Toward a Stranger and More Posthuman Social Studies

2023 AERA Division B Curriculum Studies Outstanding Book Award Honorable Mention

Posthumanism has seen a surge across the humanities and offers a unique perspective, seeking to illuminate the role that more-than-human actors (e.g., affect, artifacts, objects, flora, fauna, other materials) play in the human experience . This book challenges the field of social studies education to think differently about the precarious status of the world (i.e., climate crisis, ongoing fights for racial equity, and Indigenous sovereignty). By cultivating a greater sense of attunement to the more-than-human, educators and scholars can foster more ethical ways of teaching, learning, researching, being, and becoming. In an effort to push the boundaries of what constitutes social studies, chapter authors engage with a wide range of disciplines and offer unique perspectives from various locations across the globe. This volume asks: How can thinking with posthumanism disrupt normative approaches to social studies education and research in ways that promote imaginativeness, speculation, and nonconformity? How can a posthumanist lens be used to interrogate neoliberal, systemic, and oppressive conditions that reproduce and perpetuate in-humanness?

Book Features:

• ● A collection of essays that explore the phenomenon of posthuman approaches to social studies scholarship.
• ● Contributions by many prominent social studies education scholars representing seven countries―Canada, Norway, Russia, Spain, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and the United States.
• ● A foreword by Boni Wozolek and an afterword by Nathan Snaza, both of who have made significant contributions to critical posthumanism in education.
• ● Provocation chapters that push readers’ thinking about the various ways that posthumanism connects to teaching and learning social studies.
• ● Images of more-than-human entanglements (i.e., artwork, photography, poetry).

Bretton A. Varga is an assistant professor of history–social science at California State University, Chico. Timothy Monreal is an assistant professor of learning and instruction at the University at Buffalo, The State University of New York. Rebecca C. Christ is an assistant professor of teaching and learning at Florida International University.