michalinos zembylas

Internationally there has been some interest in how critical pedagogies might be enabled in higher education to support transformative social agendas. Few writers, however, have theorised the ethico-political aspects of this effort from a feminist new materialist perspective. By focusing on the analysis of an inter-institutional collaborative course which was constructed across three disciplines and two differently positioned universities in Cape Town, South Africa, this paper examines the design of the course retrospectively from a feminist new materialist theoretical framing. In so doing, it moves beyond more traditional understandings of critical pedagogy to consider the design and student engagement with the course from the perspective of what we call " response-able pedagogies. " Response-able pedagogies are not simply examples of the type of learning that can take place when power relations, materiality and entanglement are acknowledged; they also constitute ethico-political practices that incorporate a relational ontology into teaching and learning activities. We propose that ethico-political practices such as attentiveness, responsibility, curiosity, and rendering each other capable, constitute reponse-able pedagogies. The paper focuses on the transdisciplinary and interinstitutional course to consider how these ethico-political practices which constitute a response-able pedagogy might (be put to) work and how the students were both enabled and constrained by this design in terms of their responses to such ethico-political practices.

Internationally, an interest is emerging in a growing body of work on what has become known as ‘diffractive methodologies’ drawing attention to ontological aspects of research. Diffractive methodologies have largely been developed in response to a dissatisfaction with practices of ‘reflexivity’, which are seen to be grounded in a representational paradigm and the epistemological aspects of research. While work on ‘reflexivity’ and ‘critical reflection’ has over the years become predominant in educational and social science research methodology literature, our reading indicates that there is still important conceptual work to be done putting these two practices--reflection and diffraction--in conversation with each other and exploring their continuities and breaks as well as examining the consequences for research methodologies in education. This article raises important questions about how the concepts of diffraction and reflection are defined and understood and discusses the methodological implications for educational research.

ABSTRACT
Spiritual leadership gains attention amongst researchers for closing the gap between achieving personal and organisational goals. Despite documentations that spirituality undergirds head teacher’s actions leading inclusive schools, research still remains thin in understanding how spirituality underpins leadership for inclusive education. This paper draws on the philosophy of critical realism to
offer a conceptual tool that identifies head teachers’ spiritual actions in their efforts to include ethnic minority students. This is done through multiple qualitative methods collection from an indepth
case study at a multicultural primary school in Cyprus. The critical realist framework helps uncover head teacher’s spiritual actions in a more systematic, structured and holistic way. It reveals that head teachers’ spirituality supports the goals of inclusion and
occurs in at least four interrelated and emergent ontological levels (psychological, social, cultural and policy levels) which are set in four scaler levels from microscopic to macroscopic (sub-individual,
micro, meso and macro levels). This framework problematises mono-dimensional and reductionist understandings of spirituality in leadership. The paper concludes by suggesting solutions to enrich leadership programmes for inclusive education with fostering leaders’ spirituality at different ontological levels.

Bekerman and Zembylas provide an ethnographic description of classroom events which bring to the surface the pedagogical challenges of finding ways that talk about social remembering and rival histories without putting aside " individual " memory or presenting it as less important than collective memory. The data comes from their extensive ethnographic research project in multicultural schools in Cyprus and bilingual integrated schools in Israel where correspondingly Turkish and Greek Cypriots and Palestinian and Jewish Israelis learn together. These events show the complexities in teachers' and students' efforts to negotiate individual memory and collective narratives, and more particularly the limits and possibilities of teachers in conflict-affected societies to engage with rival histories in integrated settings. Bio Notes Zvi Bekerman, Ph.D. teaches anthropology of education at the School of Education and The Melton Center, Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He is also a faculty member with the Mandel Leadership Institute. His interests lie in human learning processes, their development, and practice, both in formal/informal and real/virtual environments; processes which, from the socio-historical perspectives within which he has been raised, comprise a large portion of human activity. More specifically he studies cultural, ethnic and national identity, including identity processes and negotiation during intercultural encounters and in formal/informal learning contexts. He is further interested in how concepts such as culture and identity intersect with issues of social justice, intercultural and peace education, and citizenship education. He has published numerous papers in these fields of study and is the funding 1 This chapter is an extended and revised version of chapter 6 in our book entitled Teaching contested narratives: Identity, memory and reconciliation in peace education and beyond (Cambridge University Press, 2012).

Background/Context: Emotions often accompany discussions of ethnic matters, yet there
have been few sustained investigations in education of how, and with what implications,
emotional responses are (de)legitimized in the classroom, especially when conflicting historical
narratives are involved. Emotions have remained in the margins of educational research
about the ways in which historical narratives are dealt with in schools, or at best, they are
regarded as epiphenomena rather than constitutive components in teaching practice.
Purpose/Objective/Research Question/Focus of Study: The main objective of this article is
to help us better understand how both emotions and historical narratives are constituted
and operate interactively at the level of both the individual and the social-political structures
within school and the wider society. The particular event on which we focus the present
analysis—a classroom activity on the death of Yasser Arafat—was chosen because it is representative
of multiple other events in which similar phenomena were identified. Its analysis
offers insights into how those involved in education (even in the context of integrated
schools) draw selectively from formal and informal sources to support their emotional identification
and sense of belonging within their particular political, national, and religious
communities.
Research Design: The events presented are based on rich data gathered from a long-
Teachers College Record Volume 113, Number 5, May 2011, pp. 1004–1030
Copyright © by Teachers College, Columbia University
0161-4681
Teaching Conflictual Historical Narratives 1005
standing ethnographic research effort in the context of the Palestinian-Jewish integrated
bilingual schools in Israel.
Conclusions/Recommendations: We highlight two main implications of the analysis developed
in this article. The first concerns the importance of teachers critically analyzing the
emotional discourses/practices through which historical narratives are authorized by,
implied by, and embodied in schools; this position also entails the recognition that such discourses/
practices have consequences for the ways in which affective spaces and communities
are constituted within the classroom and beyond. The second is that the findings of this
study concerning the teaching of controversial issues in the classroom suggest an imperative
need among teachers working with multiethnic children to increase their competence in dealing
with conflicting historical narratives at both the cognitive and emotional levels. This
competence can be partly developed through preservice and in-service teacher education that
pays attention to the emotional complexities of teaching conflicting historical narratives

Despite post-apartheid policy intentions to redress the effects of apartheid, inequalities in higher education have remained an endemic problem in South Africa, and continue to have a major influence on students and educators in South Africa. This has recently been foregrounded in student-led protests regarding equitable access to higher education (#FeesMustFall) and requests to decolonise the curriculum (#RhodesMustFall)— reigniting attention towards the enormous disparities that still exist in the South African education system generally, and which includes the higher education sector. Those institutions which were historically disadvantaged continue to struggle with paucity in terms of funding, geopolitical positioning, human and material resources. Student protest movements have resonated and reverberated across multiple higher education contexts internationally as well (for example at Oxford University, in the United Kingdom and the #StudentBlackOut demonstrations planned from Yale to University of Missouri in the United States). Conducting research into issues of social justice in relation to higher education pedagogical practices is thus of crucial importance in the present time and space, which remains plagued by issues of inequity. Although socially just pedagogies in and by themselves will not eradicate structural inequalities, they can make a contribution to recognising and critically interrogating the issues that perpetuate these injustices, exploring different ways of enacting pedagogies in higher education. Therefore, more research and scholarship is needed to enable

Internationally there has been some interest in how critical pedagogies might be enabled in higher education to support transformative social agendas. Few writers, however, have theorised the ethico-political aspects of this effort from a feminist new materialist perspective. By focusing on the analysis of an inter-institutional collaborative course which was constructed across three disciplines and two differently positioned universities in Cape Town, South Africa, this paper examines the design of the course retrospectively from a feminist new materialist theoretical framing. In so doing, it moves beyond more traditional understandings of critical pedagogy to consider the design and student engagement with the course from the perspective of what we call " response-able pedagogies. " Response-able pedagogies are not simply examples of the type of learning that can take place when power relations, materiality and entanglement are acknowledged; they also constitute ethico-political practices that incorporate a relational ontology into teaching and learning activities. We propose that ethico-political practices such as attentiveness, responsibility, curiosity, and rendering each other capable, constitute reponse-able pedagogies. The paper focuses on the transdisciplinary and interinstitutional course to consider how these ethico-political practices which constitute a response-able pedagogy might (be put to) work and how the students were both enabled and constrained by this design in terms of their responses to such ethico-political practices.

Our point of departure in this paper is the observation that in many secular societies—which may be so in variable degrees, especially in the West—as well as in societies emerging out of religious conflict, there may be the perception that educational systems ought to promote civic values while sidestepping religious or cultural values. This entanglement, in our view, presents a challenge that is deeply political, because effective participation in a society is directly relevant to ideals about equity, social justice, power relations, and the common good. We suggest that when religious and cultural affiliations are excluded from such ideals, this makes effective participation more possible or perhaps less so, especially for certain social groups such as minority and marginalized groups or groups that have been victimized in a conflict situations.

Published online: 22 December 2009 © Springer Science+Business Media BV 2009 ... The following colleagues have assisted in the reviewing of manuscripts during 2009. We greatly appreciate their contribution. ... Douglas Allchin Kay Alston Johannes Bellmann Joop Berding Gert Biesta Charles W. Bingham Steinar Bøyum Eric Bredo Roy Canning Vincent Colapietro David Coulter Craig Cunningham Andreas Fejes Lynn Fendler John Field. Ilan Gur Ze'ev John Halliday Mark Halstead David Hansen Sophie Haroutunian-Gordon ... Robert Durham Heslep Chris ...

Critical posthumanism, new/feminist materialisms and the affective turn have a great deal in common with each other, and can be seen as similar perspectives with slightly different emphases in each framework, all focusing on: relational ontologies; a critique of dualisms; and engagements with matter and the non-human. Feminist thinkers such as Rosi Braidotti, others, have been identified both as critical posthumanists and new/feminist materialists, and have also contributed to ideas about the affective turn. Many of these scholars have been influenced by the work of Deleuze and Guattari and their notions of monism and vitalism, and have moved beyond the centrality of discourse and cartesian dualisms to incorporate a vision of human/nonhuman, body/mind, subject/object, nature/culture, matter/ meaning, continuity/discontinuity, beginning/returning and creation/renewal (Barad 2007) in their work.

... και αυτό αναδεικνύεται και επιβεβαιώνεται από τις πολλές και διάσπαρτες επισημάνσεις αρκετών φοιτητών, τόσο στα μηνιαία ημερολόγια όσο ... Τα βιώματα της φοιτητικής ζωής με τη μέθοδο της εξ αποστάσεως εκπαίδευσης αποτελούν πλέον μια πραγματικότητα η οποία με γεμίζει με ...

The purpose of this article is to explore the meanings and implications of dangerous memories in two different sites of past traumatic memories: one in Israel and the other in Cyprus. Dangerous memories are defined as those memories that are disruptive to the status quo, that is, the hegemonic culture of strengthening and perpetuating existing group-based identities. Our effort is to outline some insights from this endeavor—insights that may help educators recognize the potential of dangerous memories to ease pain and offer hope. First, a discussion on memory, history and identity sets the ground for discussing the meaning and significance of dangerous memories in the history curriculum. Next, we narrate two stories from our longitudinal ethnographic studies on trauma and memory in Israel and Cyprus; these stories are interpreted through the lens of dangerous memories and their workings in relation to the hegemonic powers that aim to sustain collective memories. The two different stories suggest that collective memories of historical trauma are not simply “transmitted” in any simple way down the generations—although there are powerful workings that support this transmission. Rather, there seems to be much ambivalence in the workings of memories that under some circumstances may create openings for new identities. The final section discusses the possibilities of developing a pedagogy of dangerous memories by highlighting educational implications that focus on the notion of creating new solidarities without forgetting past traumas. This last section employs dangerous memories as a critical category for pedagogy in the context of our general concern about the implications of memory, history and identity in educational contexts.

a teaching and learning, university of Western cape, Bellville, South africa; b open university of cyprus, latsia, cyprus ABSTRACT Internationally, an interest is emerging in a growing body of work on what has become known as 'diffractive methodologies' drawing attention to ontological aspects of research. Diffractive methodologies have largely been developed in response to a dissatisfaction with practices of 'reflexivity' , which are seen to be grounded in a representational paradigm and the epistemological aspects of research. While work on 'reflexivity' and 'critical reflection' has over the years become predominant in educational and social science research methodology literature, our reading indicates that there is still important conceptual work to be done putting these two practices – reflection and diffraction – in conversation with each other and exploring their continuities and breaks as well as examining the consequences for research methodologies in education. This article raises important questions about how the concepts of diffraction and reflection are defined and understood and discusses the methodological implications for educational research.

... Responding to this lack of scholarly work, and following the recent attempt by the Greek-Cypriot educational system to introduce in schools reconciliatory ideas, this paper examines the various *Email: m.zembylas@ouc.ac.cy Page 2. 20 M. Zembylas et al. ...

Responding to human rights critiques, this article draws on some of the literature in the affective turn and posthumanism to critique the liberal framework as well as the moral superiority of humanism on which the human rights regime has been built. Both the affective turn and posthumanism – although not monolithic – are based on two important premises that favour an agonistic account of rights: the first is that human beings are regarded in social and relational rather than in atomistic terms or as individuals without connections. Secondly, a reading of human rights through perspectives of the affective turn and posthumanism highlights a critical posthumanist engagement with human rights, conducted in the name of an unfinished and ambiguous humanity connected to other sentient beings and the environment, rather than a singular or absolute political identity of humanity. This reading recognises the social, economic and political consequences of human rights and thus their potential to upset the dominant social, economic and political order, rather than accepting human rights as universal norms of social life while ignoring the ideological frame in which they are exercised.

ABSTRACT This paper investigates the interference of local politics with a peace education initiative in Greek-Cypriot education and the consequent impact on teachers’ perceptions and responses. Focusing on a recent educational attempt to promote ‘peaceful coexistence’, the authors explain how this attempt was seen by many teachers as being a part of a local leftist agenda and was therefore often rejected. When though the same initiative was positioned – through a series of teacher training seminars organised by the authors – within the global field of ‘peace education’, and was grounded in humanistic ideals, the teachers appeared much more comfortable to engage with it. Taking the local political complexities into consideration, the authors argue that despite the existing thorough critiques of the humanistic discourse of peace education, a seemingly ‘neutral’ humanistic discourse of peace education can be legitimised on the basis of two arguments: first, a humanistic discourse could serve as an entry point for talking about ‘peaceful coexistence’ in schools and second, it might offer a way to overcome the strong political connotations that these concepts appear to have locally.

In this chapter we examine the perceptions and emotions of Greek-Cypriot teachers regarding a recent governmental initiative that defined the development of “a culture of peaceful coexistence” between Greek-Cypriots and Turkish-Cypriots as a central educational objective of the 2008-2009 school year (Ministry of Education and Culture, 2008a, p. 1).

Fearful symmetry: Palestinian and Jewish teachers confront contested narratives in integrated bilingual education
Zvi Bekerman , Michalinos Zembylas
Keywords:
Historical narratives
Collective memory
Multicultural education
Bilingual education
Cross-cultural dialogue
Reconcilation
Teacher training
a b s t r a c t
The present paper deals with Jewish and Palestinian teachers who work in an integrated school in Israel, and shows the challenges and possibilities from examining these teachers’ powerful historical narratives in the context of in-service training sessions. It is shown how these teachers essentially remain firmly rooted in the hegemonic historical narratives of their own community, even when their attitudes are
challenged and clearer alternatives are considered to the reigning narratives. The findings highlight predominantly the failures in terms of the potential of educational efforts to help overcome situations of intractable conflict even within contexts specifically devised for this purpose; yet, also some openings
become apparent in the process of negotiating competing narratives and inventing new dialogic possibilities. The implications of this work suggest that schools and their historical tradition are difficult places to reach change or produce itdeven in integrated schools in which partial structural change takes placedand teacher training may not always be the answer for the need to bring changes. However, it is also indicated that an ongoing agonistics of raising critical issues regarding one’s identifications with hegemonic narratives does offer openings to take responsibility for both the challenges and the dialogic possibilities that are created in the process.
 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

In this article, we present vignettes from two projects - one in Cyprus and the other in South Africa - to show how some classrooms enact heterotopic affective spaces that oppose normal/ized identities, that is, identities grounded in polarized trauma narratives. The notion of ...

The present paper deals with epistemological and methodological issues as these touch upon the products of educational practices related to the teaching of historical narratives in settings purposely created to facilitate dialogue, inclusion and recognition among children thought to be belonging in clearly differentiated and antagonistic groups in a conflict-ridden area – i.e. Israeli Jews and Palestinians, and Greek and Turkish Cypriots. It offers an overview of the sociopolitical and educational contexts the authors have studied and vignettes of some of the events that captured their attention and led them to critically approach present theorising on peace and multicultural education. It finalizes with reflections on the epistemological and methodological issues the authors encountered in their studies.

In this interview Megan Boler discusses with Michalinos Zembylas her work during the 1980s and 1990s on " feminist politics of emotion ". A feminist politics of emotion is historically grounded in the popular slogan of second wave feminism, the " personal is political ". This shift to understanding emotions as collectively and socially produced and constructed rather than as private and individualized experiences represented a radical shift in theory and praxis concerning emotions and education. A feminist politics of emotion encourages scholars to analyze and understand the role of emotions in epistemology, ethics, cultural values and beliefs, and in the construction of social relations and hierarchies. The interview highlights the often overlooked histories of feminist pedagogies as a development from the second wave of feminism, and their pioneering attention to the role of emotions in education, learning, and knowledge production. This approach is contrasted with more recent theorizing of 'affect', that draws on Spinoza and continues to develop in the work on what is presently termed " new materialism " .

This paper investigates the interference of local politics with a peace education initiative in Greek-Cypriot education and the consequent impact on teachers’ perceptions and responses. Focusing on a recent educational attempt to promote ‘peaceful coexistence’, the authors explain how this attempt was seen by many teachers as being a part of a local leftist agenda and was therefore often rejected. When though the same initiative was positioned – through a series of teacher training seminars organised by the authors – within the global field of ‘peace education’, and was grounded in humanistic ideals, the teachers appeared much more comfortable to engage with it. Taking the local political complexities into consideration, the authors argue that despite the existing thorough critiques of the humanistic discourse of peace education, a seemingly ‘neutral’ humanistic discourse of peace education can be legitimised on the basis of two arguments: first, a humanistic discourse could serve as an entry point for talking about ‘peaceful coexistence’ in schools and second, it might offer a way to overcome the strong political connotations that these concepts appear to have locally.

This paper presents an exploratory case study of the dynamics of the entanglement between emotion and memory in the context of a teacher's pedagogical practices in a conflict-troubled society. The theoretical concept of emotional styles is used analytically to demonstrate how emotions and memory are intertwined and political. The analysis shows the ways in which emotional styles enable or discourage certain representations of the past. Also, it is shown how individual emotional experiences are connected with larger historical, political and social discourses. The implications of the concept of emotional styles are discussed in the context of teacher pedagogies.

This paper looks at teachers' interpretations of a recent and controversial Greek–Cypriot policy initiative, which aimed to promote ‘peaceful coexistence’ between the two rival communities in conflict-ridden Cyprus. Specifically, it focuses on the ways in which Greek–Cypriot teachers constructed the relation between the new policy for peaceful coexistence between Greek-Cypriots and Turkish-Cypriots with the long established but rather conflicting policy of ‘I don't forget and I struggle’. The study analyses a set of 40 interviews conducted a few months after the first introduction of the new policy and maps teachers’ interpretations using the analytical concept of interpretative repertoires. Despite the poor implementation of the new initiative in practice, the study argues that the introduction of the new policy has brought about discernible discursive shifts in some teachers’ perceptions of the older policy of ‘I don't forget’.

... Drawing primarily on the work of the late philosopher, Robert Solomon, he then describes the appraisal theory of the emotions that ground ... Thomas Goetz, Elizabeth J. Stephens and Barbara Jacob; Susan Lasky and Eileen Estes; Jerry Rosiek and Ronald A. Beghetto; and, Paul ...

In this chapter we examine the perceptions and emotions of Greek-Cypriot teachers regarding a recent governmental initiative that defined the development of “a culture of peaceful coexistence” between Greek-Cypriots and Turkish-Cypriots as a central educational objective of the 2008-2009 school year (Ministry of Education and Culture, 2008a, p. 1).

A groundbreaking collection of scholarly research that views human rights, democracy and citizenship education as a critical project. Critical Human Rights, Citizenship, and Democracy Education presents new scholarly research that views human rights, democracy and citizenship education as a critical project. Written by an international line-up of contributors including academics from Canada, Cyprus, Ireland, South Africa, Sweden, the UK and the USA, this book provides a cross-section of theoretical work as well as case studies on the challenges and possibilities of bringing together notions of human rights, democracy and citizenship in education. The contributors cultivate a critical view of human rights, democracy and citizenship and revisit these categories to advance socially just educational praxis and highlight groundbreaking case studies that redefine the purposes and approaches in education for a better alignment with the justice-oriented objectives of human rights, democracy and citizenship education. A critical response, reflecting on the issues raised throughout the book, provides a conclusion. This is essential reading for those researching these pedagogical forms and will be valuable to practitioners and activists in fields as diverse as education, law, sociology, health sciences and social work and international development.

This book explores how psychologized language has come to dominate education and schooling. Taking a critical lens to some major constructs in education—e.g. the mind, the self, identity, emotion, emotional intelligence, motivation, culture, language and meaning—and their grounding in psychologized discourses, the authors suggest possible ways to overcome these psychologized discourses and remedy their consequences. The book invites readers to move away from static, reified conceptualizations to a more active, social understanding of what education is all about.

Teaching Contested Narratives

Identity, Memory and Reconciliation in Peace Education and Beyond

Zvi Bekerman, Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Michalinos Zembylas, Open University of Cyprus

Hardback

ISBN:9780521766890
272pages
Dimensions: 228 x 152 mm
Weight: 0.55kg


Not yet published - available from December 2011

$90.00 (C)

In troubled societies narratives about the past tend to be partial and explain a conflict from narrow perspectives that justify the national self and condemn, exclude and devalue the 'enemy' and their narrative. Through a detailed analysis, Teaching Contested Narratives reveals the works of identity, historical narratives and memory as these are enacted in classroom dialogues, canonical texts and school ceremonies. Presenting ethnographic data from local contexts in Cyprus and Israel, and demonstrating the relevance to educational settings in countries which suffer from conflicts all over the world, the authors explore the challenges of teaching narratives about the past in such societies, discuss how historical trauma and suffering are dealt with in the context of teaching, and highlight the potential of pedagogical interventions for reconciliation. The book shows how the notions of identity, memory and reconciliation can perpetuate or challenge attachments to essentialized ideas about peace and conflict.


Table of Contents


Part I. Introduction and Theoretical Underpinnings: 1. Introduction
2. Problematizing peace education romanticism
3. On conflict, identity and more
Part II. Living and Teaching Contested Narratives: 4. Victims and perpetrators: how teachers live with contested narratives
5. (Im)possible openings
6. The everyday challenges of teaching children from conflicting groups
7. The emotional complexities of teaching contested narratives
Part III. Mourning, Forgiveness and Reconciliation: Problems and Possible Solutions: 8. The nationalization of mourning in troubled societies
9. The work of mourning in schools: ambivalent emotions and the risks of seeking mutual respect and understanding
10. Forgiveness as a possible path towards reconciliation
Part IV. Conclusions: Implications for Peace Education: 11. Becoming critical design experts in schools
12. Memory and forgetting: a pedagogy of dangerous memories
13. De-essentializing identity
14. Designing different paths for reconciliation pedagogies.