Treatise on teratos-pedagogy. A queer analysis of teachers and students at school

Abstract

The aim of this article is to present the fundamental ideas of queer theories in order to make them dialogue with the problems of our everyday schools and, thus, contribute to a pedagogy for the creation of a public space that produces equality and the possibility of generating community from difference. Appealing to the figure of the monstrous (in Greek tératos), as a recurrent topic in the queer universes, we will carry out an analysis in two parts: first, radicalising the otherness of the children students as a non-/anti/pre-human abnormality and, second, comparing the teaching practice with two teratological creatures, such as Frankenstein and the witches. Using a qualitative methodology of conceptual discussion, we forge a teratological narrative that allows us to explore various dimensions of classroom life, to name conflicts in unexpected ways and, perhaps, to uncover alternatives for educational action.