ERIC Number: EJ1134504
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2017
Pages: 10
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0013-1857
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Studying Like a Communist: Affect, the Party, and the Educational Limits to Capitalism
Ford, Derek R.
Educational Philosophy and Theory, v49 n5 p452-461 2017
In an effort to theorize educational logics that are oppositional to capitalism, this article explores what it means to study like a communist. I begin by drawing out the tight connection between learning and capitalism, demonstrating that education is not a subset but a motor of political-economic relations. Next, I turn to the concept of study, which is being developed as an educational alternative to learning. While studying represents an educational challenge to capitalism, I argue that there are political limitations to studying for which we need to account. Specifically, studying is not in itself political, but only represents the possibility of politics. To make this claim and to address these limitations, I turn to Jodi Dean's work on the communist Party. Dean posits the Party not as a master, director, or prophet, but as an infrastructure of affective intensity that maintains a gap in the order of things. I show that the Party is one way to organize and to defend study. Throughout the article, I illuminate the ways in which educational philosophers can contribute to political movement building by showing, developing, and refining the educational components of politics that many organizers and theorists neglect.
Descriptors: Social Systems, Educational Philosophy, Economics, Politics, Educational Theories, Political Attitudes, Political Science
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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