Critical health education in Aotearoa New Zealand

Abstract

Health education in Aotearoa New Zealand is an enigma. Premised on ostensibly open and holistic philosophical premises, the school curriculum not only permits, but in some ways prescribes, pedagogies and teacher dispositions that engage with the diversity of young people at its centre. A capacity, to not only understand contemporary health missives, but also critique them in light of lived experience and broader sociocultural conditions, is desired from students and formal assessments reward this. The New Zealand Curriculum is considered a treasure, a document that is the envy of many educators around the world, however, there is not necessarily a direct link between official curriculum and practice. In this paper, we interrogate the extent to which the aspirations of a document so laden with promise can be realised in a political climate that leans heavily on a representation of youth as troubled, fat and risky subjects. We explore the tensions, the paradoxes and the fissures that arise when an avowedly socially critical syllabus rubs up against public health imperatives and a context where the capacity to ameliorate youth health problems is ‘capital’ for vying political interests. Drawing on contexts of obesity and sexuality, we use the work of Bourdieu to explore how health education exists at the intersection of different fields of practice.

Keywords:

• Bourdieu
• Sexuality
• Obesity
• Policy
• Curriculum
• Critical

Acknowledgements

Thank you to the reviewers who provided very helpful and constructive critical feedback on earlier versions of this paper.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.