Defining Physical Education (Routledge Revivals) : The Social Construction of a School Subject in Postwar Britain

First Published In 1992, David Kirk's Book Analyses The Public Debate Leading Up To The 1987 General Election Over The Place And Purpose Of Physical Education In British Schools. By Locating This Debate In A Historical Context, Specifically In The Period Following The End Of The Second World War, It Attempts To Illustrate How The Meaning Of School Physical Education And Its Aims, Content And Pedagogy Were Contested By A Number Of Vying Groups. It Stresses The Influence Of The Culture Of Postwar Social Reconstruction In Shaping These Groups' Ideas About Physical Education. Through This Analysis, The Book Attempts To Explain How Physical Education Has Been Socially Constructed During The Postwar Years And, More Specifically, To Suggest How The Subject Came To Be Used As A Symbol Of Subversive, Left Wing Values In The Campaign Leading To The 1987 Election. In More General Terms, The Book Provides A Case Study Of The Social Construction Of School Knowledge. The Book Takes An Original Approach To The Question Of Curriculum Change In Physical Education, Building On Increasing Interest In Historical Research In The Field Of Curriculum Studies. It Adopts A Social Constructionist Perspective, Arguing That Change Occurs Through The Active Involvement Of Competing Groups In Struggles Over Limited Material And Ideological (discursive) Resources. It Also Draws On Contemporary Developments In Social And Cultural Theory, Particularly The Concepts Of Discourse And Ideological Hegemony, To Explain How The Meaning Of Physical Education Has Been Constructed, And How Particular Definitions Of The Subject Have Become Orthodoxes. The Book Presents New Historical Evidence From A Period Which Had Previously Been Neglected By Researchers, Despite The Fact That 1945 Marked A Watershed In The Development Of The Understanding And Teaching Of Physical Education In Schools. Intro -- Defining Physical Education The Social Construction Of A School Subject In Postwar Britain -- Copyright -- Defining Physical Education: The Social Construction Of A School Subject In Postwar Britain -- Copyright -- Contents -- Acknowledgements -- Foreword -- Chapter 1 Defining Physical Education: Crisis, Conflict And A Recent Debate -- A Recent Public Debate -- Physical Education Discourse: Alternatives And Continuities -- Chapter 2 Curriculum History And Physical Education As Discourse -- Social Change And Physical Education As Discourse -- Defining Physical Education: The Social Construction Of Physical Education -- Chapter 3 Politics, Culture And Education In Postwar Britain -- Consensus In Postwar Politics -- Social And Cultural Life: Change And Continuity -- Educational Discourse: Myths And Disenchantments -- The Emergence Of Mass Secondary Schooling:1945-1957 -- Education And Consumer-orientated Materialism: 1957-1970 -- Conclusion -- Chapter 4 Gymnastics And Gender: Contesting The Meaning Of Physical Education -- Three Versions Of Gymnastics -- The Demise Of Swedish Gymnastics -- The Female Creed: Educational Gymnastics And Child-centred Progressivism -- The Old And The New: Pleas For Moderation -- Scientific Measurement And The Male Perspective -- Inside The Debate -- The Aftermath Of The Debate -- Politics, Power And Patriarchy -- Chapter 5 The Games Ethic, Mass Secondary Schooling And The Consolidation Of Traditional Physical Education -- The Evolution Of The Games Ethic And Bourgeois Class Identity -- Mass Secondary Schooling And The Expansion Of Physical Education -- Sport, Recreation And The Consolidation Of Traditional Physical Education -- Popular Recreation And State Intervention -- National Identity, The National Interest And The Invention Of Tradition -- Delinquency, Social Control And Games. Traditional Physical Education As Myth -- Chapter 6 Health, Fitness And The Rise Of Scientific Functionalism -- The Positioning Of School Physical Education In Medico-health Discourse -- The Undermining Of The Medico-health Framework And The Expansion Of Health Education -- Fitness, Measurement And The Rise Of Scientific Functionalism -- Scientific Physical Education -- The Hard Core Of Scientific Functionalism: Fitness, Strength, Endurance -- A New View Of Fitness And Health -- Chapter 7 The Social Construction Of Physical Education: Connecting Past, Present And Future -- Contestation And Power: Reconstructing The Past -- Consolidation And Incubation: Merging Past And Present -- A Yet To Be Concluded Story: Prospects For The Future -- Postscript -- Index.