Teaching as Creative Subversion: Education Encounter as an Antidote to Neoliberal Exploitation of the Educational Task

Abstract

The author offers a critique of how contemporary educational practice is oriented toward production and considers its implications for themes associated with transactional analysis theory and practice. Writing from within the context of a neoliberal culture, he explores how education is subject to the principles of commodification, which contaminates how education might serve the interests of students and the intention of educators. Following from this discussion, he turns to the idea of encounter as an alternative for imagining the educational task and considers the implications for the role of the teacher and the experience of the student. A number of questions are raised for educational transactional analysts, trainers, and trainees to consider in relation to arrangements for training, accreditation, and examination within the transactional analysis community.

Keywords:

• Educational transactional analysis
• neoliberalism
• alienation
• commodification
• subjectification
• encounter
• transactional analysis training and accreditation

Disclosure statement

The author declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Giles Barrow

Giles Barrow, Teaching and Supervising Transactional Analyst (education), works as an educator and is based in the rural east of England. He can be contacted at Mill House, Mill Hill, Earl Soham, IP13 7RP, United Kingdom; email: [email protected].