Posthumanism and Higher Education

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-xxxv

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2. Unfolding: Co-Conspirators, Contemplations, Complications and More

   • Carol A. Taylor

   Pages 1-27

3. Entangled Pedagogic Provocations

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 29-29

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   2. Sounds of Scissors: Eventicising Curriculum in Higher Education

      • Bente Ulla, Ninni Sandvik, Ann Sofi Larsen, Mette Røe Nyhus, Nina Johannesen

      Pages 31-53

   3. Theatre for a Changing Climate: A Lecturer’s Portfolio

      • Evelyn O’Malley

      Pages 55-71

   4. A Manifesto for Teaching Qualitative Inquiry with/as/for Art, Science, and Philosophy

      • Candace R. Kuby, David Aguayo

      Pages 73-83

   5. Posthuman Encounters in New Zealand Early Childhood Teacher Education

      • Sonja Arndt, Marek Tesar

      Pages 85-102

   6. Putting Posthuman Theories to Work in Educational Leadership Programmes

      • Kathryn J. Strom, John Lupinacci

      Pages 103-121

   7. Re-vitalizing the American Feminist-Philosophical Classroom: Transformative Academic Experimentations with Diffractive Pedagogies

      • Evelien Geerts

      Pages 123-140

   8. Undoing and Doing-With: Practices of Diffractive Reading and Writing in Higher Education (Viewpoint)

      • Sarah Hepler, Susan Cannon, Courtney Hartnett, Teri Peitso-Holbrook

      Pages 141-151

4. Inventive Practice Intra-Ventions

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 153-154

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   2. Staying with the Trouble in Science Education: Towards Thinking with Nature—A Manifesto

      • Marc Higgins, Maria F. G. Wallace, Jesse Bazzul

      Pages 155-164

   3. Complex Knowing: Promoting Response-Ability Within Music and Science Teacher Education

      • Carolyn Cooke, Laura Colucci-Gray

      Pages 165-185

   4. Dramatizing an Articulation of the (P)Artistic Researcher’s Posthumanist Pathway to a ‘Slow Professorship’ Within the Corporate University Complex

      • johnmichael rossi

      Pages 187-209

   5. A Posthuman Pedagogy for Childhood Studies (Viewpoint)

      • Amanda Hatton

      Pages 211-215

   6. Disruptive Pedagogies for Teacher Education: The Power of Potentia in Posthuman Times

      • Kay Sidebottom

      Pages 217-236

   7. Textual Practices as Already-Posthuman: Re-Imagining Text, Authorship and Meaning-Making in Higher Education

      • Lesley Gourlay

      Pages 237-254

   8. Body as Transformer: ‘Teaching Without Teaching’ in a Teacher Education Course

      • Karin Murris, Cara Borcherds

      Pages 255-277

5. Experimental Research Engagements

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 279-280

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   2. Playful Pedagogy: Autoethnography in the Anthropocene

      • Clare Hammoor

      Pages 281-291

This book explores ways in which posthumanist and new materialist thinking can be put to work in order to reimagine higher education pedagogy, practice and research. The editors and contributors illuminate how we can move the thinking and doing of higher education out of the humanist cul-de-sac of individualism, binarism and colonialism and away from anthropocentric modes of performative rationality. Based in a reconceptualization of ontology, epistemology and ethics which shifts attention away from the human towards the vitality of matter and the nonhuman, posthumanist and new materialist approaches pose a profound challenge to higher education. In engaging with the theoretical twists and turns of various posthumanisms and new materialisms, this book offers new, experimental and creative ways for academics, practitioners and researchers to do higher education differently. This ground-breaking edited collection will appeal to students and scholars of posthumanism and new materialism, as well as those looking to conceptualize higher education as other than performative practice. 

• Posthumanism
• Posthumanist education research
• Pedagogy in a posthuman world
• Posthumanism and higher education
• Posthuman research
• New materialism

“This lively, innovative book makes a strong case for how we might, and must, engage multimodally with more-than-human co-students/researchers/pedagogues in Higher Education (HE) … . These carefully assembled writings generate inspiration for researchers and pedagogues who want to work with idea and practices … . This book imbues courage to stay with the trouble, to invent and create spaces for thinking with more-than-human participants in research and pedagogy, and to respond to the call to do HE differently.” (Karen E. Barr, Journal of Posthumanism, Vol. 1 (1), May, 2021)

• Department of Education, University of Bath, Bath, UK

  Carol A. Taylor

• Royal College of Art, London, UK

  Annouchka Bayley

Carol A. Taylor is Professor of Higher Education and Gender at the University of Bath, UK. Her research draws on feminist, new materialist and posthumanist approaches to generate experimental methodologies and transdisciplinary theories for exploring gender, space, power and participation in higher education. She co-edits the journal Gender and Education and is an Editorial Board member of Teaching in Higher Education and Critical Studies in Teaching and Learning. 


Annouchka Bayley is Programme Lead in Creative Education at the Royal College of Art, UK. Her research incorporates posthumanisms and new materialisms for 21st century higher education development; practice-as-research in the academy; and creating new approaches to the practice and critique of contemporary live performance.  

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