Cultivating Coexistence: On the Conditions of Possibility of Radical Unlearning through Embodied Experience

Application summary

This multidisciplinary research in adult education proposes to study the potential of arts-based practices for social transformation and ethical coexistence. The research contributes to current understandings of the way subjects are socially shaped to fit normative binaries and ideas that induce inequalities and social polarization related to gender, ability, race, age, and class. But these ideas are not static. I proceed with the hypothesis that learning and transforming them passes through the body; i.e. through affective and embodied experience. Following constructivist, authentic and citizenship education views which situate cognitive development in its cultural context, I stress that learning across life stages cannot be separated from the embodied and ethico-political makeup of the self. I ask how to “undo” the effect of social, epistemic and cultural conditioning and thus, investigate the conditions that may help unlearn these divisive and toxic attitudes toward self and others. I call this ‘radical unlearning’. The notion of unlearning as is used in organizational research and in feminist decolonial approaches; it generally requires questioning assumptions and is often paired with loosing privileges, but there is a lack of empirical research on how this comes about concretely, and connections are still to be established with affective and somatic processes. The research sets up a pedagogical laboratory for adults as a case study. It is supported on transformative sustainability education and on a novel pedagogical method blending in embodied, discursive, and interpersonal work. Phenomenological analysis is applied to the resulting qualitative data to establish how embodied/somatic experience and interaction shape social markers of identity, sense of agency, interaction, and personal transformation. The study will render valuable theoretical input for educational design, and practical tools for inclusivity training in intersectional and multicultural contexts