Citizenship education in Cuba : ideals, contradictions, and convivencia

Author / Creator

Dawley-Carr, Jenny Ruth, dissertant

Available as

Physical

Summary

This dissertation examines citizenship formation in Cuba. It asks “What does it mean to be a Cuban citizen today?” Drawing on concepts of state power and solidarity, I explore Cuba’s official narra...

This dissertation examines citizenship formation in Cuba. It asks “What does it mean to be a Cuban citizen today?” Drawing on concepts of state power and solidarity, I explore Cuba’s official narrative of “good” citizenship as well as citizens’ engagement with values and civic dispositions in daily life. For this qualitative study, I interviewed forty-five parents, young people, and social studies educators to understand how civic values are inculcated and practiced. I also analyzed the national civic education curriculum to learn about the Cuban government’s definition of ideal citizenship. Further, I conducted participant observations in homes and one neighborhood community to deepen my awareness of citizenship education in action. Findings demonstrate that values such as solidarity and convivencia (living together) are purposefully modeled and honed across home, neighborhood, and formal schooling contexts. Yet the growing economic gap in today’s Cuba has introduced significant challenges: citizens across generations reported on the need to prioritize their own individual concerns over helping their fellow Cubans. Parents and veteran teachers remain committed to formal schooling completion and formal labor participation as rudimentary to “good” citizenship. However, young people, raised in a very different political generation, reconcile contradictions between the expectations and daily realities with greater degrees of autonomy from ideal notions of citizenship. These findings mark an important period of time, just following the increase in private markets and just prior to restored diplomatic relations between Cuba and the United States. They document on-going social and economic transitions in Cuba and evidence how working-class families make meaning of these changes relative to the Revolution. Such changes hold great impact for schooling as well as for citizenship.

Show More