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ERIC Number: EJ1051433
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2015
Pages: 15
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-1750-8487
EISSN: N/A
"Knowledge Is Power"? A Lacanian Entanglement with Political Ideology in Education
Clarke, Matthew
Critical Studies in Education, v56 n1 p71-85 2015
This paper explores the possibilities for critical policy analysis afforded by Lacanian discourse theory, with its emphasis on the unconscious and the agency of the letter, and considers its significance for critical policy analysis in education, in ways that complement and supplement the insights of post-structuralist discourse theory. To explore these possibilities, the paper examines the fantasies residing in neoliberal education policy's vision of the knowledge economy, before focusing on a Lacanian analysis of the ideologies of knowledge and power manifested in the US KIPP (Knowledge is Power) charter school network, in order to think about how neoliberalism's obsession with knowledge as control and mastery might be unsettled by what Lacan called "the sublimity of stupidity"--by engagement with a psychoanalytic epistemology that recognizes how conscious knowledge may be interrupted by the unknowing of the unconscious and that places neoliberal regimes of knowledge in a dialectical relationship with non-knowledge, ignorance, stupidity and desire.
Routledge. Available from: Taylor & Francis, Ltd. 325 Chestnut Street Suite 800, Philadelphia, PA 19106. Tel: 800-354-1420; Fax: 215-625-2940; Web site: http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals
Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Evaluative
Education Level: N/A
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A