Friendship pedagogies as technologies of power: deploying friendship to foster participation of racially minoritized students in Danish education

Abstract

ABSTRACT This article explores how friendship relations have been used in approaches to the participation of racially minoritized students in Danish schools from the 1970s until the present day. Using Foucault’s concept of technologies of power we approach friendship as a pedagogical technology. This allows us to examine how friendship is implied in school pedagogies and to identify the problems such pedagogies of friendship claim to address. Based on an analysis of literature targeting education professionals, we examine the rationales behind professionals’ use of friendship as a pedagogy and how these have changed over time. Our analysis reveals a shift in friendship pedagogies: conceived as a means to facilitate language acquisition in the 1970s and as a preventive measure against racism in the 1980s, they have evolved into technologies for achieving ‘cultural sameness’. The article concludes with a discussion of the potentials of friendship pedagogies in antiracist education.