School Education, Psychology and Subjectivity

This book advances a cultural-historical understanding of school learning through Fernando González Rey’s Theory of Subjectivity. Moving beyond representations that reduce learning to cognitive, operational, or individual processes, it develops a conception of learning as a subjective process in which symbolic and emotional processes are inseparably articulated with learners’ life histories, relationships, and the social spaces in which they participate. The book critically revisits contributions from cultural-historical psychology, particularly those of Vygotsky, Bozhovich, and Lomov, as a basis for expanding prevailing understandings of school learning. It then develops the concepts of subjective sense, subjective configuration, social and individual subjectivity, and subject to examine the complex and singular ways in which learning is subjectively configured. The learner is understood as an active participant in the production of subjective processes that may open new possibilities for learning and development. This perspective also provides new ways of understanding learning difficulties and disability beyond their individualization, pathologization, and medicalization. Through theoretical discussion and empirical cases, the book explores how individual and social subjectivity are recursively articulated in classrooms, schools, families, and other social spaces, and how relationships, pedagogical practices, and institutional dynamics participate in learning. Particular attention is given to comprehensive and creative learning, the learner’s emergence as a subject, and the possibilities for learning to become a source of subjective development. Finally, the book explores implications for educational practice, teacher education, family–school relationships, and the education and professional practice of psychologists. Addressed to researchers, professionals, and students in psychology, education, and related fields, School Education, Psychology and Subjectivity: A Cultural-Historical Approach offers a framework for understanding school learning in its complexity and its relationship to subjectivity and human development. This is an English edition of a book originally published in Portuguese. The translation of the original manuscript into English was done with the help of artificial intelligence. The author, with the support of Daniel Goulart and Bruno Cobucci, subsequently revised the translation further to ensure its technical and conceptual accuracy and to refine the text stylistically.