Prevention of prejudice and promotion of inclusive school environment through increased diversity competence.

Education involves people and thus always involves risk and potential discomfort. When students express prejudices or make hateful statements based on stereotypical perceptions of groups, this risk may be perceived as particularly relevant. Recent research based on classroom observations and interviews with teachers indicates that teachers may feel confused and paralyzed when students express prejudices and radical attitudes, such as racism, immigration, anti-Semitism, Islam, homosexuality or right-wing extremism. It has also been suggested that teachers have only to some degree used 22 July 2011 as a starting point for addressing violence and undemocratic attitudes in teaching, because they have been afraid of how to deal with different reactions from students. The project includes two PhD-projects, one of which is about teachers' experiences of facing prejudice and hate speech. Based on interviews with 20 teachers from different parts of the country, who work in middle school or high school, this project investigates how teachers interpret and meet students' use of stereotypes and derogatory group-based utterances, and how they negotiate and navigate in their work and in their meetings with students. Among other things, the teachers 'stories about their practices indicate that there is a tension between the Education Act requirements for "zero tolerance" for derogatory and discriminatory statements, and the general part of the curriculum that emphasizes students 'diversity of opinion and the school?s responsibility to train students to deal with diversity. The second PhD-project investigates students' experiences of prejudice, insults and diversity of opinion in the classroom. Based on classroom observations and interviews with a total of 28 students from three different upper secondary schools, boys' use of derogatory humor and the ambiguity inherent in their use of humor are examined. This turned out to be a widespread and complex phenomenon among the boys interviewed. The findings indicate that the boys in the study frequently use prejudiced and discriminatory language in their humor practices and socialization with friends. Another article discusses how girls with a Muslim background experience teaching about Islam and discusses their experiences in the light of theories about boundaries, representation and responsibility. The findings indicate that the Religion and Ethics classroom is a space where differences and boundaries between students, on the basis of religion, becomes clearer in teaching about Islam. Furthermore, teaching of Islam seems to emphasize differences and strengthen negative discourses related to Islam and Muslims, rather than to nuance and challenge prejudices, stereotypes and boundaries. The project also discusses students' stories about diversity of opinion in the classroom, and their experiences of discomfort related to this. The two doctoral projects complement each other. The project, which is based on interviews with teachers, reveals teachers 'insecurity towards students' practices, and shows how teachers are in a state of tension when they both promote diversity of opinion and at the same time ensure the individual student's security as required by the Education Act. The project, which is based on classroom observations and interviews with students, offers new knowledge about students' perspectives on several of the topics that teachers find difficult in their professional practice, and can thus offer teachers new and relevant knowledge. Both projects are part of key debates in the field of education, related to teaching about controversial issues, questions about "safe space" and the relationship between the individual's security and challenging diversity of opinion, as well as discussions about the tension between teachers' professional judgment on the one hand and juridification in the field of education on the other. The projects thus offer new and important knowledge within an important field.

Prosjektet skriver seg inn i sentrale debatter innen utdanningsfeltet, med særlig vekt på spenninger knyttet til meningsmangfold, meningsbrytning, kritisk tenkning og elevers individuelle trygghet. Prosjektet drøfter blant annet læreres erfaringer med økt rettsliggjøring, og hvordan dette utfordrer deres arbeid og forståelse av pedagogisk skjønn. Prosjektet drøfter videre elevers opplevelser av ubehag knyttet til meningsmangfold i klasserommet, og peker på at elevers ubehag kan se ut til å hindre fruktbart meningsmangfold. Det er rimelig å forvente at resultater fra prosjektet vil bli brukt og diskutert innen utdanningsfeltet de kommende årene, og at det vil kunne få direkte betydning for undervisning innen lærerutdanningen og skole.

Utdanning innebærer alltid en risiko fordi «utdanning ikke er et teknisk maskineri, men et møte mellom mennesker» (Biesta, 2014, s. 23). Denne risikoen kan oppleves særlig aktuell i møte med elever som gir uttrykk for gruppebaserte fordommer eller kommer med hatefulle ytringer. Nyere forskning basert på klasseromsobservasjoner og intervjuer med lærere, indikerer at lærere kan føle seg rådville og handlingslammet når elever gir uttrykk for fordommer og radikale holdninger, knyttet til for eksempel rasisme, innvandring, antisemittisme, islam, homoseksualitet eller høyreekstremisme. Likeledes antyder Anker og von der Lippe (2015) at lærere i liten grad har brukt hendelsen 22. juli som utgangspunkt for kritiske drøftinger av udemokratiske holdninger, fordi det å «åpne for debatter som kan ta ukontrollerbare retninger, kan oppleves utrygt» (2015, s. 94, se også Røthing, 2017). Dette prosjektet søker gjennom intervjuer med både elever og lærere å utvikle ny kunnskap som kan danne grunnlag for å øke læreres kompetanse på dette området. Intervjuene skal ha en interseksjonell tilnærming for å kunne undersøke hvordan ulike forhold spiller sammen. Det er særlig viktig å utvikle ny kunnskap om elevers erfaringer på dette området, noe som krever strategisk rekruttering av informanter. Målet er å bidra til at lærere skal kunne stå i eget ubehag og møte og ivareta elever som krenker og krenkes, og at de skal kunne utvikle mangfoldskompetanse (Røthing, 2017) og etablere uenighetsfellesskap (Iversen, 2012, 2014), som hjelper dem i arbeidet med å forebygge gruppebaserte fordommer og hatefulle ytringer og fremme trygge, inkluderende skolemiljø (se prosjektbeskrivelsen for referanser).