Freedom Through Restriction?:Merleau-Ponty, Dewey, and Foucault on Habit-Formation

For the past ten years, I have been researching the relationship between digital devices, attention, and distraction as these phenomena coalesce and intertwine in the classroom. In that period, I have become increasingly intrigued with the idea that contemporary schools should be concerned with educating students’ attention. As Joris Vlieghe (2017) puts it, “the core task of education is precisely to form attention, in the sense of disciplining people who are not inclined to sit still for say an hour” (p. 402). While critical educational scholars are likely to balk at the notion of ‘disciplining’ students and ‘forming’ their attention, the purpose of this chapter is to provide a postphenomenological defense of this idea. To do so, I want to discuss habit-formation. I first draw on phenomenology and pragmatism to argue that habit-formation constitutes an inescapable aspect of human existence. I then move on to discuss why critical educational scholars are skeptical about educational habit-formation or ‘discipline’. Finally, however, I turn to my own research on digital distraction to argue that, to the extent that contemporary attention is conjoined with tech habits, it makes good sense to talk about disciplining attention.