Curriculum, History of

Abstract

This chapter analyzes the cultural conditions that gave rise to curriculum studies and later to curriculum history, and the ways that curriculum history could become a cooperative research program for understanding the development of schools in their respective cultural and national contexts. It makes a distinction between a global and an international research agenda, suggesting that the latter offers important advantages. It also addresses the historical roles that constitutions play in shaping citizens through schooling. The chapter also analyzes how the architecture of education systems aims not only at fabricating national unity and identity but also at creating social distinctions within the nation-state.