Exploring War and Peace from Turkish and US Teachers’ Perspectives: A Comparative Study

• In Event: Changing Educations in Conflict and Peace: War, Violence, and Education Reform

Proposal

Despite volumes of work over decades, peace education is still largely hidden and its legitimacy is often questioned in educational settings, particularly public schools (Stomfay-Stitz, 2008), resulting in challenges to integrate peace education in mainstream schooling and pre-service and practicing teacher education and training (Bekerman & Zembylas, 2014; Author, 2021; Author & Author; 2021). Critical examination of the complexities and underlying reasons of this failure from the perspectives of practicing and pre-service teachers would provide insights towards overcoming these challenges in diverse settings. Considering the potential power of learners and teachers as transformative subjects, and educational spaces as sites of transformation (Bajaj 2008, 2012; Author, 2022; Author et al., 2023), this comparative study of Turkish and US pre-service teachers examines how the two groups of future-teachers' beliefs regarding war, violence, and peace are formed, how these beliefs reflect and contribute to cultural norms, and how these beliefs and cultural norms are influenced and transformed by educational spaces. This comparison is significant because Turkey and the US are two ally countries and many universities in Turkey provide an American model of higher education in their particular contexts (Üsdiken, & Wasti, 2009; Onursal-Besgul, 2016).

Using Hofstede’s cultural dimensions theory (2001) as a conceptual framework, this comparative interpretative phenomenological qualitative study examines data from interviews with 38 American and 44 Turkish future-teachers' beliefs about war, peace, and peace education to explore how future-teachers in these countries explain peace, war, and violence by centralizing and reflecting on the key virtues, values, and norms that they learned (in)directly at schools, in their lives, and in other social institutions. The data from the American participants were collected face-to-face, but the data from the Turkish participants were collected online due to COVID-19 lockdown. In addition, the age range of the participants from the US varied more in comparison to the Turkish participants.

We begin with the assumption that the concepts of war, violence and peace take on a range of meanings within and across cultural groups, and that such meanings are implicated in addressing fundamental curriculum questions, including: what should be taught about war and peace, and what should be excluded? where do war and peace fit within the school curriculum and instruction? and what perceived purposes or educational value do they hold? Through a comparative lens we explore the local peace education practices, possibilities and challenges to employ peace education in the U.S. and Turkish contexts. We present critical analyses and findings within the context of the recent sociological, cultural and political changes in the recent history and the geopolitical positions of both countries (especially Syrian refugee crisis in Turkey and 9/11, Afghanistan and Iraq wars of the U.S.), which we believe can contribute to the limited literature on the complexities of peace education practices from a comparative perspective. We also discuss implications focused on peace education theory and practice in both settings delving into the complexities of peace education practice in varying socio-cultural and historical elements.

Authors

• Gulistan Gursel-Bilgin, Boğaziçi University

• Ozlem Erden-Basaran, TED University