Risky Choices – Autonomy and Surveillance in Secondary English Classrooms

Achievement data from New Zealand secondary schools suggest that students from lower socio-economic communities have fewer opportunities to engage with complex content in subject English. This article examines this phenomenon by drawing on Foucault’s notion of governmentality and considers how a co...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Claudia Rozas Gómes
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Tuwhera Open Access Publisher 2023-12-01
Series:New Zealand Journal of Teachers' Work
Online Access:https://ojs.aut.ac.nz/teachers-work/article/view/615
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Summary:Achievement data from New Zealand secondary schools suggest that students from lower socio-economic communities have fewer opportunities to engage with complex content in subject English. This article examines this phenomenon by drawing on Foucault’s notion of governmentality and considers how a context of simultaneously increased autonomy and surveillance may shape curriculum and assessment choices. To explore these ideas, I use interview data from ten secondary English teachers in the wider Auckland region. I complement Foucault’s (1982) explanation of governmentality with Ball, Maguire, and Braun’s (2012) notion of policy enactment to explore spaces of both compliance and resistance.
ISSN:1176-6662