Complexifying the ‘Visualised’ Curriculum with Actor-Network Theory

Abstract

Rather than conceptualising the curriculum as a mandate which guides a teacher’s task of advancing the knowledge of students, or what the author will call the simple story, the curriculum as an object of complexities is explored in this article. The article considers how approaching the curriculum relationally can be a more fruitful quest than simply accepting that curriculum activity is predetermined, predictable, or standard. Drawing on actor-network theory and the fieldwork resulting from a funded, primary school Arts project in Australia, the curriculum is examined as a relational effect of education. In doing so, it is shown how interdependent webs of heterogeneous relations contribute to this entity called ‘the curriculum’, encouraging activity to be practised in particular ways, yet suggesting activity could be otherwise.