Journal of Curriculum and Pedagogy

The Journal of Curriculum and Pedagogy is a biannual publication sponsored by the Curriculum and Pedagogy Conference. Patrick Slattery and James G. Henderson developed the idea and with the financial support of Texas A&M and Kent State University, started the journal in 2004. The journal honors the interdependence of varied perspectives, research, scholarship, and forms of representation in order to achieve richer and more complex opportunities for curriculum workers to explore the relevance and significance of their efforts.

The journal offers two unique elements when compared to other curriculum journals. First, it provides spaces for arts-based researchers to share their work both within the journal and on its cover. Each issue of the journal includes an arts-based work, and the cover of the journal for each issue includes a photograph or work of art that coincides with an arts-based article. This element of the journal represents a vital partnership that began between the Curriculum and Pedagogy Conference and the Arts-Based Educational Research Special Interest Group of the American Educational Research Association (ABER SIG) in [Page 506]2000 during the conference's first annual meeting. At the time, ABER met jointly with Curriculum and Pedagogy, and since that time the conference has maintained an arts-based strand at each annual conference.

Second, the journal maintains a “Perspectives” section in each issue. In this section, the editors identify a key question or issue in the field and seek a variety of very diverse leaders in the field who provide responses. ‘Perspectives’ sections have included such issues as how spiritual, moral, and theological discourses influence curriculum and pedagogy; how curriculum workers can claim a progressive curriculum and pedagogy in a politically conservative climate; how the arts inspire curriculum and pedagogy; and how curriculum scholars can become public intellectuals. The editors who plan and develop each “Perspectives” section actively seek diverse perspectives in order to provide engaging and complex conversations about the questions and issues.

The mission of the journal focuses on intersections between curriculum theory, the study of teaching practice, and the professional artistry that emerges within those intersections. The journal considers these intersections democratic spaces based upon the core ideals of John Dewey and his notions of experience, community, and creative expression. Therefore, the journal's editors strive to move away from simple solutions by encouraging conversations between scholars and practitioners who use varied forms of inquiry: historical, theoretical, theological, and philosophical analysis; arts-based research; linguistics; autobiography; and scholarship addressing issues of gender, sexuality, race, and ethnicity.

The journal attempts to bring honest challenges to the field so its readers can critically explore problems and possibilities within K–12 classrooms, within teacher education programs, and within the larger society. To this end, the journal recognizes the need to honor diverse perspectives, multiple forms of inquiry, and both interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary boundaries within its pages. However, the journal does not merely provide parallel spaces for these diverse views and varied forms of inquiry. It also seeks tensions and intersections between and among them.