism – the conditions it places on how people investigate and make sense of “what is” – is now installed as the legitimate way of reading texts and, by extension, making sense of social relations. Overall the narrow way in which “reality” is defined in the logic of positivism constitutes a crude empiricist way of reading.

Author

• Deborah P. Kelsh, College of Saint Rose