Language and Power in Education
by Dimitrios Thanasoulas
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4. Language and power in education
Language and power in education is an issue which many scholars have been concerned with-Heidegger, Foucault, Bourdieu, Fairclough, and others-and which will constitute the background against which the construction of educational discourse may be examined. Our age is characterised by the exercise of power through consent rather than coercion, wherein the role of language has been enhanced, only to be used as a vehicle for the production and reproduction of social order. '[I]t is mainly in discourse that consent is achieved, ideologies are transmitted, and practices, meanings, values and identities are taught and learnt' (Fairclough, 1995: 219). Furthermore, living in an age of radical change, instability, and social "fermentation," we witness the constant shaping and reshaping of cultural practices and forms of power-developments that indisputably affect and charge language. Educational practices form a domain of discursive practices, which in turn are disseminated as of a particular cultural, social, and pedagogic value. At any rate, 'to be subjected to education has meant to become disciplined according to a regimen of remembering and forgetting, of assuming identities normalized through discursive practices, and of a history of unpredictable diversions' (Fendler, 1998, cited in Popkewitz & Brennan, 1998: 9). These discursive practices Foucault (1971, cited in Popkewitz & Brennan, 1998: 66) calls 'procedures of exclusion', which he divides into three categories: 'prohibited words', i.e., constraints on what and how to speak; 'the division of madness'-the dividing line between reason and folly; and 'will to truth'-the desire to learn. In this light, we can argue that the discourse of education 'exercises its own control' (Foucault, 1971, cited in Popkewitz & Brennan, 1998: 65).

4.1. Discourse, social control, and the construction of knowledge within the classroom
Despite the fact that the role of education has always been held in high regard, the experience of schooling amounts to what Philip Corrigan (1991, cited in Popkewitz & Brennan, 1998: 231) refers to as the 'tightening of bodies' when students are expected to raise their hands to speak, ask permission to perform a certain act, or rely on the teacher for their success or failure-a bipolar view which afflicts society at large. It is flagrantly obvious that education is a domain where 'compliance and uniformity of thought, behaviour, and action' are sine qua non elements (Coren, 1997: 29). Knowledge is by no means the sole concern of education; through discourse, students and teachers actually enact and, in so doing, reproduce social roles in which power is inherent. Inasmuch as knowledge is 'a joint possession' (Mercer, 1995: 1), it can be shared and negotiated by the participants in the educational process. As Coren (1997: 52) notes, '[o]ur identity, or sense of self, cannot exist in a vacuum, so our enjoyment of knowledge may depend on the nature and quality of the relationships which we allow ourselves, or are allowed, to establish'. Nevertheless, even though knowledge is the product of a collective endeavour, in which the role of teachers and students is equally important, it ends up being a "social good" dispensed by the teacher only to those who decide or are able to abide by discoursal, or other, conventions. As we shall see, 'teachers use talk to control the behaviour of children' (Mercer, 1995: 2), which means that teachers exercise social control over pupils by dint of discourse. In Foucaultian terms, pedagogical interaction is riddled with various 'techniques of power' (Foucault, 1983, cited in Popkewitz & Brennan, 1998: 234-245), which we will examine by drawing upon several teacher-student(s) sequences.

4.2. Techniques of power in pedagogical interaction
In this section, we will pay particular attention to segments of data, with a view to examining the ways in which the teacher exercises control over the students through the discourse he constructs. It goes without saying, of course, that educational discourse, being a conventionalised means of negotiating and coping with knowledge and each of the subjects taught within the classroom, confers social power and authority on the teacher, while ascribing to pupils minor or, at best, secondary importance. It seems that, unbeknown to students, what is transpiring within the classroom, mainly through teacher (and student) talk, aids and abets, as it were, in pupils' subordination and is conducive to the reproduction of cultural models and norms that view teachers as the legitimate purveyors of knowledge and students as members of the "benighted mob." Let us now consider some instances of teacher-student talk, thus tracing the forms that "discourse as social control" takes within the context of the classroom.

Sequence 1
(1) Teacher: Now . We're going to er follow up the work we were doing last week on Present Simple. Can anyone remind us: when is Simple Present used? Maria?
(2) Maria: We use it when um when . when we say what we do every day.
(3) Teacher: (pensive, then smiles) Yeh. We use Present Simple for habitual actions, right. Any examples? I think we went through some in the book last week.
(4) George: The sun shines? or I never do my homework (laughs)
(5) Teacher: That's right George. This time you did your homework didn't you? Ok now I'm going to . I'm going [ to
(6) George: [ no not again! I don't like ( ) on the blackboard
(7) Teacher: You read my mind, George. You're going to be the one to . to um write some sentences on the blackboard . and . and the rest of you are going to write them down, ok? Today we're going to to er learn how to form questions and negatives in the Present Simple.
(8) Katia: Why do we learn all this?
(9) Teacher: (laughs) Ah because if we didn't . learn all this . you wouldn't be able to er ask such questions, Katia (turns her back, looking at the blackboard. George is now standing next to the teacher facing his classmates)
(10) George: Can I write . the same examples?
(11) Teacher: Yes. Remember, short sentences . try to keep them simple and er and legible (smiles). Costa, I have no spare pen to give you. (goes next to him) Ok George . let's see some examples. Stop talking and help George (George writes down the examples he came up with earlier)
(12) Katia: She comes home twice a week
(13) Teacher: Is it "comes" or "goes"?
(14) Katia: No no . She comes she er my cousin Eleana . She comes she visits me twice a week. She lives in Zografou . very near
(15) Teacher: (goes to the blackboard, her back turned) OK Here are two more sentences for you George. "She comes home twice a week" and er what's the other one? [ "She
(16) Katia: [ "She lives in Zografou"
(17) Teacher: Thank you Katia . (to a student muttering at the back) Jimmy, I can always tell your voice you know . That's great George . Now it's it's time to . to form some questions using these examples. Jimmy? Can you please help us?
(18) Jimmy: Hmm Do the sun shine?
(19) Teacher: You take the auxiliary "do" yes . Is "the sun" singular or plural?
(20) Jimmy: Singular
(21) Teacher: Right. So you should say "does" instead of "do" . and [ then
(22) Jimmy: [ Does the sun
shine?
(23) Teacher: Great! Maria, it's your turn…

In this sequence, we see that the teacher is first of all attempting to establish some continuity between last week's work and the task she wishes the students to engage in (turn (1)). Prior to engaging the students in the task, she checks their understanding of the concept "Present Simple" by eliciting from them what she thinks are the main features they should bear in mind, and providing feedback (turns (3), (5), (21), (23)). Furthermore, in doing so, she uses the contributions of those who have studied and remember what it is they should do to remind the rest of the class who may not. It is noteworthy that the teacher refrains from providing the answers herself, for in this way she can both check the students' knowledge and help present this knowledge as something owned by the pupils as well as herself. After all, learners should get involved with new knowledge if they want to consolidate their own understanding. And this is achieved through trying to use this knowledge on their own. 'The process of creating knowledge in classrooms is one in which, for it to be successful, themes must emerge and continue, explanations must be offered, accepted and revisited, and understanding must be consolidated' (Mercer, 1995: 68). As Mercer (ibid.: 18) notes, such sequences are 'conversational routine[s], which can only happen if everyone who participates knows the rules for "doing lessons," the conventional ways for talking like a teacher or a pupil' (my italics). In some respects, this sequence, as part of a lesson, is a kind of 'temporary detachment' (ibid.) from the real world at large, for it is patently obvious that, in order to learn the Present Simple, no evaluative comments (as in turns (3), (5), (21), (23)) would be required, save to attest to, and reproduce, the different social roles that teacher and students occupy.
Moreover, there are some features that, not only evidence the teacher's control over the students, but also enact this very control. For example, in turns (11) and (17) (Costa, I have no spare pen to give you, Stop talking and help George, Jimmy, I can always tell your voice you know) she implicitly (in the case of the first and third examples) passes judgement on the students' behaviour (Costas' being absentminded and Jimmy's not paying attention), while (in the second example) placing constraints on what the students should do. Cloaked with the mantle of hints, her exercise of control is direct and blatant, nonetheless. These are instances of what Foucault (1983, cited in Popkewitz & Brennan, 1998: 235) referring to the 'techniques of power' pervasive in the classroom calls surveillance. Of course, the fact that the teacher avails herself of some students' contributions in her attempt to construct her lesson, while paying little attention to the rest, is itself an exclusionary technique.

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