Beauvais, C;
Higham, R;
(2016)
A Reappraisal of Children's 'Potential'.
Studies in Philosophy and Education
, 35
(6)
pp. 573-587.
10.1007/s11217-016-9508-5.
Preview |
Text
Beauvais_Reappraisal_children_potential_Final_VoR.pdf - Published Version Download (427kB) | Preview |
Abstract
What does it mean for a child to fulfil his or her potential? This article explores the contexts and implications of the much-used concept of potential in educational discourses. We claim that many of the popular, political and educational uses of the term in relation to childhood have a problematic blind spot: interpersonality, and the necessary coexistence for the concept to be receivable of all children’s ‘potentials’. Rather than advocating abandoning the term—a futile gesture given its emotive force—we argue that the concept of children’s potential must be profoundly rethought to be workable as a philosophical notion in education. In an era marked by the unspoken assumption that ‘unlimited potential’ is always a good thing, we argue that it might be necessary to think about the limitations of the notion of individual potential; namely, the moment when it comes into contact with other people’s projects. We propose a conceptualisation of potential as the negotiated, situated, ever-changing creation of a group of individuals, in a process marked by conflict, and which remains essentially difficult.
| Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Title: | A Reappraisal of Children's 'Potential' |
| Open access status: | An open access version is available from UCL Discovery |
| DOI: | 10.1007/s11217-016-9508-5 |
| Publisher version: | https://doi.org/10.1007/s11217-016-9508-5 |
| Language: | English |
| Additional information: | Copyright © The Author(s) 2016. Open Access: This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. |
| Keywords: | Potential, Agency, Existentialism, Intersubjectivity |
| UCL classification: | UCL UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Education UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Education > UCL Institute of Education UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Education > UCL Institute of Education > IOE - Learning and Leadership |
| URI: | https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/1562247 |
Archive Staff Only
 |
View Item |
