Abstract
Since the turn of the millennium, positive psychology has become a significant part of contemporary psy-complexes around the world. In this chapter, we explore how the practicality of positive psychology is established through a certain regime of truth that introduces conditions on how happiness can be discerned and acted upon in schools. Using Michel Callon’s theory of translation, we examine how positive psychology translates rationalities of rule into psychological discourses, and how positive psychology is, in turn, translated into interventions in schools. As a case in point, we analyse the Australian Geelong Grammar School (GGS) model of positive education, which is the best known example of embedding principles of positive psychology in schools.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Binkley, S. (2014). Happiness as enterprise: An essay on neoliberal life. New York: SUNY Press.
Brunila, K. (2012). A diminished self: Entrepreneurial and therapeutic ethos operating with a common aim. European Educational Research Journal, 11(4), 477–486.
Callon, M. (1986). Some elements of a sociology of translation: Domestication of the scallops and the fishermen of St Brieuc Bay. In J. Law (Ed.), Power, action and belief: A new sociology of knowledge (pp. 196–233). London: Routledge & Kegan Paul.
Callon, M. (1998). An essay on framing and overflowing: Economic externalities revisited by sociology. In M. Callon (Ed.), The laws of the markets (pp. 244–269). Oxford: Blackwell.
Christopher, J. C., & Hickinbottom, S. (2008). Positive psychology, ethnocentrism, and the disguised ideology of individualism. Theory & Psychology, 18(5), 563–589.
Conoley, C. W., Conoley, J. C., Spaventa-Vazil, K. Z., & Lee, A. N. (2014). Positive psychology in schools: Good ideas are never enough. In M. J. Furlong, R. Gilman, & E. S. Huebner (Eds.), Handbook of positive psychology in schools (pp. 497–506). New York: Routledge.
.
Fejes, A. (2008). To be one’s own confessor: Educational guidance and governmentality. British Journal of Sociology of Education, 29(6), 653–664.
Fenwick, T. (2010). Un-doing standards in education with actor-network theory. Journal of Education Policy, 25(2), 117–133.
Fenwick, T., & Edwards, R. (2010). Actor-network theory in education. London: Routledge.
Foucault, M. (1982). The subject and power. Afterword. In H. Dreyfus & P. Rabinow (Eds.), Michel Foucault. Beyond structuralism and hermeneutics (pp. 208–226). Brighton: Harvester.
Foucault, M. (2005). The hermeneutics of the subject: Lectures at the Collège de France 1981–1982 (Vol. 6). New York: Macmillan.
Foucault, M. (2008). The birth of biopolitics: Lectures at the Collège de France, 1978–1979. New York: Palgrave.
Geelong Grammar School. (2012). A model for positive education. Retrieved from https://www.ggs.vic.edu.au/School/Positive-Education/Resources
Geelong Grammar School. (2015). Our positive education model. Retrieved from https://www.ggs.vic.edu.au/School/Positive-Education/What-is-Positive-Education-/Our-Positive-Education-Model
Gorur, R. (2013). My school, my market. Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education, 34(2), 214–230.
Gorur, R. (2015). Situated, relational and practice-oriented: The actor-network theory approach. In K. Gulson, M. Clarke, & E. Bendix Petersen (Eds.), Education policy and contemporary theory (pp. 87–98). London: Routledge.
Huppert, F. A., & So, T. T. (2013). Flourishing across Europe: Application of a new conceptual framework for defining well-being. Social Indicators Research, 11(3), 837–861.
Latour, B. (1983). Give me a laboratory and I will raise the world. In K. Knorr-Cetina & M. Mulkay (Eds.), Science observed: Perspectives on the social study of science (pp. 141–170). London: Sage.
Latour, B. (1986). Visualization and cognition: Thinking with eyes and hands. Knowledge and Society, 6, 1–40.
Latour, B. (2005). Reassembling the social – An introduction to actor-network-theory. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Lopez, S. J., & Gallagher, M. (2011). A case for positive psychology. In C. R. Snyder & S. J. Lopez (Eds.), Oxford handbook of positive psychology (pp. 3–6). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Mckay, F. (2013). Psychocapital and Shangri-Las: How happiness became both a means and end to governmentality. Health, Culture and Society, 5(1), 36–50.
Miller, P., & Rose, N. (2008). Governing the present. Cambridge: Polity Press.
Norrish, J. M. (2015). Positive education: The Geelong Grammar School journey. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Norrish, J. M., & Vella-Brodrick, D. A. (2009). Positive psychology and adolescents: Where are we now? Where to from here? Australian Psychologist, 44(4), 270–278.
Norrish, J. M., Williams, P., O’Connor, M., & Robinson, J. (2013). An applied framework for positive education. International Journal of Wellbeing, 3(2), 147–161.
Petersen, E. B., & Millei, Z. (2015). Psy-disciplinary cogs in the teacher education machine. Knowledge Cultures, 3(2), 127–145.
Peterson, C., & Seligman, M. E. (2004). Character strengths and virtues: A handbook and classification. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Reveley, J. (2013). Enhancing the educational subject: Cognitive capitalism, positive psychology and well-being training in schools. Policy Futures in Education, 11(5), 538–548.
Rose, N. (1996). Power and subjectivity: Critical history and psychology. In C. F. Graumann & K. J. Gergen (Eds.), Historical dimensions of psychological discourse (pp. 103–124). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Rose, N. (1999). Powers of freedom: Reframing political thought. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Seligman, M. E. (2008). Positive education and the new prosperity: Australia’s edge. Education Today, 8, 3.
Seligman, M. (2011a). Flourish: A visionary new understanding of happiness and well-being. London: Free Press.
Seligman, M. E. (2011b). Learned optimism: How to change your mind and your life. New York: Vintage.
Seligman, M. E. (2015a). Resilience training for educators. Retrieved from https://www.authentichappiness.sas.upenn.edu/learn/educatorresilience
Seligman, M. E. (2015b). Foreword. In Norrish, J. M. (Ed.), Positive education: The Geelong Grammar School journey (pp. ix–xiii). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Seligman, M. E., & Csikszentmihalyi, M. (2000). Positive psychology: An introduction. American Psychologist, 55(1), 5–14.
Seligman, M. E., Ernst, R. M., Gillham, J., Reivich, K., & Linkins, M. (2009). Positive education: Positive psychology and classroom interventions. Oxford Review of Education, 35(3), 293–311.
Usher, R., & Edwards, R. G. (2005). Subjects, networks and positions: Thinking educational guidance differently. British Journal of Guidance & Counselling, 33(3), 397–410.
Usher, R., & Edwards, R. (2015). Researching the ANT-ics of confessing. In A. Fejes & K. Nicoll (Eds.), Foucault and a politics of confession in education (pp. 106–118). London: Routledge.
Williams, P. (2011). Pathways to positive education at Geelong Grammar School. Integrating positive psychology and appreciative inquiry. AI Practitioner, 13(2), 8–13.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Copyright information
© 2016 The Author(s)
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Saari, A., Harni, E. (2016). Positive Education as Translation and Conquest of Schooling. In: Bendix Petersen, E., Millei, Z. (eds) Interrupting the Psy-Disciplines in Education. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-51305-2_6
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-51305-2_6
Published:
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London
Print ISBN: 978-1-137-51304-5
Online ISBN: 978-1-137-51305-2
eBook Packages: EducationEducation (R0)