Arathi is a sociologist of education. Her current research examines reparative justice in educational systems and practices. How might collective recognition of past and present injustices help us imagine ‘reparative futures’ of education? What does reparation in education look like?
This line of inquiry has emerged from Arathi’s scholarship over a number of years which has illuminated the structural injustices of schooling systems. She has examined the politics of educational inequality in the Indian, Australian and UK contexts as well as the global governance of childhood and the family.
Underlying much of this research has been an abiding interest in the racial politics of education. Her scholarship has explored the active erasures of racism and coloniality in the field of education and the ways in which racial capitalism sustains educational injustices. Major collaborative works in these areas include: Learning Whiteness: Education and the Settler Colonial State (Pluto, 2022); Black Lives Matter and Global Struggles for Racial Justice in Education (Chicago, 2023); and Learning With the Past: Racism, Education and Reparative Futures (Unesco, 2020).
Prior to joining the University of Oxford, Arathi taught at the Universities of Bristol, Cambridge and Sydney. She is a co-convenor of the Race, Empire and Education Research Collective.
Funded Research Projects
Reparative Futures of Education (REPAIR-ED)
This is a five-year research programme (2023-2028) selected by the European Research Council and funded by UKRI Frontier Research. It involves collaborating with primary school-communities in the city of Bristol to conduct in-depth ethnographic and oral-history research on the features and mechanisms of structural inequities in education. The project uses its empirical findings to facilitate dialogues with schools, their communities, policy-actors and the broader public to explore how reparative justice in education might be conceptualised and enacted. It is motivated by the overarching question: what does reparation in education look like?
ESRC Centre for Sociodigital Futures
We live in a sociodigital world (the social and digital are interwoven). No single ‘future’ awaits us – there are many possible ‘sociodigital futures’. The Centre for Sociodigital Futures (CenSoF) brings together world-leading interdisciplinary expertise to explore sociodigital futures in-the-making to support fair and sustainable ways of life. Arathi is a member of the team whose work focuses on the sociodigital futures of education.
Global Advocacy for Anti-Racist Education
Global education policy frameworks have been silent on racism and coloniality, despite the overwhelming role of racial injustice in the maintenance of educational inequities across the world. This 8-year project, in partnership with Action Aid International, the University of Bristol, and a global consortium of anti-racist activists and educators, builds research evidence and a global movement for anti-racist education policy, systems and practices.
Research
Sriprakash, A., Rudolph, S., Gerrard, J. (2022) Learning Whiteness: Education and the Settler Colonial State. London: Pluto Press.
Walker, S., Strong, K., Wallace, D., Sriprakash, A., Tikly, L., Soudien, C. (2023) Black Lives Matter and Global Struggles for Racial Justice in Education. Comparative Education Review. 67(S1) Chicago University Press.
Sriprakash, A. (2012). Pedagogies for Development: the politics and practice of child-centred education in India. Dordrecht, Springer.
Hopkins, L. and Sriprakash, A. (Eds.) (2016). The ‘Poor Child’: the cultural politics of education, development and childhood. London, Routledge.
Welch A., Connell R., Mockler N., Sriprakash A., Proctor H., Hayes D., Foley D., Vickers M., Bagnall N., Burns K., Low R., and Groundwater-Smith S. (2017) Education, Change and Society, (Fourth Edition). Melbourne: Oxford University Press.
Takayama, K., Sriprakash, A., and Connell, R. (Eds.) (2017) Contesting coloniality: Re-thinking knowledge production and circulation in Comparative and International Education. Comparative Education Review, 61 (S1).
Gerrard, J. and Sriprakash, A. (Eds.) (2019) Migration, Borders and Education: International Sociological Inquiries. London: Routledge.
Sriprakash, A., Williamson, B., Facer, K., Pykett, J., & Valladares Celis, C. (2024). Sociodigital futures of education: reparations, sovereignty, care, and democratisation. Oxford Review of Education, 1–18. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/03054985.2024.2348459
Sriprakash, A (2022) Reparations: theorising just futures of education, Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education, DOI: 10.1080/01596306.2022.2144141
Gerrard, J. Sriprakash, A., Rudolph, S. (2021) Education and Racial Capitalism. Race, Ethnicity and Education DOI: 10.1080/13613324.2021.2001449
Myers, K., Sriprakash, A., & Sutoris, P. (2021). Toward a “New Humanism”? Time and Emotion in UNESCO’s Science of World-Making, 1947–1951. Journal of World History 32(4), 685-715
Facer, K. and Sriprakash, A. (2021). Provincialising Futures Literacy: a caution against codification. Futures. Vol. 133.
Sriprakash, A., Nally, D., Myers, K., and Ramos-Pinto, P. (2020). Learning with the Past: Racism, Education and Reparative Futures. Paper commissioned for the UNESCO Futures of Education report.
Sriprakash, A., R. Maithreyi, Akash Kumar, Pallawi Sinha & Ketaki Prabha (2020): Normative development in rural India: ‘school readiness’ and early childhood care and education, Comparative Education 56(3): 331-348
Sriprakash, A., Tikly, L., Walker, S. (2020) The erasures of racism in education and international development: re-reading the global learning crisis. Compare: Journal of Comparative and International Education. 50:5, 676-692
Sriprakash, A, Sutoris, P, Myers, K. (2019) The science of childhood and the pedagogy of the state: Postcolonial development in India, 1950s. Journal of Historical Sociology. 32 (3): 345-359
Rudolph, S. Sriprakash, A., Gerrard, J. (2018). Knowledge and Racial Violence: the shine and shadow of ‘powerful knowledge’. Ethics and Education 13:1, 22-38.
Maithreyi, R. and Sriprakash, A. (2018) The governance of families in India: education, rights and responsibility. Comparative Education. 54:3, 352-369.
Proctor, H. and Sriprakash, A. (2017) Race and Legitimacy: historical formations of academically selective schooling in Australia. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies. 43:14, 2378-2392.
Takayama, K., Sriprakash, A., and Connell, R.W. (2017) Towards a postcolonial comparative and international education. Comparative Education Review. 61 (S1): 1-24
Sriprakash, A., Qi, J., and Singh, M. (2016) The uses of equality in an elite school in India: enterprise and merit. British Journal of Sociology of Education. 38:7, 1022-1036.
Gerrard, J., Rudolph, S., and Sriprakash, A. (2016) The politics of post-qualitative inquiry: history and power. Qualitative Inquiry 23(5): 384-394.
Sriprakash, A., Proctor, H., and Hu, B. (2015). Visible Pedagogic Work: parenting, private tutoring, and educational advantage in Australia. Discourse: studies in the cultural politics of education. 37:3, 426-441.
Sriprakash, A. and Mukhopadhyay, R. (2015) Reflexivity and the Politics of Knowledge: educational researchers as ‘brokers’ and ‘translators’ of international development. Comparative Education. vol 51, no 2, pp 231-246.
Sriprakash, A. (2013). New learner subjects? Reforming the rural child for a modern India. Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education, vol 34, no 3, pp 325-337
Mukhopadyay, R. and Sriprakash, A. (2013). Target-driven reform: Education for All and the translations of equity in India. Journal of Education Policy, vol 28 no 3, pp 306-321
Sriprakash, A. (2011) The contributions of Bernstein’s sociology to educational development research. British Journal of Sociology of Education vol 32 no 4, pp 521-539.
Mukhopadyay, R. and Sriprakash, A. (2011) Global frameworks, local contingencies: policy translations and educational development. Compare: a Journal of Comparative and International Education vol 41 no 3, pp 311-326.
Sriprakash, A. (2011) Being a teacher in contexts of change: classroom reforms and the repositioning of teachers’ work in India. Contemporary Educational Dialogue vol 8 no 1, pp 5-31.
Sriprakash, A. (2010) Child-centred education and the promise of democratic learning: Pedagogic messages in rural Indian primary schools. International Journal of Educational Development vol 30 no 3, pp 297-304.
Sriprakash, A. (2009) ‘Joyful Learning’ in Rural Indian Primary Schools: an analysis of social control in the context of child-centred discourses. Compare: A Journal of Comparative and International Education vol 39, no 5, pp 629-641.
