Emotions, affects, and trauma in classrooms: Moving beyond the representational genre

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to draw together and engage some of the most prominent themes throughout the literature on emotions, affects, and trauma in classrooms: the representation of trauma in classrooms and its risks; the body as a part of traumatic experience and how it may be engaged pedagogically; and the un/making of affective communities as pedagogical spaces that can be transformative. It is argued that the prevalent representational account of trauma in classrooms imposes certain constraints that frame the pedagogical work that may be conducted. New theoretical and research developments in the affective turn about the implications of emotions, affects, and trauma for the body and politics, pose serious challenges to the representational genre. It is suggested that reparative pedagogies grounded in new theoretical perspectives may invoke critical reflection and transformative action in ways that expose and reframe the affective infrastructures of exclusion, inequality, and injustice.