Dissemination of Ideology through Textbooks: A critical analysis of Pakistan Studies for the undergraduates

Author(s) : Tazanfal Tehseem

Abstract:

Any program of education, for school or college, university or training centre can never be considered wholly objective. It is an essential product of certain choices made by those in-charge(s) of selecting what knowledge and skill should be taught to the learners.
Therefore, the curriculum at any educational level is based on certain values and biases which reflect the views and beliefs of those who have designed and constructed it. Thus the learners’ extensive exposure to such a curriculum and other learning material over the years serves as the powerful means of indoctrinating them with specific ideological biases.
The role of textbooks in any educational program is highly important; they expose the learner to specific, socio-cultural, national and moral aspects. Generally, those are opinion-molding texts rather than purely knowledge based texts for they define the world, pass judgments upon it and frame our attitudes towards it. The present study based on the qualitative approach is concerned with the dissemination of ideology through textbooks. The selected textbooks have been analyzed manually on the paradigm of content analysis and the conclusion is drawn by keeping in view the socio-political and socio-cultural norms of the Pakistani society in which they operate.