Mellan människa och häst : Djur-blivande i den pedagogiska relationens mellanrum

Sammanfattning: Pedagogy has been theorised as a process of becoming, throughout history, as well as in contemporary research. In an interplay between literary configuration as a form of arts-based research and analysis based in philosophy of education, this dissertation explores the in-between of the educational relation within a specific human–horse relationship in order to examine, re-symbolise and re-negotiate the very presumptions of what pedagogy can become.   I am interested in the educational possibilities in the relational processes of becoming when the Other is a horse and, further, how imaginaries, enabled by a questioning of the anthropocentrism of processes of becoming, can contribute to think pedagogy as a relational process of becoming, rooted in becoming-animal.   Firstly, against the backdrop of a critique of the discourse on animality, I analyse becoming-animal in depth. By working with the concept of figuration, I investigate the processes of becoming between human and other-than-human. As Rosi Braidotti’s (2002) notion of becoming-animal informs this specific, enfleshed relation between human and horse, this lived relation also concretises the notion of becoming-animal.   Secondly, in the light of a cartography of the power relation, I claim, in line with Patton (2003), that it is nonetheless possible for ethical relations to emerge in and through that relation. By linking the idea of ‘being faced by animals’, as developed in Matthew Calarco’s (2008) work with the idea of ‘being addressed’ as developed in Gert Biesta’s (2012) work, I see the horse’s face appear as an educational and ethical questioning.   Thirdly, drawing on Luce Irigaray’s (1993) concept of difference, yet in another way, and displacing space for wonder to the relational space between human and horse, I highlight how processes of becoming-animal break through. Further, I explore how re-configurations offer possibilities of shaking the idea, rooted in human subjectivity, out of which the living is classified into the ‘ontological categories’ of ‘Human’ and ‘Animal’.   In conclusion, I discuss how educational possibilities emerge in relational processes when the Other is a horse in two different yet transversal ways: firstly, through the lived relation to the Other and secondly, through possibilities for other-than-anthropocentric imaginaries.   The dissertation not only contributes to the field of education, and more specifically within the field of philosophy of education concerning educational relations. It also contributes to the development of the field of horse studies within the fields of humanities and social science.