Mapping the biopolitics of school dropout and youth resistance

Abstract

This article will put forth an introductory argument and evidence for school non-completion as a form of biopower, and school dropout to be considered a form of biopolitical youth resistance in the United States (US). Beginning with a brief overview of the empirical relationship of education to health and current graduation rates in the United States, the first section then intertwines these data to elucidate a framework of education as a form of biopower. Using focus groups (n = 6) and a cognitive mapping method called X-ray maps, this qualitative, youth participatory action research (YPAR) study of twenty-two (22) youth ages 14–19 in New York City investigated the ways in which schooling is embodied. Its findings reveal what education policy is doing to the body, how and in what ways youth resist these forces. The last section puts forth a theory for considering dropout as a form of biopolitical youth resistance.

Keywords:

• school dropout
• urban education
• qualitative methods
• mapping
• education policy
• participatory action research
• health
• biopower
• biopolitics

Acknowledgements

With gratitude to the Project DISH youth researchers: Kamille, Shadaisha Camp, Christine, Samuel Castro, Demeterios Gould, Akesha, Kionnei Lyons, Shakira Morris, Jose Torres, De’Sean Wright, without whom none of this would have been possible. This research was funded by the Sponsored Dissertation Fellowship of the Graduate Center of City University of New York (2008–2009), and was written while a W.K. Kellogg Health Scholar postdoctoral fellow at Johns Hopkins University, Bloomberg School of Public Health (2009–2011).