Drawing on positioning theory, the authors explore how discourses of manipulation in everyday debates and research literature contribute to what Cook (2017) has termed "the moral project of childhood". The analysis shows that children are positioned in these discourses either as incompetent, powerless victims or as powerful, egoistic or psychopathological agents, and moreover that these discourses unreflexively build upon and reinstate pre-sociological Dionysian and Apollonian views on childhood, and a taken-for-granted generational order in which adults hold power over children.

Denne artikel beskæftiger sig med rollespil som en læringsteknologi. Artiklen stiller skarpt på rollespil som en nuanceret styring, der søger at fremme en særlig adfærd. Der argumenteres for, at rollespillet er et eksempel på en strategisk praksis, der fungerer ved at inddrage de lærende i påvirkningen af sig selv og hinanden. Gennem et feltstudie af et træningsforløb for forældre med udadreagerende børn er rollespil som læringsteknologi undersøgt. Med et foucaultiansk magtperspektiv belyses de specifikke teknikker, der gør rollespillet til en legende praksis, for siden at tillægge det en anden alvor. Artiklen viser, hvordan rollespillet tager form i samspillet mellem instruktører og forældre og viser sig virksomt ved at inkludere forældrene i udførelsen og omdirigere deres modstand. ENGELSK ABSTRACT: Lotte Galløe: Imaginary Real Life. The Governed Learning of Role Playing This paper examines role-playing as a learning technology. It focuses on role-playing, as employed in the social services, as an advanced form of governance aiming to produce a certain behavior on the part of the learners. Based on an ethnographic interpretation of Michel Foucault’s notion of power, the paper sheds light on role-playing in practice in Parent Management Training (PMTO) group sessions. Role-playing in PMTO exemplifies the use of particular techniques that shape role-playing as an imaginary game, and simultaneously ascribes it significance in real life. The article argues that role-playing’s apparent non-serious approach enables a strategic practice engaging the learners in the governing actions targeted towards shaping them as subjects. The paper shows how the techniques of enactment, instruction, and evaluation unfold by involving the parents in the performance. Finally the paper shows how resistance is rejected or adapted within the governing practice. Keywords: role-play, Foucault, governance, PMTO, learning.