School Bullying and Social Relations

Aim

After completion of the course, the student should be able to: - Account for the central concepts within school bullying research - Discuss school bullying from different methodological and theoretical perspectives - Explain the importance of power relations to school bullying - Critically reflect over dominant bullying discourses - Critically analyse school bullying interventions

Content

The course introduces a number of different perspectives for understanding the problem of school bullying and for critically analysing the various interventions used to prevent and reduce its prevalence in schools. The course is structured around six themes related to aggressive behaviour, social relations, the school context, gender and sexuality, power relations, and anti-bullying interventions. The first theme focuses on early research into bullying and aggressive behaviour. The second theme introduces more social psychological perspectives on bullying and social relations in schools. The third theme deals with sociological and pedagogical research on bullying, violence and pedagogical practices. The fourth theme discusses bullying in relation to gender and sexuality. The fifth theme considers the power relations central to school bullying. The sixth theme considers the ways in which intervention programmes have approached the problem and their effectiveness.