Hegemonic and Marginalised Educational Utopias in the Contemporary Western World

Abstract

This article discusses whether utopian thinking in education has really disappeared, as is often argued. The argument is here made that while overtly utopian thinking has lost its legitimacy among social sciences and education theorists and practitioners, the influence of various utopian discourses on educational policies and practices remains strong. The first part of this article contextualises the present state of utopian thinking by overviewing its historical development. The second part discusses this in the context of education. The third part raises the issue of hegemonic utopias that present as 'realist' discourses about the future. The fourth section brings into discussion marginalised utopias, and asks the question if there are any spaces left for utopias that most deeply challenge patriarchal and Western assumptions about what constitutes knowledge, history, future and ideal education. The article concludes by arguing that all 'regimes of educational truths' whether labelled 'realistic' or 'utopian' draw their inspiration from a particular image of the future, an image that always includes at least some elements of the utopian.

Storytelling in troubled times: what is the role for educators in the deep crises of the 21st century?

“…At a scholarly level, it is between education understood as ‘reproduction’ or as ‘prefigurative practice’ – debates that oppose competing visions of how futures are and should be produced in and through education. Throughout this, there is a deeply Utopian impulse that threads itself through educational thinking and drives educational reforming zeal from politicians to educators to parents (Halpin, ; Lewis, ; Milojevic, ; Webb, ).…”

Thinking about Higher Education

“…Academic reality is, for its managerial designers and visionaries, an accomplished utopia, a further change of which, other than minor refinements, would be only for the worse. Thus, the fact that, as Barnett argues, utopian thinking about higher education is rather thin on the ground indirectly proves, in my view, the extent of the 'repressed utopianism' or 'crypto-utopianism' [both terms borrowed from Olssen (2003) and Milojevic (2003) respectively to signify unacknowledged though operative utopianism] that works underneath neo-liberal and managerial anti-utopianism.…”

Invoking spirits in the material world: Spiritualism, surrealism, and spirituality at work

“…The development also represents a shift away from a discourse of utopianism and social reform towards what Jacques (2002) terms crypto-utopia -a discourse within which utopian ideals reside but are concealed. While cryptoutopianism purports to communicate the truth about the future, Milojevic (2003) argues, "such realistic futures also subtly promote implicit assumptions about the nature of future society (high tech, globalised) and impose these views on other future discourses. All other discourses about the future are made to adjust to and negotiate with these, arguably, most-likely futures (p. 446).…”