Perhaps no other novel has received as much attention from moral philosophers as South African writer J. M. Coetzee’s Disgrace . The novel is ethically compelling and yet no moral theory explains its force. Despite clear Kantian moments, neither rationalism nor self-respect can account for the strange ethical task that the protagonist sets for himself. Calling himself the dog man, like the ancient Cynics, this shamelessly cynical protagonist takes his cues for ethics not from humans but from animals. He does (...) not however claim much in the way of empathy or understanding of animals, and his own odd motives remain a puzzle throughout the stages of his ethical transformation. Many scholars approach Coetzee’s text through an ethics of alterity, and even argue that Disgrace is exemplary in this regard. Kristeva’s rendition of alterity ethics brings us close to the novel’s vision, and yet the novel points towards a more primordial basis for ethics in the search for meaning through the human encounter with other animal species. (shrink)

How can educators and their students interrogate the ethics and politics of suffering in ways that do not create fixed and totalized narratives from the past? In responding to this question, this essay draws on J. M. Coeetze’s Disgrace, and discusses how this novel constitutes a crucial site for bearing witness to the suffering engendered by apartheid through inventing new forms of mourning and community. The anti-historicist stance of the novel is grounded on the notion that bearing witness to suffering (...) without betraying it means refusing to represent it, that is, refusing to translate history and speak of it; instead, the novel’s characters remain inconsolable before history. The essay builds on these ideas and considers whether educators and their students need to (re)learn the limits of historicism in comprehending conflict, oppression, otherness and suffering; also, it examines the educational implications of such a pedagogical task. (shrink)

There is growing global consensus that inequality is making sustainable development goals unattainable. Social inclusion of the historically marginalized and equality of opportunity is crucial for sustainable development. Inclusive quality education for all is therefore considered as one of the three main targets for sustainable development according to UNESCO’s Incheon declaration in 2015. This paper draws on an institutional ethnography of a globally interconnected old colonial school’s inclusive pedagogic work in postcolonial India. The school’s work has been much celebrated in (...) existing research by academics, global donor agencies and also by the Indian government’s Sarva Shikshya Abhiyan office. This paper analyses how the school conceptualized a distinct inclusive pedagogy to educate the hearts and the minds of children driven by local community needs for social inclusion within a context of extreme inequality. This paper argues that the school’s conception of inclusive education addressing the diverse learning needs of children developed as a syncretic cultural formation drawing on its institutional mission for social justice, as well as indigenous history of educational reform and philosophy of community engagement. In doing so, this paper engages with the ‘philosophy of context’ and draws on the ‘southern theory’ of inclusive education as envisioned by Rabindranath Tagore, indigenous education reformer and Nobel Laureate poet activist during early twentieth-century colonial British India, who challenged both local and global inequality through his creative and educational work. (shrink)