How Neoliberal Ideology Interpellates Students as Alienated Learners
Faculty Mentor Information
David Gabbard
Presentation Date
7-2017
Abstract
I began college interested not in knowledge, but in what the minimum requirements were for a credential that would lead to capitalist success; “The American Dream.” Following a decade of disillusionment with higher education I returned to the academy driven for meaningful knowledge that would allow me to positively affect the common good. Using Louis Althusser’s Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses to build a theoretical framework incorporating interpellation in conjunction with Marx’s alienation, has given me the language to articulate the attitudes, behaviors, and disengagement of my younger self and current peers. Althusser posits that the dominant Ideological State Apparatus (ISA) is the school; hegemonically parallel to the class controlling the State in order to reproduce the conditions and relations of production. The interpellation of students from individuals into subjects promotes alienated/disengaged learning. This study seeks to understand some of the ways neoliberal ideology has affected educational policy, specifically higher education, using this framework to analyze alienated/disengaged learning as a function of interpellation by analyzing the educational reforms proposed by neoliberal pundits, especially those masquerading as helping U.S. children.
How Neoliberal Ideology Interpellates Students as Alienated Learners
I began college interested not in knowledge, but in what the minimum requirements were for a credential that would lead to capitalist success; “The American Dream.” Following a decade of disillusionment with higher education I returned to the academy driven for meaningful knowledge that would allow me to positively affect the common good. Using Louis Althusser’s Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses to build a theoretical framework incorporating interpellation in conjunction with Marx’s alienation, has given me the language to articulate the attitudes, behaviors, and disengagement of my younger self and current peers. Althusser posits that the dominant Ideological State Apparatus (ISA) is the school; hegemonically parallel to the class controlling the State in order to reproduce the conditions and relations of production. The interpellation of students from individuals into subjects promotes alienated/disengaged learning. This study seeks to understand some of the ways neoliberal ideology has affected educational policy, specifically higher education, using this framework to analyze alienated/disengaged learning as a function of interpellation by analyzing the educational reforms proposed by neoliberal pundits, especially those masquerading as helping U.S. children.