1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910438227103321

Autore

Nissen Leslie B

Titolo

Curriculum and the life erratic : the geographic cure / / Leslie B. Nissen

Pubbl/distr/stampa

Rotterdam : , : Sense Publishers, , [2013]

©2013

ISBN

94-6209-362-8

Edizione

[1st ed. 2013.]

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (143 p.)

Collana

Transgressions : cultural studies and education

Disciplina

143

Soggetti

Children of alcoholics

Children of alcoholics - Education

Alcoholism - Social aspects

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Note generali

Description based upon print version of record.

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references.

Nota di contenuto

Preliminary Material -- Introduction: Curriculum and the Life Erratic -- The Confounded Life of an 80-Proof Home -- The Unhinged Lives of Kids on the Move -- Drinking and Driving (Away) -- “Hold Still” -- The Geographic Cure Writ Large -- References.

Sommario/riassunto

Curriculum and the Life Erratic: The Geographic Cure lays bare the untold damage done to children who are forced to endure the toxic combination of "fermented parenting" (as author Leslie Nissen has termed it) and frequent family moves at the hands of alcoholic parents who perpetually seek the elusive Geographic Cure. While such parents deceive themselves that in the next new place, sobriety will prevail, their children know better. Alcoholics who chronically uproot their families for a fresh start usually carry along every reason to drink. For the school-age children of such cure-seeking alcoholics, the torment of life with a volatile, unpredictable and chronically intoxicated parent is intensified by the anguish of being “the new kid” who changes schools at the whim of the parent. Highly mobile children, bearing an alarmingly long list of prior schools, may be part of a group which Nissen calls Geographic Cure Children, whose chances of finding help are nearly non-existent, despite their acute need for care. The dilemma of this unique subset of Children of Alcoholics is examined via autobiographical, psychoanalytic and fictional lenses. Nissen also



recounts her own urge to hit the road when diagnosed with cancer, and explores the Geographic Cure writ large, observing how the current “testing frenzy” and clamor for cures for low test scores dominate educational policy. Could teachers’ panic about accountability cause them to resent new students who appear at their classroom doors mid-year? Is education encumbered because, at the hands of policy-makers, educators are working the Life Erratic?