TY - JOUR

T1 - Peter's positions: a diffractive analysis of authority in a year one classroom

AU - Leuschner, Hannes

N1 - Funding Information: ‘Materialität von Geschlecht und pädagogischer Autorität – Interferenzen von Körpern und Dingen in Bildungsinstitutionen’ funded by the Lower Saxony Ministry for Science and Culture (Germany). Project partners: Leuphana University Lüneburg, Hildesheim University, Braunschweig Technical University. The project compared the interferences between gender, matter and pedagogical authority in primary and secondary schools and engineering studies at College and University in Lower Saxony from 2017 to 2020. Funding Information: This work was supported by the Niedersächsisches Ministerium für Wissenschaft und Kultur (Lower Saxony Ministry for Science and Culture, Germany). Publisher Copyright: © 2021 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.

PY - 2021/10/2

Y1 - 2021/10/2

N2 - This article presents an ethnography of the entanglement of space, learning and teaching bodies and pedagogical authority in a primary school in Germany. We focus on the spatial placement of a boy diagnosed with ‘special needs’. Inspired by Carol Taylor’s analysis of a male teacher’s authority at a college. we describe the boy’s changeable seating position first with de Certeau’s spatial understanding of power relations and then with Barad’s agential realism. By conducting this ‘diffractive’ analysis of his performances, we can show how he is subjected to the teacher’s authority and has a remarkable authoritative power himself at the same time. Finally, by focussing on the relationship between the researcher and the boy, we discuss the process of data gathering as it is entangled with the interpretation of data.

AB - This article presents an ethnography of the entanglement of space, learning and teaching bodies and pedagogical authority in a primary school in Germany. We focus on the spatial placement of a boy diagnosed with ‘special needs’. Inspired by Carol Taylor’s analysis of a male teacher’s authority at a college. we describe the boy’s changeable seating position first with de Certeau’s spatial understanding of power relations and then with Barad’s agential realism. By conducting this ‘diffractive’ analysis of his performances, we can show how he is subjected to the teacher’s authority and has a remarkable authoritative power himself at the same time. Finally, by focussing on the relationship between the researcher and the boy, we discuss the process of data gathering as it is entangled with the interpretation of data.

KW - Agential realism

KW - bodies and space

KW - diffractive approach

KW - posthuman performativity

KW - pedagogical authority

KW - Educational science

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85111662028&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1080/17457823.2021.1952638

DO - 10.1080/17457823.2021.1952638

M3 - Journal articles

VL - 16

SP - 475

EP - 490

JO - Ethnography and Education

JF - Ethnography and Education

SN - 1745-7823

IS - 4

ER -