Books by John Smyth

This book has been considered by academicians and scholars of great significance and value to literature. This forms a part of the knowledge base for future generations. So that the book is never forgotten we have represented this book in a print format as the same form as it was originally first published. Hence any marks or annotations seen are left intentionally to preserve its true nature.

This book explores schools and how they can function as social institutions that advance the interests and life chances of all young people, especially those who are already the most marginalized and at an educational disadvantage.

This book considers the detrimental changes that have occurred to the institution of the university, as a result of the withdrawal of state funding and the imposition of neoliberal market reforms on higher education.

Living on the Edge: Rethinking Poverty, Class and Schooling, Second Edition confronts one of the most enduring and controversial issues in education-the nexus between poverty and underachievement.

This book draws on the stories of thirty-two young Australians to identify the barriers and obstacles they face in 'getting a job' in precarious times and from their vantage point.

From Silent Witnesses to Active Agents

Brings a perspective to one of the protracted issues affecting young lives - disengagement from schooling. This book examines disengagement from the vantage point of the lives, experiences, interests and aspirations of the communities from which young people come, and within which they are embedded.

Smyth's research is pursued with vigour through the lives he researches, as he interrupts and punctures `bad' theory, supplanting it with more democratic alternatives, which, by his own admission, makes his research (and all research), political.

This book explores schools and how they can function as social institutions that advance the interests and life chances of all young people, especially those who are already the most marginalized and at an educational disadvantage.

Becoming Educated examines the education of young people, especially those from the most `disadvantaged' contexts. This book shifts the focus to matters such as taking social class into consideration, puncturing notions of poverty and disadvantage, understanding neighborhoods as places of hope and creating spaces within which to listen to young peoples' aspirations.

An analysis of how Critical Pedagogy can be a force for positive change in schools around the world, helping the most disadvantaged students. It shows how teachers, students, parents, communities, and researchers can develop narratives that amount to working with and for those who are increasingly being silenced, marginalised and excluded.