The idea of education focuses on passing what is good in our world to the generations that arrive as newcomers. With the newcomers, the world is renewed (Arendt 1961): changed while preserving what is valuable in it. This view has recently been re-invigorated in the debate on instrumentality in education. In one instance, Hodgson, Vlieghe and Zamojski (2017) evoke the notion of "love to the world" (as opposed to "hate," which they ascribe to critical pedagogy) as the foundation of post-critical education, focused on things of concern around which passionate teaching can unite students and teachers.

In this symposium, we juxtapose this way of seeing education with the global situation in which more and more children are displaced. In most cases, education for newcomers who are refugees and asylum seekers is planned with repatriation in mind (Dryden-Peterson & Reddick, 2017; Ferede, 2018). However, in the face of climatic catastrophe and prolific wars, repatriation frequently becomes impossible. If those children stay in receiving countries, "things of concern" of their new teachers may differ radically from those of their parents or themselves. How do we conceive of education for next generations in this context?

Next, as typically construed in trans-generational pedagogical narratives, is one who arrives later. In this symposium, we are exploring "nextness" in a broader sense, both in temporal and spatial terms. We want to stress that ”next” also arrives spatially, as "next to us", neighbour or alien. This perspective opens to broader ethical and political issues. What is education when its next generation – one to inherit the world -- is both temporal and spatial? When its newcomer children are not only arriving after us but are, at the same time, neighbors or aliens to us? What is it, then, that needs passing on, what can be passed on, and what is worth passing for the sake of "us”, or for "them," and for the world itself?

The symposium proposed to the Philosophy of Education Network will be organized in two sessions.

In Session 1, we explore what next generation means, in times of existential threats when having children is becoming an ethical issue, by interrogating the concept of "nextness" in spatial and temporal terms (Kalisha). Children who arrive, arrive “thrown”, while the challenge for educators is creating conditions for their dwelling (Parker). We ask whether education can provide space for educators taking ethical responsibility which requires that what we know as pedagogical tact in Herbart becomes multicultural tact (Hilt & Rompianesi). Finally, we discuss empirical data on teachers' ethical dilemmas and possibilities while teaching newcomers in an introductory class in Norway (Gudmundset & Brøvig Østby).

Arendt, H. (1961). The Crisis in Education. In Between Past and Future: Eight Exercises in Political Thought. The Viking Press. Bauman, Z. (2003). Wasted lives: Modernity and its outcasts. Wiley. Biesta, G. (2021) World-centered education: A view for the present. Routledge. Derrida, J. (2000) Of Hospitality. Stanford: Stanford University Press. Edelman, L. (2004). No Future: Queer theory and the death drive. Duke University Press. Heidegger, M. (1996) Being and time: A translation of Sein und Zeit. SUNY Press. (Original Hodgson, N., Vlieghe, J., Zamojski, P. (2017). Manifesto for a Post-Critical Pedagogy. Latour, B. (2018). Down to earth: Politics in the new climatic regime. (C. Porter, Trans.). Polity Press. Levinas, E. (1998). Entre Nous. Thinking of the Other. Colombia University Press. Lippitz, W. (2007). Foreignness and otherness in pedagogical contexts. Phenomenology and Practice, 1 (1), 76-96. Mollenhauer, K. (2013). Forgotten Connections: On Culture and Upbringing (N. Friesen, Trans.). London: Routledge. Nail, Th. (2015) The Figure of the Migrant. Stanford: Stanford University Press Ranciere, J. (1999). Disagreement. University of Minnesota Press. Steinbock, A.J. (1995). Home and beyond: Generative phenomenology after Hüsserl. Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press. Van Manen, M. (1991). The tact of teaching: The meaning of pedagogical thoughtfulness. Althouse Press.