A critical analysis of discourses on gender equality in education: the case of Turkey

ABSTRACT

Despite national and international attempts to eliminate gender inequality in education, it remains a pressing issue in Turkey. Because gender equality is often shaped by and through discursive practices, the present study explores how educational policy and media discourses create gender inequalities in education. The critical discourse analysis examines 124 policy documents published by 12 governmental organizations and 252 newspaper clippings found in 14 different national newspapers published in Turkey over the last decade. Additionally, interviews were conducted with 13 teachers working at K-12 schools. Our analysis showed that while official statements support gender equality in education, contradictions underlying many educational policies continue to re/produce gender inequalities.

KEYWORDS:

• Gender inequalities in education
• educational policies
• critical discourse analysis

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Pınar Mercan Küçükakın

Dr. Pınar Mercan Küçükakın is an instructor at School of Foreign Languages at Ankara Yıldırım Beyazıt University in Ankara, Turkey. She received her doctorate degree from the Middle East technical University, Department of Educational Sciences. She has fifteen years of teaching experience at primary, secondary and tertiary levels. Her recent work includes gender policy in Turkish education, the role of teacher education in increasing gender awareness of prospective teachers, immigrant education policies, and social justice leadership. She also conducted needs analysis and curriculum evaluation studies of ELT curriculum in Turkey. She was awarded a Fulbright Post-Doc Research scholarship and conducted research at the University of Wisconsin, Madison in 2018-2019.

Cennet Engin-Demir

Dr. Cennet Engin-Demir is a professor at the Middle East technical University, Faculty of Education in Ankara, Turkey. She also conducted research on social issues and education such as gender inequalities, child labor, education of disadvantaged children, urban and rural education, education in Central Asian Turkic Republics, and alternative and democratic education. She worked as expert and consultant at various projects related to education. Recent works included girls' education, inclusive education, democratic citizenship and human rights education, domestic violence againts women, effects of light work on school achievement and gender sensitive schools. She also co-ordinated and completed various Projects on active citizenship and gender equality in education supported by EU and Turkish government successfully. She was awarded a Fulbright Senior Research scholarship and conducted research at the University of Wisconsin, Madison in 2010-2011. Currently, she is the chair of the METU, Department of Educational Sciences.