Academic controversy and Singapore history: Context, teachers and subpublics

Can we utilise controversy in classrooms when it is discouraged in society? This is a proposition to be taken seriously in Singapore. It raises a basic question about academic controversy: do we introduce young learners to controversial issues, or draw upon their awareness of such issues? Particularly with younger pupils, contentious learning will involve both approaches in some combination. But there is a difference between students grappling with an issue they know to be contentious, and having the issue defined on their behalf by teachers and policymakers. In the latter case, the student will simply be reconciling competing perspectives, but while controversial issues are competing accounts, the reverse is not true. The Oxfam guide defines controversial issues as those ‘that have a political, social or personal impact and arouse feeling and/or deal with questions of value or belief’ (Oxfam 2006: 2). Controversial issues are socially, rather than academically, determined.