Girls' Education in the Developing World

The education of girls in the Global South has been championed as a hopeful solution for unlocking economic and social transformation within international development discourse. Marginalized adolescent girls have been constructed in complex and contradictory ways—portrayed at once as imperiled and vulnerable, yet also aspirational and hopeful. This article sheds light on key literature that critically examines and importantly unsettles common framings and understandings of girlhoods and girls’ education. For instance, several scholars trace the imperial, colonial, and neoliberal tropes that proliferate throughout representations in girls’ education campaigns, past and present. A great deal of scholarship has traced the incredibly persistent framings of girls in crisis—as victims of cultural and sexual oppression and in need of external salvation through educative missions. On the other hand, feminist scholars have also cast a critical eye on commonsense representations of girls’ agency and empowerment, which often position privileged girls as empowered feminist saviors. Critical literature within the field illuminates how commonsense girls’ education ideals often flatten the peculiarities and unequal relations of power and difference that girls’ lives are situated within, depoliticizing calls for girls’ education. Meanwhile, recent philanthropic and corporate efforts to promote girls’ education are also increasingly framed in terms of neoliberal business and market rationalities that idealize girls’ economic potential as human capital investments. Responding to and resisting these challenging stereotypes, critical gender and education scholars demonstrate how particular ideas of educated girlhoods are deeply animated by particular desires and attachments informed by cultural, historical, and sociopolitical contexts. Collectively, these authors shed light on the nuances, ambiguities, and contradictions of girls’ lived experiences. Girls navigate their precarious and uncertain lives within and beyond schooling and contest and negotiate the overdetermined discourses that surround them. This article is organized thematically and covers both historical and contemporary scholarship surrounding girls’ education, informed by a wide range of disciplinary, theoretical, and methodological perspectives. Drawing connections between girl crises past and present, this collection of scholarship brings light to the anxieties, concerns, and hopes placed in educating girl.