Un-/Re-making educational digitalization: exploring the affirmative dimension of CDA through the discursive repertoires of art and museum education

As educational digitalization increasingly contributes to a functionalist and competitive reframing of education (Giroux, 2011; Komljenovic & Williamson, 2023; Peters & Jandrić, 2018), in this article I address this tendency discursively, holding attention to the appreciation of discourses as productive of social realities. First, building on literature and through CDA I disentangle the values and imperatives which animate the contemporary prescriptive discourse of digital education, focusing on how digital learners and learning are discursively shaped through the mobilisation of digital technologies’ material affordances. Second, with this analysis as a background and acknowledging the contested nature of any field of discursive production, I carry on an exercise of affirmative critique. I tap into art and museum education as potential discursive repertoires to reimagine how we think about, and therefore enact, digital education. To do that, I present two case studies as empirical entry points into such discussion, reflecting on how they unsettle some premises and assumptions regarding digital learners and learning.