Computer Literacy as Ideology

Ideology Critique and Ethnographic Methods

Our approach to the study of ideology draws upon a number of critical traditions in educational theory, and attempts to add an empirical dimension. Elsewhere (see Goodson & Mangan, forthcoming) we have laid out what we see as the basic ethical and epistemological imperatives of schools-based research. One of our goals, following Stenhouse, is to produce “a story of action within a theory of context”. By this, we mean to indicate the need for educational research which begins with grounded studies of the everyday life-worlds of teachers and students in schools, but which does not end there. Empirical observation of classroom activity needs to be set within a broader theoretical context which will allow for the development of new perspectives on everday activities.

In order to set the stage for a report from our empirical research, then, we will first present a brief overview of some of the major contributors to the analysis of ideology in educational systems generally, and some of those focused more specifically on the use of computers in schools.

Encountering Ideology in Schools

Although ideology is a fundamental concept in the analysis of social institutions dating at least to Marx and dealt with at length by Weber, Mannheim, and many others, its modern application in the study of schooling is perhaps best enunciated by Michael Apple. In Ideology and Curriculum, first published in 1979 and in a second edition in 1990, Apple lays out both a clear statement of the importance of ideology in understanding state-supported schooling, and a research programme for its examination and analysis. In decoding curricular ideologies, he says,

The basic act involves making the curriculum forms found in schools problematic so that their latent ideological content can be uncovered. Questions about the selective tradition such as the following need to be taken quite seriously. Whose knowledge is it? Who selected it? Why is it organized and taught this way? (Apple, 1990, p. 7).