Conditions of Possibility: Tracing the Discursive Emergence of the Teacher-as-Defender

• In Event: Beyond Liberation: Philosophies, Politics, and Desires in Reimagining Education

Abstract

This study employs Foucauldian genealogical methodology to examine how discursive and policy transformations following school violence created conditions for teachers to be reconceptualized as armed security agents. Over 30 states now permit teachers to carry firearms, with Tennessee Senate Bill 1325 most recently permitting teachers to carry guns confidentially without informing parents—legislation finalized after the Covenant School shooting in Nashville. This transformation signifies a profound reconfiguration of educational spaces, power relations, and teacher subjectivity. The armed teacher represents a fundamental transformation in what it means to be a teacher and reconfigures the very nature of educational spaces. Where arming teachers just years ago would have been unthinkable, today it is presented as inevitable and natural. By tracing how this once-unthinkable practice became possible, this research demonstrates how historical contingencies rather than inevitable solutions created our current approach to school security—an approach that fundamentally challenges multiracial democratic possibilities in education.

Author

• Shelby J. Morris, University of Alabama