Thinking from another place, thinking the unthinkable: towards a queer pedagogy

Abstract

The recognition of diversity has assumed a crucial role with regards to education due to the social transformations that have been taking place in the so-called advanced democracies. Indeed, the multicultural context and the preeminence of the struggles for recognition of (sexual, gender, racial, cultural, religious, or other) differences are the two main characteristics of current social trends. However, the different implicit and insufficiently questioned conceptions of diversity delineate a controversial area of debate. With these considerations in mind, my aim in this article is, on the one hand, to make a critical reflection on the limits and challenges that sexual and gender diversity poses to the educational sphere, and to current politics; and, on the other, to analyze the valuable contributions drawn from feminist and queer theories and their importance to education in recent years. The article concludes with some notes on queer pedagogy and its challenges.