Critical Consent Curriculum: Towards Ethical Self-Empowerment in Schools

Thinking at the intersections of curriculum theory and sound studies, this article explores what the author has named a “critical consent curriculum.” This paper traces the many reverberations of sociopolitical and cultural norms that not only devalue consent as a critical part of schooling, but how the absence of such dialogues in teacher education programs and schools has, in many ways, normalized the milieu of nonconsensual relations and relationships as they are expressed across educational contexts and communities. Alongside an analysis of several “samples” from sonic ethnographic studies, this paper serves as a call to action for teacher education programs to enmesh a critical consent curriculum and, relatedly, curriculum studies across teacher education programs. This is not an “either/or” argument but, rather, a “both/and” dialogue about how this proposed lens to education would impact everyday intra-actions in schools by foregrounding consent.