Teachers Aren't the Only Losers: Undermining the Public Good of Education

• In Event: AERA Poster Session 8
  In Poster Session: Critical Educators for Social Justice Poster Session

Abstract

Neoliberal ideologies have become pervasive within social and educational discourses and are influencing the public’s understandings of teachers, curriculum, and education. In this study, we employed critical discourse analysis of artefacts (including published articles, website content, and social media feeds produced by media outlets, governments, educational organizations, and the general public) to reveal the ways in which these discourses are reconfiguring teaching, undermining curricula, and dismantling public education. In this presentation, we will focus specifically on ways in which the discourses of neoliberalism are reconstituting teachers and the teaching profession. We will do so using the analytic themes of responsibilisation, deprofessionalization, and feminization, arguing that the discourses of neoliberalism are undermining education as a public good and destabilizing democracy itself.

Authors

• Shannon Dawn Maree Moore, University of Manitoba

• Melanie D. Janzen, University of Manitoba