Concerns about terrorism, radicalisation and extremism are found within many of the discourses surrounding the safety of young people within modern British society. The current UK Counter-Terrorism Strategy, known as Prevent (2011), suggests that the education system should be responsive to these concerns and that schools in particular need to include certain counter-terrorism measures into their administrative and teaching procedures. However, despite the increased literature on these issues, very little has been done to investigate or incorporate pupils' views into the discussion. Most young people are not, nor have the desire to be, involved in terrorist activities, yet they are still witnesses to the discourses associated with the preventative measures expressed by the State and by the discourses from other sources, such as the media. Therefore, this exploratory study into their perceptions of terrorism provides a unique insight into how these discourses affect young people's views of others and of society-wide ideologies, such as religion. It does not provide suggestions for educationalists and policy makers, since it was conducted separate to State procedures, but rather provides young people with a voice in this ever-growing field of study. The research participants included pupils aged 13-15 years old, from a selection of six schools in Warwickshire, including four comprehensive and two grammar schools. The research drew on the theoretical foundations of Foucault and used Case Study Research methods to uncover the pupils' perceptions of terrorism. By exploring the pupils' language and those influential power-knowledge processes that contributed to the formulations and expressions of their knowledge, this study investigated the affects that external influences can have in the pupils' perceptions and, in doing so, it demonstrated how capable young people are of engaging with a variety of complex and sensitive issues associated with the topic of terrorism.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:bl.uk/oai:ethos.bl.uk:665326 |
| Date | January 2014 |
| Creators | Quartermaine, Angela |
| Publisher | University of Warwick |
| Source Sets | Ethos UK |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
| Source | http://wrap.warwick.ac.uk/71324/ |
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