FreshEd

Humans have been the center of Western philosophy and science for centuries, at least since the European enlightenment. With the rise of artificial intelligence, climate change and challenges to the very idea of subjectivity, are we moving into an era that is perhaps better labeled post-human? But what would posthumanism mean for education? My guest today is Stefan Herbrechter. A research fellow at Coventry University and a Privatdozent at Heidelberg University, Stefan has a new book chapter entitled “Posthumanist Education?” published in the International Handbook of Philosophy of Education. Full transcript available at http://www.freshedpodcast.com/stefanherbrechter/

Does social science as it is commonly understood and practiced work in post-socialist settings? That may sound like an absurd question, even a bit crude. My guests today, Alla Korzh and Noah Sobe, see limits to the very social imaginaries underpinning social science. They argue that the diversity of post-socialist transformations challenges the existing paradigms and frameworks of theory and method used in much social science today. Together with Iveta Silova and Serhiy Kovalchuk, Alla and Noah co-edited a 17-chapter volume entitled “Reimagining Utopias: Theory and method for education research in post-socialist context.” The book explores from many perspectives the shifting social imaginaries of post-socialist transformations to understand what happens when the new and old utopias of post-socialism confront the new and old utopias of social science.  Alla Korzh is an assistant professor of international education at the School for International Training Graduate Institute, World Learning. Noah Sobe is a professor of cultural and educational policy studies at Loyola University Chicago and past president of the Comparative and International Education Society. Full transcript available at www.freshedpodcast.com/korzhsobe

The images and stories of migrant families being separated by the United States government set off a global conversation about immigration, borders, and justice. If the political philosophy of liberalism is based on liberty and equality, then the events of the past few months have challenged the very core of liberal democratic states. My guest today is Bruce Collet. He researches migration and public schooling, with a special interest in migration, religion, and schooling in democratic states. He’s thinking through what we might call liberal multiculturalism as well as issues around security. Bruce Collet is an Associate Professor in Educational Foundations and Inquiry at Bowling Green State University in Ohio. He is the author of Migration, Religion, and Schooling within Liberal Democratic States (Routledge, 2018), and Editor of the journal Diaspora, Indigenous, and Minority Education. Full transcript available at: http://www.freshedpodcast.com/brucecollet/ ‎

Today we take a critical look at human rights. My guest is Radha D’Souza. Radha has a new book entitled: What’s wrong with rights? Social movements, Law, and Liberal Imaginations. In our conversation we discuss why there has been a proliferation of human rights since the end of World War II and how these rights have actually furthered the interests of the transnational capitalist class. Radha also discusses education as a human right and the challenge it has for social movements and unions such as education international. Radha D’Souza teaches law at the University of Westminster, London. Full transcript available at: http://www.freshedpodcast.com/radhadsouza/

Today we look at conditional cash transfers as a global phenomenon of educational development. My guest is Michelle Morais de Sa e Silva. Michelle has written a new book called Poverty Reduction, Education, and the Global Diffusion of Conditional Cash Transfers, which was published by Palgrave Macmillan. She finds that different political ideologies have been used to justify conditional cash transfers, helping them spread worldwide. Michelle Morais de Sa e Silva is a Lecturer in International and Area Studies in the Department of International and Area Studies at the University of Oklahoma. www.freshedpodcast.com/silva

On June 30th, Sweden will officially cancel its agreement with Elsevier, one of the largest academic publishers in the world. No longer will new journal articles or books published by Elsevier be available in any Swedish university or library. Why is this happening? What’s behind the disagreement between Elsevier and Sweden?   Today Wilhelm Widmark, the Library Director at Stockholm University, joins me to talk about the state of academic publishing. Widmark serves as the Vice-Chair of the Swedish Bibsam Consortium steering committee, the group that negotiates agreements with publishers on behalf of universities and libraries across the country. Although he criticizes Elsevier for charging excessively high prices on academic publications, he places most of the blame on the academic system of meritocracy that is based on academic publications.

Today we continue our exploration of the Fourth Industrial Revolution and what it means for education. Last week, we looked at comparative education as a field. Today we look at teachers. What are the prospects and perils of the fourth industrial revolution for teachers? My guest today is Jelmer Evers. Jelmer is a teacher, blogger, writer, and innovator. He teaches history at UniC in the Netherlands and works with Education International, the global federation of teacher unions. He was nominated for the global teacher prize in 2012 and is known for his book called Flip the System. Today Jelmer and I discuss his new co-edited volume Teaching in the Fourth Industrial Revolution: Standing at the Precipice, which was published by Routledge earlier this year. http://www.freshedpodcast.com/jelmerevers/

We’ve all heard the terms “Big Data,” Artificial Intelligence, and Machine Learning. They are supposedly at the heart of a Fourth Industrial Revolution that, because of technology, is altering the way in which we live, work, and relate to one another. But how is this so-called era of datafication transforming what we mean by both “comparative” and “education”? Earlier this month, the Post Foundational Approaches to Comparative and International Education Special Interest Group of the Comparative and International Education Society organized a webinar entitled “The Datafication of Comparative Education.” The webinar brought together NelliPiattoeva, Ezekiel Dixon-Román, and Noah W. Sobe. I moderated the discussion, which focused on how data and algorithms are reshaping ways of thinking, seeing, acting, and feeling in educational research, policy, and practice. In this special addition of FreshEd, I’m going to replay our conversation because I think there is a lot of critical work to be done on cybernetic systems in education. http://www.freshedpodcast.com/freshed-116-the-datafication-of-comparative-education/

Private interests are increasingly becoming commonplace inside education. In today’s economic globalization, the attainment of knowledge is seen as the key difference between economies that succeed and economies that stagnate or fail. Perhaps more precisely, it is knowledge that determines if an individual — not a national economy—succeeds or fails. We call this the “knowledge economy” and it is one of the main reason why private interests have entered education systems. Private interests in education range from private schools and private textbook and examination companies to the emerging belief that education is an individual, positional good that can be purchased and to the financialization of education where companies buy and sell student debt. It also includes things such as evidence based policy and information technology Our guest today, Professor Gita Steiner-Khamsi sees herself as a second generation researcher of educational privatization. Whereas the first generation of scholars aimed at describing the phenomenon, she attempts to explain — or theorize — it. How can we explain the rise of a global education industry? Gita Steiner-Khamsi is a Professor at Teachers College, Columbia University in New York City. She is a co-editor of the newest World Yearbook of Education, which focuses on “The global education industry.” The volume was co-edited with Antoni Verger and Christopher Lubienski and is the focus of today’s show.

Today: Case Studies. My guests, Fran Vavrus and Lesley Bartlett. They have a new co-written book entitled Rethinking Case Study Research: A Comparative Approach, which will be published by Routledge later this year. Fran and Lesley contend that the recent conceptual shifts in the social sciences, some of which have been discussed by previous guests on this show, demand that case studies re-configure their approach towards culture, context, space, place, and comparison. Fran Vavrus is a professor in the college of education and human development at the University of Minnesota. Lesley Bartlett is a professor in the School of Education at the University of Wisconsin – Madison. I spoke with Fran and Lesley in Mid-July. They have written an exclusive summary of their forthcoming book, Rethinking Case Study Research: A Comparative Approach, for FreshEd listeners, which is only available on FreshEdpodcast.com Check it out today.