ABSTRACT
This chapter presents one of the alternatives to seeing pupils as raw materials for management, contrasting as it does the practices of listening to pupils (as political agents) and reading them (as governmental problems). The analysis springs from a fictive situation: a pupil swearing at a teacher. It is possible that they are doing so as a result of a traumatic event with no connection to the classroom, or even a chemical imbalance in the brain, and a teacher would be betraying their métier if they neglected to address that. But it is also possible the pupil is expressing themself in the only way they find possible in an environment designed by powerful pedagogues (Scott would call this a hidden transcript). This interpretive choice relates to McGilchrist’s account of the two hemispheres of the brain: the one characterised by closed interpretations according to established categories, the other by openness to broader contexts and multiple meanings. The teacher must choose to treat the pupil as a patient in need of help, or as a citizen eager to express themself.
