Raising cosmopolitan children: Chinese middle-class parents' educational strategies. Issue 2 (3rd April 2022)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Soong, Hannah
• Is Part Of: Comparative education. Number 58:Issue 2(2022)
• Page Start: 206
• Page End: 223
• Publication Date: 2022-04-03
• Subjects: cosmopolitanism -- globalisation -- international schools -- Chinese families -- parenting strategies; 世界主义 -- 全球化 -- 国际学校 -- 中国家庭 -- 教养策略; Education -- Periodicals; Comparative education -- Periodicals; 370.9
• DOI: 10.1080/03050068.2021.1984016
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0305-0068

Abstract

ABSTRACT : This article examines the educational strategies of Shanghai Chinese middle-class parents who intend to raise their children to be cosmopolitans. It is based on a 2-year interview study of a group of Chinese parents who send their children to accredited international bilingual schools in Shanghai. Drawing on the concept of ordinary cosmopolitanism, I identify the promotion of extra-curricular activities and frequent travel within China and internationally as two central family practices used to foster a cosmopolitan orientation to improve their children's future. Although cosmopolitanism has a strong appeal to them, my analysis challenges both their concept of cosmopolitan parenting and whether a meaningful cosmopolitan education can take place through parenting strategies. I argue that a transpositional understanding of Chinese middle-class cultural logic of parenting involves a new thinking about the risks, compromises and complex interactions between culture, class and education, as inherent in their parenting strategies for 'principled', 'fluid' and 'universal' cosmopolitanism.