Pedagogy in a pandemic: Responsibilisation and agency in the (re)making of teachers

Abstract

ABSTRACT This paper focuses on the making of teachers as educational subjects within a specific socio-historical context. It attempts to create a critical ontology of teacher identity, as highlighted by pedagogical discourses during the initial stages of the Coronavirus Pandemic in Hawaiʻi and the subsequent school shut down during the 2020 Spring semester. Through autoethnographic practitioner inquiry, I analyse the relationship between education and the state, the historical and contemporary discourses at play, and the tensions of teacher agency in (re)shaping teacher identities. The paper analyses educational continuities and discontinuities in Pandemic discourses, specific to my context but resonant with national trends within the United States. These include the affective governance of responsibilisation, the amplification of inequalities, the shifting perception of the teaching profession, the proliferation of divergent pedagogical discourses and technologies, and increased teacher agency in (re)making their own identities, roles, and responsibilities within the ambiguity of the socio-historical context.