This book offers a new perspective into the world of international schools and the lucrative industry that accompanies it. It examines how the notion of the ‘global’ becomes a successful commodity, an important social imaginary and a valuable identity marker for these communities of privileged migrants and host country nationals. The author invites the reader on an ethnographic journey through an international school community located in Germany – illuminating the central features that define and maintain the sector, including its emphasis on ‘globality’, engagement with the concept of ‘Third Culture Kid’, and its wider contentious relationship with the ‘local’. While much attention is placed on ‘global citizenship’, international school communities experience degrees of isolation, limited mobility, over-protection and dependency on the school community– impacting their everyday lives, inside and outside the school. This book is guided by larger questions pertaining to the education and mobilities of ‘migrant’ youths and young adults, as well as the notion of what it means to be ‘global’ today.

The Handbook of Research on Critical Issues and Global Trends in International Education addresses the growing complexity and diversity of international schools by examining the critical issues and global trends faced by practitioners in this field. With a lack of research on the experiences and actions of school practitioners in these isolated workplaces, this book aims to provide practical and evidence-based solutions. The book covers a wide range of topics, including equity and access, diversity, teacher retention, legal frameworks, school typology, governance, cultural competence, third culture kids, leadership and practice, technology, and parent engagement. Written by educational professionals, researchers, and anthropologists, it offers a unique collection of voices from those with lived experiences in this field, making it an invaluable resource for anyone interested in gaining a deeper understanding of the international school sector. Whether you are an educator, researcher, policymaker, school leader, lecturer, or anthropologist, the Handbook of Research on Critical Issues and Global Trends in International Education is a must-read comprehensive guide to the complexities and challenges of international education, providing practical solutions for improving the quality of education in this rapidly evolving field. If you are looking to gain a nuanced understanding of the critical issues facing international schools and evidence-based approaches for addressing these challenges, this book is the perfect resource for you.

This book presents a searing critique of the global take on education, questioning why the idea that education should be international has come to dominate the field and positing that the discourse of internationalisation has altered the way we conceptualise education. Using diverse examples from the Middle East, the UK and South-East Asia, the book gathers insights from international schooling, refugee education and the internationalisation of higher education to argue that the ‘global gaze’ renders other ways of looking at education as invisible. It suggests that an oversaturation of international comparison amongst individuals and institutions alike creates a culture of powerlessness, exclusion and silencing. Furthermore, this volume also debates the issues that are caused when education is required to transcend national boundaries. Ultimately questioning the global education system in its current form, this book will be an important contribution for academics, researchers and students in the fields of higher education, education policy and politics, and education and development more broadly.

The concept of Third Culture Kids is often used to describe people who have spent their childhood on the move, living in many different countries and languages. This book examines the hype, relevance and myths surrounding the concept while also redefining it within a broader study of transnationality to demonstrate the variety of stories involved.

Manfred B. Steger’s extensive body of work on globalization has made him one of the most influential scholars working in the field of global studies today. His conceptualization of the global imaginary is amongst the most significant developments in thinking about globalization of the last three decades. Revisiting the Global Imaginary pays tribute to Steger’s contribution to our intellectual history with essays on the evolution, ontological foundations and methodological approaches to the study of the global imaginary. The transdisciplinary framework of this field of enquiry lends itself to investigation in diverse sites. This volume of essays explores practices associated with the reproduction of the global imaginary in such diverse sites as mobile money, Irish pubs, cyber-capitalism, urban space, music in post-apartheid South Africa and global political movements, amongst others.

This book offers new understanding of the implications of pluralism and of transnational movements to higher education and the construct of a “native speaker” within contemporary globalization processes. Theoretically, it calls for a revisioned English as an International Language (EIL) pedagogy and a wider acceptance of EIL and of World Englishes. It challenges the postsecondary education sector to change the discourse around language proficiency to one that engages the “pluralism of English.” As for the applied significance, the book contributes to the work on neo-racism which means racism goes beyond color to stereotypic foreign cultures, nationalities, and exotic accents based on cultural distinctions instead of merely skin differences. The book contributes to higher education policy and practice, pushing a revisioning of ESL in conceptual and pedagogical ways, such as designing more culturally oriented curriculum, implementing culturally responsive pedagogy, and valuing the teaching proficiency more than the language proficiency.

What are the imagined communities that compel men to kill or to die for an idea of a nation? This notion of nationhood had its origins in the founding of the Americas, but was then adopted and transformed by populist movements in nineteenth-century Europe. It became the rallying cry for anti-Imperialism as well as the abiding explanation for colonialism. In this scintillating, groundbreaking work of intellectual history Anderson explores how ideas are formed and reformulated at every level, from high politics to popular culture, and the way that they can make people do extraordinary things. In the twenty-first century, these debates on the nature of the nation state are even more urgent. As new nations rise, vying for influence, and old empires decline, we must understand who we are as a community in the face of history, and change.