This study explores the normative frameworks through which selected parents, students, teachers, and education activists in three villages in rural Pakistan understand and articulate the value of girls' schooling. It argues that within the dominant analytical paradigms of human capital theory and neoliberalism, researchers and policymakers have tended to conceptualise 'demand' for schooling in terms that are narrowly focused upon measuring and boosting enrolment, and thus have failed to capture whether and how shifting enrolments correspond to shifting norms and to the broader imaginative regimes through which differently located actors experience and produce the gendered value of schooling. Typical analyses of 'demand' for girls' schooling have mostly focused upon what factors of schooling provision are most likely to increase parents' willingness to send their daughters to school, and thus inadvertently conflate 'demand' with 'supply' and reveal very little about whether or how such factors influence normative evaluations of girls' schooling by parents, children, teachers, and others across various contexts where enrolment is on the rise. This oversight hinders efforts at comparison that are critical for planning and interpreting transnational initiatives for achieving gender equality in and through schooling. To improve upon this trend, this study illustrates a) the normative evaluations that underpin selected instances of 'demand' for girls' schooling in three villages in rural Pakistan, and b) how these normative evaluations have changed over time and in relation to particular interventions. Using data from seventeen weeks of fieldwork spanning two villages in the southern Punjab and one in Gilgit-Baltistan, the study explores perspectives about the value of girls' schooling in relation to the key themes of marriage, employment, and purdah. By bringing this data into comparison with mainstream discouses about 'demand,' the study highlights the limitations of those discourses and charts a path for further comparative inquiry. Findings illustrate how normative perspectives about girls' schooling are differentially contested and transformed over time even as enrolment trends converge across contexts, and suggest that researchers and practitioners concerned with promoting gender equality in and through schooling should lend greater attention to the social interactions through which 'norm-making' occurs. This sort of attention to 'norm-making' can reveal new opportunities for intervention, but also, and perhaps more importantly, it inspires humility by demonstrating that all normative evaluations of schooling - whether emerging from education 'experts' or from farmers in rural villages - reflect socially and historically situated notions of personhood, none of which is more 'natural' than any other.

The purpose of this thesis is to explore how education in one girls' government school teaches understandings of citizenship and to identify potential links to the reproduction of identity-based violence in Pakistan. This in-depth qualitative case study was conducted in a girls' government model school. This study focuses on curriculum and school practices of the secondary school section. Data was collected through interviews with staff, a participatory workshop with teachers, focus groups with students, classroom observation, and informal discussions. I also analyzed the Pakistan Studies textbook used in the secondary section of the school. Using theories of critical education, intersectionality, and Galtung's violence triangle, I argue that despite recent political and curricular reform attempts, education in Pakistan reproduces a homogeneous concept of a legitimate citizen (male Sunni Muslim). While this evolved to unite an ethnically diverse Pakistan, it has contributed to identity-based violence (direct, structural, and cultural) against those that do not fit within this conception. In this school, the Pakistan Studies textbooks create an official discourse that promotes this gendered and exclusionary citizenship. I show how the Pakistan studies textbook uses history and constitutional lessons to promote citizenship that is based in a masculine Islam meant to oppose the Hindu ‘other' as well as to promote the exclusion of women and minorities from full citizenship. I also found that teachers own understandings of citizenship, which closely reflect the text, are deeply rooted in their understanding of their notions of the ideal Muslim woman. I find that the school rewards gendered behavior in both students and teachers. I then explore the extent to which the school reproduces other social divisions including religious, ethnicity, and class. I find that the school simultaneously reproduces, mitigates, and exacerbates these tensions. I then argue that the teachers' and students' understandings of the role of women to counter violence is rooted in the notions of middle class women's roles as mothers and supporters of men that are reproduced through school practice. This study furthers the knowledge on the links between education and violence by showing that promoting a homogeneous ideal of a citizen through education, while intended as a nation building project, can contribute to structural, cultural and direct violence against women and minorities, limiting their agency to engage in social transformation.

Le ministère de l’Éducation nationale a publié en août 2002, puis réactualisé à la rentrée 2007 une liste de référence de 300 œuvres de littérature de jeunesse pour le cycle 3, (La liste a été amendée en mars 2013). L’objectif nettement affiché du ministère de l’Éducation Nationale est d’aider à comprendre le monde, "faire évoluer les représentations, projeter les élèves dans l’avenir, leur transmettre des valeurs, les aider à construire un idéal" grâce aux valeurs présentes dans les œuvres de littérature de la liste de références. La littérature est ici considérée comme "une chance de façonner concrètement et en profondeur les valeurs au-delà des déclarations de bonnes intentions". Tout élève du CE2 au CM2 lit des ouvrages de la liste Éducation Nationale. Pour les enseignant.e.s c’est un gage de sérieux. De plus, il n’y pas de risque de contestation par les familles du choix de l’œuvre. Enfin les livres coûtent chers. Il s’agit donc pour une école d’un investissement à long terme qui doit être consensuel au niveau de l’équipe pédagogique. Dans certains milieux, les élèves ne connaîtront et ne liront que des livres de la liste de référence. Il semble alors légitime de s’interroger sur les valeurs présentées aux élèves et, dans le cadre de cette thèse, plus particulièrement sur les modèles amoureux qui sont proposés aux jeunes lecteurs et aux jeunes lectrices. Notre étude porte sur les 115 ouvrages de cette liste qui mettent en scène des situations d’émois amoureux. Cela va d’une simple réplique par exemple celle du bûcheron dans le Magicien d’Oz qui rencontre "… une jeune fille très belle … très vite je me mis à l’aimer de tout mon cœur", à un roman tout entier Je suis amoureux d’un tigre de Paul Thiès par exemple. Cela concerne tous les genres littéraires : albums, bandes dessinées, contes, romans, théâtre. Aujourd’hui, la réalité amoureuse et sexuelle évolue dans notre société, qu’il s’agisse de divorce, vie en couple, pacte civil de solidarité ou affirmation des orientations sexuelles. Comment, à travers l’étude de la littérature de jeunesse, analyser la permanence du modèle amoureux illustré par le couple "bonne ménagère, prince charmant" et les transformations ou les déclinaisons de ce modèle ? Les livres pour la jeunesse enregistrent-ils ces changements ? Les reflètent-ils ? Comment et jusqu’où ? Les valeurs et les modèles amoureux mis en scène sont-ils différents selon le sexe du personnage ? / The Ministry of Education published in August 2002 a reference list of 300 pieces of youth literature for primary school (this list was updated in September 2007 and in March 2013). The clear objective of the Ministry of Education is to help understand the world, "develop representations, send students in the future, pass values on to them, support them to build an ideal" thanks to the values put forward in the pieces of youth literature from the reference list. The literature is considered here as "an opportunity to actually and deeply shape up the values, beyond the statements of good intentions". Every pupil from 3rd to 5th year of primary school reads books from the Department of Education list. For teachers, it is a guarantee of quality. Moreover, there is no possible questioning of choices by the families. Finally, books are expensive. For schools, they represent long-term investments which must be agreed on by all the teaching teams. In some social environments, the pupils will know and will read only the books from the reference list. Therefore, it seems crucial to assess the values presented to pupils, and more particularly in the present thesis, to examine the love models which are proposed to the young readers. Our study concerns 115 books from this list, staging situations of loving emotions. It ranges from a simple line, e.g. the one by the lumberjack of the Wonderful Wizard of Oz who meets "… a very pretty girl… very quickly I started to love her with all my heart", to a whole novel e.g. I’m in love with a tiger by Paul Thiès. It concerns all the literary genres: albums, comic strips, tales, novels, theater. Today the reality of love and sex keeps changing in our society, with the divorce, life in couple, civil union (PACS) or assertion of the sexual orientations. Through the study of the youth literature, how to analyze the durability of the love model illustrated by the couple "good housewife, prince charming", and its transformations or declensions? Are these changes recorded in the books for youth? Do books reflect them? How and to what extent? Are the values and the staged love models different according to the sex of the character?

L'enseignement supérieur féminin est très important en Arabie saoudite mais, pour des raisons à la fois culturelles et sociales, il n'existe pas d'études sur ce phénomène qui touche les rapports sociaux et la condition féminine au royaume saoudien. Comment est conçue l'éducation féminine en Arabie saoudite? Comment est vu l'enseignement supérieur féminin? Quelle est la situation et l'image des femmes à l'université? Quel impact sur la famille et la culture saoudiennes? Où en est la mixité et les relations hommes-femmes? Autant de questions auxquelles cette thèse tente de répondre en s'appuyant sur des analyses de corpus journalistiques et des enquêtes sur le terrain. Dans une première partie sont exposés les éléments culturels qui structurent l'imaginaire saoudien concernant la question de la femme et de l'éducation féminine. Dans une seconde partie est analysée l'image de l'enseignement supérieur féminin à partir d'une étude de corpus et d'enquêtes sur le terrain. Enfin, dans une troisième partie, cette image est mise en perspective par rapport aux enjeux sociaux, économiques et politiques du royaume saoudien. / Women's higher education is very important in Saudi Arabia, but for both cultural and social reasons, there are no serious studies on this phenomenon that concerns the gender relationships in the Saudi kingdom. How is designed female education in Saudi Arabia? How is perceived female higher education? What is the status and image of women in higher education? What impact on the family and the Saudi culture? What about diversity and gender relationships? These are questions among others that this PhD dissertation attempts to answer based on analyzes of press corpus and many field investigations. In the first part of the dissertation are explained the cultural elements that shape the imagination of Saudi people regarding the issue of women education. In the second part is analyzed the image of female higher education based on a corpus study and field surveys. Finally, in the third part, the perception of highly educated women is put into perspective in relation to social, economical and political stakes of the Saudi kingdom.

This study is an investigation of how cultural traditions can militate against the education of women in Zambia with a focus on the Tumbuka tribe. Ethnographic methods were employed over a period of three months in a village in the Eastern Province of the country. Data were collected through participant observation, focus group and in-depth interviews, narratives, and documents. A total of 47 participants comprised the sample. This research cuts through multidisciplinary fields such as social sciences, education and anthropology. Through thematic analysis data were analysed. Evidence in this research demonstrates that patrilineal groupings are strongholds of the patriarchal predisposition and that patriarchal attitudes and cultural traditions do not recognize women as equal partners with men. The Tumbuka women‟s experiences and beliefs reflect socio-cultural traditional norms that tend to limit gender equality, and compel women to accept and justify male domination at the expense of their own status and to regard consequent inequalities as normal. Evidence demonstrates that the initiation rites, an active institution for girls of pubescent age, interfere more with the school-based education of girls. The women are active social agents as well as passive learners who will not allow the girls they are coaching to question the reason or purpose for some traditional practices that are oppressive and directly cause them to fail to complete their schooling successfully. The strong hold that the cultural traditions has on the locals has further resulted in conflicts with modern schooling, which is viewed as disseminating „white‟ man‟s culture and values. Established in this research is the fear and suspicion that the locals have on the outcome of their children learning these values that they see as alien to their own. The modern education provided in school is perceived as a force that undermines cultural values. It is viewed as presenting an inherent challenge to the cultural traditional control measures that are in place. Arguably, while ethnic traditions should be respected and sustained because they define one's identity, aspects of culture which are discriminatory, restrictive and tend to devalue women‟s physical, emotional and psychological development should be eliminated because they are retrogressive. Therefore the argument that deep seated socio-cultural traditions play a significant role in encumbering female education is proven.

Cette thèse met en lumière l'histoire de l'éducation des filles arméniennes du milieu du XIXe au début du XXe siècle en analysant pour la première fois cette histoire dans le contexte général des événements politiques qui ont influencé son développement. Elle explore également le travail des femmes arméniennes en tant que pédagogues, organisatrices et donatrices des écoles de filles. Cette recherche est fondée sur un large éventail de sources publiques et privées : rapports, programmes et règlements scolaires, publications de presse (éditoriaux, correspondances, nouvelles, annonces générales et publicitaires), œuvres littéraires, discours publics, mémoires, journaux intimes, autobiographies et lettres. Celles-ci révèlent la progression de l'éducation des filles des cours particuliers et de la formation archaïque par des femmes pieuses et des diaconesses jusqu'à la fondation d'écoles régulières pour les filles et à une forme d'éducation similaire à celle de leurs frères. Le développement de l'éducation et des écoles de filles arméniennes s'est déroulé dans le contexte triplement tumultueux des politiques coloniales et répressives du gouvernement russe au Caucase, des efforts de l'Église arménienne pour maintenir son autorité et son pouvoir sur les communautés arméniennes, et de la croissance du mouvement national et révolutionnaire des arméniens. Cette recherche souligne la façon dont la question de l'éducation des filles arméniennes a émergé et évolué. Elle montre également comment ce changement a amené les femmes arméniennes à assumer un rôle public, à établir des écoles, des organismes de bienfaisance, des bibliothèques, à écrire et à traduire de la littérature pour enfants, à organiser une série d'activités de collectes de fonds pour les écoles de filles (bazar de charité, loterie publique, vente de broderies, théâtres et concerts) et à participer au mouvement révolutionnaire. Cette thèse s'inscrit dans l'actualité des recherches en sciences de l'éducation sur la scolarisation, les programmes et les institutions scolaires du XIXe et du début du XXe siècle. Elle s'engage également dans les débats sur l'éducation des filles et l'histoire des femmes dans l'Europe de l'Est et au Caucase. Cette recherche contribue enfin aux Études Arméniennes en écrivant un chapitre essentiel et inédit de l'histoire arménienne sur la présence et le rôle des femmes dans les événements politiques, sociaux et culturels majeurs du XIXe et du début du XXe siècle. / This dissertation brings to the light the story of the late-mid-nineteenth century and early twentieth-century education of Armenian girls for the first time by placing it in the context of the general political events that influenced its development. It also examines Armenian women's work as educators, organisers and sponsors of girls' schooling. The research is based on a wide array of public and private sources: school reports, programs and regulations, press publications (editorials, correspondences, news, announcements and advertisements), literary works, speeches, memoirs, diaries, autobiographies and letters, which reveal the period's progression from girls receiving private tutoring and an archaic training by deaconesses and celibate devotees to establishing regular schools for girls and providing them a similar form of education as their brothers. The development of Armenian girls' schools and education took place in the turbulent context of the repressive colonial politics of the Russian Government in the Caucasus, the efforts of the Armenian Church to maintain its authority and power over the Armenian communities and the growing Armenian national-revolutionary movement. The research uncovers the nuances of changing consciousness about Armenian girls' education and shows how it led Armenian women to assume public roles, establish schools, charities, libraries, write and translate children's literature, undertake a wide range of fund-raising public activities for girls' schools (charity bazaars, public lotteries, embroidery sales, theatres and concerts) and enter the revolutionary movement. This dissertation joins a vibrant conversation in the educational sciences about nineteenth and early twentieth-century schooling, programs and institutions. It also engages in the discussions about Eastern-European and Caucasian girls' education and women's history. The research also contributes to Armenian Studies by restoring to Armenian history a missing and vital chapter about women's presence and role in the late nineteenth and early twentieth-century major political, social and cultural developments.