As a response to "Le Fils," a film directed by the Dardenne brothers, we explore the idea of speaking as an invitation and juxtapose it against ideas of speaking as a transactional, calculative, calibrated, activity. Speaking tends to be understood as a relatively straightforward matter: as a means of communication structured by such values as the…

Schools and classrooms, as well as the work place and the Internet, are considered today as learning "environments". People are regarded as learners and the main target of school education has become "learning" pupils and students how to learn. The roles of teachers and lecturers are redefined as instructors, designers of (powerful) learning…

The increasing emphasis on participation in education offers the starting point for this paper. Participation appears to be a strategic notion in a particular problematisation of education: this is installed through certain ways of speaking and writing (discourse) and through certain procedures, instruments and techniques that are proposed and…

This paper starts from a brief sketch of the classical figure of critical educational theory or science (Kritische Erziehungswissenshaft). Critical educational theory presents itself as the privileged guardian of the critical principle of education (Bildung) and its emancipatory promise. It involves the possibility of saying "I" in order to speak…