Making “Mini-Me’s”: Service-Learning as Governance of the Self in a South African Context

Abstract

This article presents an attempt to examine my own service-learning practices through the use of the conceptual tools of Michel Foucault, in particular his notions of governmentality and power. The article views the development of service-learning in South Africa and our current practices as operating within a regime of truth, and it considers service-learning as an apparatus for constructing particular kinds of subjects. From a broad conceptual lens, the article moves to the analysis of an interaction during a critical reflection process in service-learning in an attempt to examine actual practices and how these may produce different subjectivities. The article is an attempt to encourage other practitioners to reflect on their own practices, uncover their assumptions, and ask how things could be otherwise.