How can we queer the classroom?

Queer pedagogy
“One that refuses normal practices and practices of normalcy, one that begins with an ethical concern for one´s own reading practices, one that is interested in exploring what one cannot bear to know, one interested in the imaginings of a sociality unhinged from the dominant conceptual order.“ (Britzman, 1995, p. 165.)

On Thursday 28th of January AGORA and JustEd organised a “Queering the classroom – queer pedagogy and anti-oppressive education“-workshop, that was conducted by Jón Ingvar Kjaran from the University of Iceland, School of Education. Before the workshop I was bursting with excitement as I was going to get a chance to hear about and discuss queer theory and queer pedagogy. For me, these are new but fascinating approaches to research and teaching.

A few of us couldn’t wait for the workshop to begin so we started the discussions on the topic at the morning’s JustEd Coffee -event. Some of the articles on queer pedagogy we had received before the workshop had mentioned material (i.e. documentaries, books) that could be used for disturbing heteronormativity in the classroom and educating about same sex families and the multiplicity of gender and sexual orientations. I had brought with me a Finnish book for children called Ikioma perheeni (My very own family). It is a story of a child named Kuu (Moon) who has two mothers. All in all the book describes a non-heteronormative family unit. The book refuses to define the gender of the main character, Kuu, which is very refreshing in a world that labels children at birth with binary labels as either girl or boy.

The actual workshop began with an introduction to queer theory and pedagogy as well as anti-oppressive education. We discussed the key concepts and Jón introduced his study concerning the discourse of heteronormativity in Icelandic upper secondary schools. Heteronormativity, in short, presumes and enforces a certain identity, sexuality and behaviour according to the biological sex of a person. It also privileges heterosexuality as the norm. Queering was defined as disrupting/destabilizing the dominant discourse. The young people who Jón had interviewed had their own answers for creating queer spaces: some used their bodily performances as vehicles of resistance to the heteronormative order in the school. Currently, Jón is working on a book about Schooling Sexualities in Iceland and the Nordic countries, which will be published by Palgrave in 2017.

But how can we do all this as a part of teaching? What are the ways in which we could queer the classroom? We talked about teachable moments that teachers (and others as well) can utilise to educate on queer matters. For example taking the time to answer when a student asks a question that concerns gender or sexuality. Memorial days, such as the International day against homophobia, transphobia and biphobia (17th of May), also offer an opportunity for teachable moments. Different kinds of materials (documentaries, films and books) can be used as resources for teaching about queer issues.

“Education involves learning something that disrupts our common sense view of the world. The crisis that results from unlearning, then, is a necessary and desirable part of anti-oppressive education. Desiring to learn involves desiring difference and overcoming our resistance to discomfort.” (Kumashiro, 2002, p. 62.)

So for educators the task of queer pedagogy and anti-oppressive education seems to be to disturb practices of normalcy and assist the students in unlearning. And how about doing queer research? Many of the participants were researchers, so one important takeaway from the workshop, in one participant’s own words, was learning more about theoretical and methodological tools to research the topics. With these theoretical, pedagogical and methodological points of view we are a few steps closer to queering the classroom.

We will have another seminar on the subject of Queer pedagogy in May (information on the event will be available on the AGORA website during the spring). Welcome!

Bibliography
Britzman, D. (1995). Is There a Queer Pedagogy? Or, Stop Reading Straight. Educational Theory, 45 (2), 151–165.
Kumashiro, K. K. (2002). Troubling Education: Queer Activism and Anti-Oppressive Pedagogy. New York, NY: Routledge.

Further reading
Britzman, D. (1998). Lost subjects, contested objects. Albany: State University of New York Press.
Bryson, M. & de Castell, S. (1993). Queer Pedagogy: Praxis Makes Im/Perfect. Canadian Journal of Education, 18(3), 285–305.
Cumming-Potvin, W. & Martino, W. (2014). Teaching about Queer Families: surveillance, censorship, and the schooling of sexualities. Teaching Education, 25(3), 309–333.
Kjaran, J. I. & Jóhannesson, I. Á. (2014). Inclusion, exclusion and the queering of spaces in two Icelandic upper secondary schools. Ethnography and Education, 10(1), 42–59.
Kjaran, J. & Kristinsdóttir, G. (2014). Queering the environment and caring for the self: Icelandic LGBT students’ experience of the upper secondary school. Pedagogy, Culture & Society, 23(1), 1–20.
Martino, W. & Cumming-Potvin, W. (2014). Teaching about sexual minorities and “princess boys”: a queer and trans-infused approach to investigating LGBTQ-themed texts in the elementary school classroom. Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education, 1–21.

Some resources for teachers

Films/documentaries
Its elementary
Brother to brother
20 straws: Growing up gay
Brokeback mountain
The Danish girl
Torka aldrig tårar utan handskar
Aban and Khorshid

Books
Ikioma perheeni
You can find some picture books in English here