The role of history of education as an organizational framework for educational knowledge has been pivotal in the creation and diffusion of educational knowledge. However, there remains a gap in empirical research concerning the semantic structure of history of education knowledge and its transnational transmission. This study addresses this gap by employing complex network science and natural language processing techniques to construct semantic networks for history of education textbooks in German and Chinese. The goal is to explore the early development of the discourse system within the field of "history of education" and investigate the aspects of stability and variability in the process of transnational transmission. To achieve this, a comprehensive collection of 125 history of education textbooks published in Germany from 1794 to 1933 and 59 history of education textbooks published in China from 1901 to 1948 was systematically compiled. Subsequently, a computer-processable full-text corpus with a total word count of approximately 25.8 million was created through optical character recognition. The study utilizes distribution-based semantic proximity metrics to reconstruct the semantic networks between high-frequency words in the two corpora. The results indicate that the semantic networks of both German and Chinese history of education textbooks exhibit similar overall topological structures, comprising around six interrelated conceptual core categories. For instance, German history of education textbooks encompass key categories, including the institutional foundation of education centered around "school and teacher," family education with "child and parent" as the core, curriculum and teaching emphasizing "student and teaching," philosophical and religious category focusing on "human and spirit," and a category labeled "educational theory," with "education and pedagogy" at its core. These categories are intricately linked by historical elements at the heart of the network, establishing the foundational discourse system in German history of education textbooks. Remarkably, this methodology unveils connections between categories, challenging preconceived notions present in German history of education. Notably, terms like Bildung and Pädagogik, traditionally emblematic of German pedagogy, do not hold a central position in the network. Further comparative analysis reveals an isomorphism between the semantic categories of Chinese and German history of education textbooks, with differences in local topological structures, such as historical categories not occupying a central position but being connected to specific semantic categories. Additionally, China's distinctive educational institutions, figures, and ideas are embedded in specific positions in the network. In the next phase, the study plans to introduce time and social dimensions to examine the dynamic mechanisms of knowledge structure replacement in history of education textbooks, along with the social background (or institutional conditions) of history of education knowledge producers. The methodological framework proposed by this study offers a new approach for researching discourse systems in pedagogy from a comparative perspective.

In the first half of the nineteenth century, under the influence of the Enlightenment, the Scientific Revolution and the Industrial Revolution, a trend of diffusion of useful knowledge from the elite group of intellectuals to the lower classes began in England, where the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge was founded in London in 1826. The purpose of the society was to diffuse knowledge by means of inexpensive publications and the organization of lectures. Meanwhile, with Britain's overseas colonial expansion, missionaries and merchants went to other countries and also began to establish branches of the SDUK one after another, including the Americas, India, China, and other places. Through the establishment of branches of SDUK in various countries, the useful knowledge, science and civilization of the West were widely diffused throughout the world. In March 1834, Walter Henry Medhurst published an article "Spreading Knowledge in China" in the China Dairy, suggesting that the same organization be established in China, and on November 29, 1834, the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge in China (SDUKC) was formally established in Guangzhou. The members of the society came from Britain, Germany, the U.S., Spain, Sweden, Portugal, and many other Western countries. Among all the societies founded by foreigners in Guangzhou at that time, the SDUKC had the largest number of members and the widest coverage. When Britain launched the Opium War against China in 1840, most of the Society's members either marched off with the British army or were expelled from Guangzhou by the Qing government, the SDUKC lacked sponsorship, died out rapidly after 1840. Although the SDUKC existed for a very short period of time, it published monographs such as A Complete History of the World, Global Geography, Atlas of the World, and etc, as well as periodicals such as Eastern Western Monthly Magazine. The distribution scale of these books and periodicals was not only limited to Guangdong, but also extended to the whole country. Taking the SDUKC as the object of research, this study starts from the research perspective of transnational history, adopts the method of knowledge transfer, and carries out a content analysis of the main publications of the SDUKC, exploring how useful knowledge from the West spread to modern China through the SDUKC? What knowledge was disseminated by the SDUKC in this process? What are the ways, methods and means of knowledge dissemination, and how did knowledge dissemination in the early 19th century encounter cultural conflicts in the process of cross-cultural interaction? How did the SDUKC deal with different cultural perspectives on knowledge? What are the results of knowledge transfer? How do Chinese communities recognize Western useful knowledge? This study attempts to analyze the connection and entanglement between Chinese and Western societies during the cross-cultural dissemination of useful knowledge in the first half of the nineteenth century through the practical activities of SDUKC in disseminating useful knowledge in early modern China, and to reveal the relationship between the dissemination of useful knowledge and colonialism in the nineteenth century.

In recent years, the vibrant scientific field of the history of knowledge has seen an increasing turn to questions about the circulation of knowledge. While there is currently no »common understanding or definition of the concept«, the focus on knowledge circulation nevertheless appears to be »a promising trajectory for developing the history of knowledge« (Östling et al. 2018, 17), as knowledge and circulation are constitutively linked: Knowledge »responds to ›impulses‹ from other fields of knowledge from different social spaces [...], it is picked up again in other places and transformed in the process« (Sarasin 2011: 164). In this regard, empirical case studies help us to (preliminary) answer questions of what is circulating and to what extent knowledge is being transformed in the course of its movement or even circulation. This is where the planned talk comes in, that is based on an early research project between Argentinean and German historians of education: In 1961 the former German Olympic participant and official Carl Diem and his wife Liselott Diem, a physical education pedagogue, followed an invitation of the Argentinean government to advise the Argentine sports administration regarding the implementation of physical education in schools. In addition, they gave lectures and showed educational films in front of an audience that consisted mainly of physical [higher] educators and sports students. In a time of political instability and increasing debates about an ›Argentinian identity‹ there was a strong focus on reforming [higher] education, e. g. with the intention of establishing postgraduate courses in physical education in Argentina for the first time. Both, in La Plata (Argentina) and Cologne (Germany), we were able to trace various sources such as letters, lectures, and teaching materials, including written and audiovisual sources, that were used in Argentinean [higher] educational institutions. Based on these sources the planned talk addresses the question of how this empirical case can be understood as a circulation of knowledge in the context of body, education, and nation. Focusing on the transatlantic movement we want to ask what ›knowledge‹ was conveyed – particularly in connection with physical education and national identity. Through what materials was this ›knowledge‹ disseminated? Which actors and institutions were involved? And how was this ›knowledge‹ used – for example to develop local sports education? Particularly concerning the historical context between Latin America and Europe, which is characterised by [post]colonialism, we think that aspects of contested knowledge[s] will play a decisive role within the project. Nevertheless, we would like to use the exchange in the context of the SWG’s open section Exploring Histories of Knowledge to undertake the first steps in illuminating this [educational] exchange across the Atlantic Ocean as an empirical case of knowledge circulation within the field of the history of knowledge.

The paper utilises the Sociology of Knowledge Approach to Discourse (Keller, 2019) to explore the history of US economic education between 1945 and the 1980s. During this period, the discursive field of economic education was marked by internal competition and friction with adjacent areas of expertise. The paper examines the bodies of knowledge mobilised by different claim-makers in the discursive formation and historical trajectory of an educational project. Economic education involves the dissemination of knowledge about capitalist society. Unsurprisingly, initiatives in this field have frequently been coupled with endeavours of economic stakeholders, primarily corporate management, at political persuasion (Leccese, 2021). The early Cold War witnessed a surge in such activities (Fones-Wolf, 1994; 2000). Simultaneously, however, the vision of an economically-literate enlightenment emerged. Stemming from the diagnosis that "the great majority of current political issues hinge on questions of finance and economic policy" (Baker, 1950: 391), economic literacy was presented as an indispensable resource for enabling citizens to engage more intelligently in political decision-making (Williams, 1949). Embodied institutionally in the Joint Council on Economic Education, this vision inspired economics and education scholars to engage in curriculum development and the professionalisation of economics instruction in US high schools. What would later be called the economic education movement (Habib, 1964) sought to demarcate itself simultaneously from a) the knowledge production practices of corporate communications and advertising (Melby, 1950: 381), and b) established traditions of citizenship education. These traditions prioritized different stocks of knowledge, pertaining to national history, constitutional law, and moral instruction. Proponents of economic enlightenment shared a non-partisan ethos and a commitment to scientific objectivity (Hancock, 1950). From the 1970s onwards, however, shifts in political culture and the discourse of the social sciences contributed to weakening the tenability of these commitments. The Plausibilisation of Societal Influence on Education. Resonant with the spread of ‘neoliberal’ ideas, corporate interference in curriculum design increasingly came to be viewed as inherent to the (desirable) self-governance of civil society. Concomitantly, the notion that societal forces impact education transitioned from a tried-and-true heuristic device of critical education research to a mundane theorem. If all of this diminished the urgency of pursuing impartiality, the adoption of standpoint epistemologies in radical studies of education (Gottesmann, 2016) contributed to casting objectivity as such as a suspicious notion. Faith in the emancipatory potential of economic enlightenment waned. Paradigm Wars and Re-Ethicalisation. While progressive interventions shifted from minute curriculum design to advocating theoretical/disciplinary pluralism as a counterweight to the predominance of neoclassical economics, civic empowerment once again became primarily associated with the elevation of ethical literacy. Using monographic issues of pedagogical journals and 'popular economics' magazines devoted to economic education as privileged sources (JES, 1950; Challenge, 1964; PJE, 1980), episodes of knowledge conflicts over US economic education will be presented to highlight dimensions of historical continuity and change.