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This study was conducted in Zambia from 2002 to 2008, a country greatly affected by the HIV (Human Immunodeficiency Virus)/AIDS (Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome) epidemic. The global, national, as well as local discourses on spread and mitigation were clustered around scientific knowledge and the local context and cultural traditions. The education sector struggled with implementing the national HIV/AIDS education strategy but by a broader stakeholder involvement, and a close collaboration between the educational sector and tribal chiefs and their traditional internal structures, a localized approach emerged. The overall objective of the paper is to illustrate how a multi-voiced strategy can bring about sustainable change, illustrated by this study. The study used qualitative constructivist and grounded theoretical approaches, and applied the third generation of cultural and historical activity theory (CHAT) as an analytical tool. Bernstein’s concept, symbolic control, contributes to a broader understanding of the underlying processes and outcomes of the study. The findings revealed that the strategically monitored multi-voiced participation of local stakeholders created a learning space where both scientific and indigenous knowledge were blended, and thereby creating solutions to preventive action meeting the local needs. The study exemplifies these processes by identifying contradictions between the various levels and activity systems involved, by listing some of their characteristics, manifestations and finally their negotiated solutions. These solutions, or the third space interventions, the outcome of the multi-voiced participation, is in the paper used to explore a theoretical framework for an ethical and decolonized development strategy; a precondition for sustained local development.
Ellen Carm. Exploring a Third Space for Sustainable Educational Development—HIV/AIDS Prevention, Zambia. Sustainability 2018, 10, 946 .
AMA StyleEllen Carm. Exploring a Third Space for Sustainable Educational Development—HIV/AIDS Prevention, Zambia. Sustainability. 2018; 10 (4):946.
Chicago/Turabian StyleEllen Carm. 2018. "Exploring a Third Space for Sustainable Educational Development—HIV/AIDS Prevention, Zambia." Sustainability 10, no. 4: 946.
The rational for this paper is contextualized within a broader national and international agenda of reaching Education for All (EFA), knowledge transformation and production with an overall focus on Education for Sustainable Development (ESD). Whose education and whose development is at issue? The purpose of this paper is to reconceptualize EFA in a broader developmental context. Definitions of formal-, non-formal and informal education are applied in order to analyze the epistemological perspectives underlying the educational achievements more than two decades after Jomtien in 1990. Concepts of contextualized expansive education and object-oriented learning will be used to reveal the systemic causes of the challenges the individual actors experience in their daily learning activities. Two case studies further illustrate how a broad stakeholder involvement through collective design and implementation created innovation and educational transformation that contributed to relevant and sustained learning/knowledge and development at an individual and community level. The paper argues that in the current sociocultural context, responses to EFA need to be based on a comprehensive national education strategy, situated in the local context. By creating space for educational innovation, through interaction and negotiation, the confluence of the epistemological lenses characterizing formal, non-formal, and informal learning could ultimately be a strategy to adequately respond to the diversified learning needs of the population and sustainable developmental of the country. One expected outcome of the paper is a contribution to the future strategies of EFA beyond 2015, built on the urgent requirements for inter-professional partnership and collaboration through a multidimensional approach to education and learning.
Ellen Carm. Rethinking Education for All. Sustainability 2013, 5, 3447 -3472.
AMA StyleEllen Carm. Rethinking Education for All. Sustainability. 2013; 5 (8):3447-3472.
Chicago/Turabian StyleEllen Carm. 2013. "Rethinking Education for All." Sustainability 5, no. 8: 3447-3472.
Through cross-disciplinary and participatory processes involving key stakeholders from the Zambian education sector, as well as from the traditional leadership structure, a localized HIV/AIDS-prevention strategy, Interactive School and Community Approach (ISACA), was developed and implemented throughout one province between 2002 and 2006. The study is guided by constructivist grounded theory and explores the impact of the chiefs’ involvement in preventing the spread of HIV/AIDS through close collaboration and interaction across traditionally vertical boundaries, for example between the formal educational and traditional leadership structures. The strategy created communicative spaces for the merger of Western and indigenous knowledge. The study reveals the importance of involving the chiefs, the custodians of culture and traditions in cultural transformation and development, and shows their significant role as gate-openers and change agents, a precondition for sustainable local development.
Ellen Carm. The role of local leaders in cultural transformation and development. Compare: A Journal of Comparative and International Education 2012, 42, 795 -816.
AMA StyleEllen Carm. The role of local leaders in cultural transformation and development. Compare: A Journal of Comparative and International Education. 2012; 42 (5):795-816.
Chicago/Turabian StyleEllen Carm. 2012. "The role of local leaders in cultural transformation and development." Compare: A Journal of Comparative and International Education 42, no. 5: 795-816.