The ex-machination of teacher education: a genealogical critique of the politics of AI and the ‘responsibilities’ of teacher educators

Adopting a critical genealogical method inspired by Foucault, complemented by Shoshana Zuboff’s theorisation of surveillance capitalism, this article analyses the position of AI in education as a technology of governance within the forces of algorithmic futuring. In teaching, attention has turned to the challenges faced by the profession regarding the ethical use of AI in the classroom. However, much of this discourse neglects the inherent governing politics of these technologies as well as their inherent violence in reproducing systemic injustices. In part, this is symptomatic of a failure to observe the accurate historical positioning of AI as the result of convergences of several core vectors, characterised by their rise in the neoliberal era. Our analysis considers a range of official and media discourses underpinning the emergence of AI, and associated politics, within the current policy landscape related to teaching and teacher education. Our findings challenge AI’s ostensible novelty amid genealogies of corporate influence, rendered intelligible amid forces of datafication in education, and culminating in recent intergovernmental organisation discourses centred on transforming teaching and teacher education. We excavate a colonial ‘politics of ex-machination’ seeking to evolve an outmoded teaching profession and transforming teachers into techno-pedagogues and ethical gatekeepers.