Desiring Conviviliaty as the Emancipatory Heart of an Erotic Pedagogy

• In Event: Colonialism, Conviviality, and Othering: An International Perspective

Abstract

Objectives and Purposes
In Chilean post-colonial and neoliberal society, the concept of 'convivencia' represents a pursuit of peace influenced by Judeo-Christian morality and intertwined with bourgeois third-world progressivism. Rooted in the history of colonial and clerical exploitation as the seed of the Chilean Nation-State, seeking "peaceful conviviality" is based on the argument that assimilation of differences is necessary for peace (Iglesias, 2020). The dominant ideals of school conviviality promote neutral, morally upright, and civilized behaviors directed towards moderation, discretion, inhibition, obedience, and soberness; excluding queer identities as abject and in need of alignment with heterosexual norms – to be straightened up–.
Nevertheless, it is alarming that there is no legal framework for comprehensive sexual education in Chile, declaring as a state duty “guaranteeing a secular and non-sexist comprehensive sexual and emotional education” (El Mercurio, 2021). Furthermore, suicide rates have increased by over the 29% in adolescent men versus 68% in teenage women (Fundación Convivo, 2023); inside schools take place almost 40% of bullying and discrimination against LGBTIQ+ communities (Subsecretaría de Prevención del Delito, Ministerio del Interior y Seguridad Pública, 2021).

Theoretical Framework & Modes of Inquiry
Heterosexuality functions as a control dispositive once it leads to learning ‘being heterosexual’ as a transversal disposition (Ahmed, 2006). Indeed, our key objective with this presentation is to interrupt the understanding of conviviality in terms of peace while proposing to reframe it as ‘desiring conviviality, instead. Every emancipatory displacement is violent by nature, despite the forms that its externalities take. A conviviality that recognizes desires’ violent routes –as leading to new trajectories outside dispositives– we are naming and validating it as a desiring conviviality. A ‘desiring conviviality’ to validate the potential creative hope triggered by persistent practices of warm-welcoming minimal differences or desires in a Deleuzian sense (Deleuze, 1987). Becoming the heart of an erotic pedagogy, it opens the possibility to unmask straight motivations in-between pedagogical interactions –prefigured and goal-oriented expectations and meritocratic aspirations–, as they represent some of the hetero-compulsive routes for social mobility through education.
Taking Chile as a pretext case, we produce evidence that justifies the urgency of such an onto-epistemological turn by reviewing protocols of conviviality rules for students, passages from biographical accounts of our students who were schoolgirls between 2010 and 2020, and narratives of women who were schoolgirls in the 20th century. A quick glance to this data reveals a strong emphasis on establishing a heterosexual order to foster harmonious coexistence. Expressions, actions, or language with sexual connotations that challenge the dominant gender order are prohibited and considered morally disrespectful. Students who wish to aesthetically express themselves differently can face punishments, and practices that prioritize adult authority and subordination are mandatory. Specific dress codes are imposed, such as prohibiting "extravagant" big earrings or revealing clothing for women and mandating certain attire for men.

Significance
We reuse neo-materialistic ideas to create a po(ethic) onto-epistemological dislocation to embrace a chaotic, imaginative, and passionate critical conviviality to intending to queer-decolonize Latin American education.

Authors

• Leonora Beniscelli Contreras, Universidad Alberto Hurtado

• Kyuttzza Gómez Guinart, Universidad Alberto Hurtado