Aislinn O'Donnell

Securitisation, Counterterrorism and the Silencing of Dissent: The Educational Implications of Prevent

Abstract This paper outlines some of the implications of counterterrorist legislation, including Prevent, for the pedagogical relationship and for educational institutions. The concept of ‘radicalisation’, central to the Prevent Strategy, is one that is contested in the field of counterterrorism, yet educators are now expected to identify and refer students ‘at risk of radicalisation’. Such students are described as vulnerable throughout the policy documentation; however, the way in which vulnerability is conceptualised is resonant with colonial discourses of contagion and immunity, and it risks silencing and even pathologising the person labelled vulnerable. Prevent does not clearly define central concepts such as extremism, radicalisation, vulnerability, and this may make both students and staff fearful speaking freely in classrooms and lecture halls. Based on the experience of teaching IRA and INLA prisoners in the Republic of Ireland, the author outlines a set of philosophical and ethical principles that ought to underpin education. It is argued that education must not be subordinated to security and intelligence agendas on pragmatic, educational and ethical grounds.

Contemplative Pedagogy and Mindfulness: Developing Creative Attention in an Age of Distraction

Over the last decade, there has been a considerable expansion of mindfulness programmes into a number of different domains of contemporary life, such as corporations, schools, hospitals and even the military. Understanding the reasons for this phenomenon involves, I argue, reflecting upon the nature of contemporary capitalism and mapping the complexity of navigating new digital technologies that make multiple and accelerated solicitations upon attention and our affective lives. Whilst acknowledging the benefits of mindfulness practice, this article argues that it is equally important to attend to the ethical framework that gives orientation to these practices and the outer conditions that shape lived daily experience, such as school or work environments. I suggest that the well-meaning efforts to secularise mindfulness, provide scientific evidence for its effectiveness, and introduce it to wider publics may have served to impoverish the rich contribution that practices of mindfulness, situated within a broader ethical framework, can make to human lives, and arguably contribute to the educational endeavour. For example, the emphasis on transforming inner conditions of students’ lives can lead to the neglect of outer conditions, such as structural inequality, or unhealthy and exploitative work practices. This can result in practices that privilege individual wellbeing over compassion and concern for the happiness of others, providing a buffer against loving attention to the world and others. Instead, I ask how mindfulness in educational settings could come to be viewed in a different light if we reflect upon the ways in which school environments and curricula can promote mindfulness, awareness, sensitive inquiry, and contemplative practices through the day, rather than offering it as a discrete intervention focused on the self and wellbeing.

Contagious ideas: vulnerability, epistemic injustice and counter-terrorism in education

Abstract The article addresses the implications of Prevent and Channel for epistemic justice. The first section outlines the background of Prevent. It draws upon Moira Gatens and Genevieve Lloyd’s concept of the collective imaginary, alongside Lorraine Code’s concept of epistemologies of mastery, in order to outline some of the images and imaginaries that inform and orient contemporary counter-terrorist preventative initiatives, in particular those affecting education. Of interest here is the way in which vulnerability (to radicalisation) is conceptualised in Prevent and Channel, in particular the way in which those deemed ‘at risk of radicalisation’ are constituted as vulnerable and requiring intervention. The imaginary underpinning such preventative initiatives is, I argue, a therapeutic/epidemiological one. If attention is paid to the language associated with these interventions, one finds reference to terms such as contagion, immunity, resilience, grooming, virus, susceptibility, therapy, autonomy, vulnerability and risk—a constellation of images/concepts resonant with therapeutic and epidemiological theories and practices. I outline some of the implications of this therapeutic/epidemiological imaginary for epistemic injustice. If people, in this case, students, teachers and parents, feel that their voice will not be given credence, this leads to testimonial injustice. If one group is constituted as a suspect community, this risks hermeneutical injustice for that group—a situation facing Muslims at present. Given the requirements for educators and educational institutions to enact this particular iteration of preventative counter-terrorist legislation, the way in which vulnerability (to radicalisation) is understood and operationalised has direct bearing upon education and the educational experience of all stakeholders, in particular in relation to the conditions for epistemic justice.

Shifting education's philosophical imaginaries: relations, affects, bodies, materialities

As Michele Le Doeuff pointed out in her classic feminist work, The Philosophical Imaginary, images function in philosophical writing to enact certain political and theoretical possibilities and limitations. She draws our attention to the relationship between images and concepts throughout the history of philosophy, and philosophy’s forgetting and occlusion of its own imaginaries. We wonder with Le Doeuff about the image that philosophy gives to itself of what it is to do philosophy. So too we wonder about the images that orient and inflect both educational practice and research. What images do educational researchers give to themselves of education, the practice of education and of research in education? This issue examines the ways in which diverse educational imaginaries operate. It thinks from and with recent feminist work in both philosophy and education.

Thinking-in-concert

In this essay, I examine the concept of thinking in Hannah Arendts writings. Arendts interest in the experience of thinking allowed her to develop a concept of thinking that is distinct from other forms of mental activity such as cognition and problem solving. For her, thinking is an unending, unpredictable and destructive activity without fixed outcomes. Her understanding of thinking is distinguished from other approaches to thinking that equate it with, for example, problem solving or knowledge. Examples of a ‘problem-solving’, skills-based approach to thinking that place a premium on behavioural change are drawn from the context of the prison. I offer an alternative example of thinking with others from my philosophy classes in the prison. I draw upon Arendts insights to develop a concept of ‘thinking-in-concert’. Whilst Arendt believes that thinking must be a solitary activity, I argue that the concept of ‘thinking-in-concert’ helps to capture experiences of thinking with others in a manner that is more hesitant and provisional than some descriptions of communities of enquiry or democratic education. The embodied presence of others matters when ‘thinking-in-concert’. I describe this approach as educational as well as conversational. This helps to communicate the way in which we turn towards others and may be pulled up short by them as we strive to think together or experience moments of conversion or insight whilst enjoying the ordinary activity of talking with others. This concept may help us to understand the difference between the experience of thinking, teaching and learning when we are physically present to one another and the experience of virtual learning or teaching.