The Ill Which Remains Within: Exploring the Limits of Hope as a Philosophical Basis for Education

Being particularly at home in critical theories of education, hope is invoked widely by theorists to render bearable perspectives of the politics and practices of education which leave the reader with little reason for optimism in education. Despite much knowledge from critical pedagogues and theorists on the threat of neoliberal ideologies to systems and subjects of education, one is hard-pressed to find cited research that would suggest educationists ought to be anything but hopeful in their teaching. In this paper, I use the theoretical tools of psychoanalysis as interpreted by the philosopher Slavoj Zizek to critically examine how hope, rather than freeing us from the present, traps us in a version of the future. Working with Freirean theories of subjectivity in education, I argue that hope holds us captive to our potential future enjoyment, and that it is thinking on and bearing the miseries of the present that can offer greater freedom for the subject.