School as Community: From Promise to Practice

2. Postmodernism and Community in Schools: Unraveling the Paradox

CHAPTER 2 Postmodernism and Community in Schools: Unraveling the Paradox Gail Furman INTRODUCTION Paradox has become a frequently used term in recent literature on community in schools (Furman, 1996; Merz & Furman, 1997; Shields & Seltzer, 1997). In an earlier book, for example, Carol Merz and I explored a number of apparent paradoxes around the concept of community in public schools, including the notion that homogeneity can and should be the basis for community when school populations are becoming increasingly heterogeneous (Merz & Furman, 1997). Similarly, Shields and Seltzer (1997) outline the paradox of “finding a purpose or meaning for bringing people together” in community (p. 429), given the language and intracultural differences they found in schools that appeared to house a homogeneous Native American population. The central paradox of community highlighted in this literature might be stated this way: Community is assumed to be based in commonalties—the shared values, “visions,” and purposes typically mentioned in the education literature . Yet, school populations are increasingly diverse. Efforts to build community in schools that focus on “centering” certain values over others may have the perverse effect of alienating members of the school population who do not share those values, thus defeating the intended purpose of community. Stated more simply, as community in a school is purportedly strengthened 51 This chapter is adapted from an article of the same title in Educational Administration Quarterly (Furman, 1998). Content from the original article is used by permission of Corwin Press. through shared values, it may become smaller, taking in only those community members who hold those values. In this chapter I will argue that this “paradox” about community and diversity arises partly from the persistence in continuing to apply modernist theories and concepts of community to schools in postmodern times. In other words, the assumption that community membership hinges on commonalities or sameness—on the values, cultural background, kinship relationships and so on that are held in common by community members—is a product of modernist thinking and theorizing, which is friendly to dominant centers or “one best way” of doing things. The problem with applying this modernist thinking to contemporary public schools is that today’s diverse school populations are not characterized by kinship ties, common cultural or religious background, neighborhood affiliations, or shared values of other types. Rather, schools reflect the multilingual, multicultural diversity of the postmodern world. New concepts of community are needed for application in schools and in other institutions in a postmodern society. Thus, in this chapter, my interest is in resolving the paradox by reconceptualizing community to achieve a better fit between our theoretical understandings of community and the realities of schools and society. To do this, I explore how postmodernist theory may be useful in analyzing and critiquing “modernist” notions of community and in articulating new directions for the possibilities of community in schools. There are three basic parameters for this discussion. First, I use a frame for postmodernism that includes three facets: postmodernism as descriptive social theory, postmodernism as normative/constructive social theory, and postmodernism as oppositional/deconstructive social theory. These will be elaborated in sections to follow. Second, “community” as used throughout this chapter will mean the experience of being in community—the sense of belonging, trust of others, and safety—that is the essence of Gemeinschaft (Tönnies, 1887/ 1957).1 In schools, the effort to “create community” typically means the effort to foster these communitylike experiences for students and educators. Third, the discussion here is about public schools with open enrollments, that is, the traditional American “common school.” Issues of community are different in both private schools and public “schools of choice,” because these schools often exhibit greater homogeneity in their student populations. COMMUNITY AND SAMENESS IN SCHOOLS As I have discussed in the introduction to this book, the term community has many meanings. Like postmodernism, community is a “shifting signifier” (Giroux, 1992) or “contested concept” (Foster, 1995a; Parker, 1996), useful for a variety of purposes. In education, some writers advocate “professional com52 Furman munity” (Johnson, 1990; Louis & Kruse, 1995; Newmann & Wehlage, 1995); some focus on building a “community of learners” or “learning community” among students and staff (At Home in Our Schools, 1994; Barth, 1990; Calderwood , 2000; Oxley, 1997); others provide normative ideas for “democratic community” (Apple & Bean, 1995; Kahne, 1994; Parker, 1996; Strike, 1993); while still others more or less co-opt the term community to attach to a particular reform model (e.g...