Opening discourses of citizenship education: a theorization with Foucault

Abstract

We argue two major difficulties in current discourses of citizenship education. The first is a relative masking of student discourses of citizenship, by positioning students as lacking citizenship and as outside the community that acts. The second is in failing to understand the discursive and material support for citizenship activity. We thus argue that it is not a lack of citizenship that education research might address, but identification and exploration of the different forms of citizenship that people already engage in. We offer a fragmentary, poststructuralist theorization oriented to explore the 'contemporary limits of the necessary', drawing on specific resources from the work of Michel Foucault and others for the constitution of local, partial accounts of citizenship discourses and activities, and exploration of their possibilities and constraints. We argue this as a significant tactic of theorization in support of an opening of discourses of citizenship and in avoiding the discursive difficulties that we have identified. Our theorization then is significant in its potential to unsettle discourses that confine contemporary thought regarding citizenship education, and support exploration of what might be excessive to that confinement.

Adult Education as a Heterotopia of Deviation

“…In this article, we draw on a poststructural theorization inspired by the work of Michel Foucault (Foucault, 2007;Foucault & Miskowiec, 1986) and education scholars who have developed and mobilized such a perspective (e.g., Fejes, 2006Fejes, , 2010Nicoll, Fejes, Olson, Dahlstedt, & Biesta, 2013;Olson, Fejes, Dahlstedt, & Nicoll, 2014;Simons & Masschelein, 2008). We specifically draw on the concept of heterotopia inspired by Foucault (Foucault & Miskowiec, 1986).…”

“…In order to analyze how adult education is shaped as a heterotopia of deviation, this article draws on data within a larger project on citizenship education within and beyond adult education (Nicoll et al, 2013;Olson et al, 2014;Rahm & Fejes, 2015). Students, teachers, as well as policy documents are all part in shaping discourses on adult education.…”

Citizenship discourses: production and curriculum

“…Student citizens do not act in a void, but draw on wider discourses and social and institutional provisions and material resources for them (Elm-Larsen, 2006;Nicoll et al, 2013;Olson, 2012c). There is an argument to be had that by incorporating wider understandings of citizenship into the curriculum it might be possible to capture the imagination and motivation of young people in education by drawing on their current engagement and interest (Biesta, Lawy & Kelly, 2009;Lawy & Biesta, 2006;Öhrn, Lundahl & Beach, 2011).…”

Adult education and publishing Canadian fiction in a global context: a Foucauldian analysis

“…Fiction provides a conduit for the circulation of ideas about citizenship--about identity, social issues, power struggles, and shifting discursive practices. Nicoll et al (2013), say citizenship:…”