Currently reading Eggert et al. (2025) on “Teaching to say ‘no’: pedagogies of refusal in the social sciences classroom (and beyond)”

This article sounds so relevant: How do we teach to say “no” to unethical or harmful behaviour (and, in extension, future research (which is where the authors are heading), or maybe, me thinks, participating in other collective harmful behaviour towards, for example, the climate)? This comes from a very different disciplinary context from mine, so I am struggling a bit with transfer…

Eggert et al. (2025) discuss refusal in research (which is what we want to teach our students) as something that is not a binary decision of staying or leaving, but as something that should be focussed on the well-being of the participants, and that can (and should, when appropriate) happen at any stage of the research process, from formulating a question, selecting methods, to disseminating results; that can reorient towards justice, equity, inclusion; “teaching refusal reshapes our understanding of the research process, and in particular of power, agency, and responsibility within it“. As they cite Freed (2025) which I haven’t read: “the emotional work is part of the work” (Wow, that is so powerful, especially after a day at work where the emotional work definitely was part of the work, which I did not realise or acknowledge until just now!). Teaching refusal is also a collaborative enterprise that needs to be co-created with students, research participants, and the wider community, as a collective responsibility, not a “process of personal introspection“.

But how to teach it then? Eggert et al. (2025) suggest creative methods like drawings, pictures, collages, games, role play, films, music, etc; since “refusal has a performative element built into it, as it is not simply about saying ‘no’, but then also performing that ‘no’“. I had really no idea what that could mean in practice, but I found some examples in the references, for example Tuck & Yang (2014), describing how erasing the victims of lynching from pictures moves the focus on the people that were looking at them (and likely lynching them right before), on everything else that is in plain view but would never be in focus. The suggestion there is to, also in other research contexts, take pictures of an intended research space and erase the main object to gain new insights (that is such a cool idea!), which often leads to changing research questions because the old ones suddenly feel wrong. Thinking about this, there are many points where we, also in my line of research, can ask ourselves whether we really need to ask for all the data we routinely ask for and explore all topics, does it possibly do more harm than it helps by, for example, invading privacy (even if perfectly legally) or triggering bad memories? Of course, often it is not clear-cut what causes harm and what does not, and there is always the potential for unforseen and unintended consequences. But how do we try to prevent harm in our pursuit of research? Such a relevant question that we need to constantly keep asking ourselves…

Eggert, J. P., Hagen, J. J., & Turner, L. (2025). Teaching to say ‘no’: pedagogies of refusal in the social sciences classroom (and beyond). Teaching in Higher Education, 1-10. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/epdf/10.1080/13562517.2025.2518395

Pictures in this post were taken at Active Divers’ summer camp. Starting on Friday evening, when some people set up the dive rig and my only contribution was swimming out with them to where it was going to be moored over night, and take pictures…

But someone has to take night swimming wave pictures!

And look-at-my-shadow-on-the-ground-of-the-quarry-and-the-waves-around-my-head pictures!

Or weird split shots of the rest of the group getting ready to dive and the ground of the quarry (where the old road used to go down into it).

The quarry is pretty cool — this is what the edges look like: Really sharp angles from where the pieces of rock were cut, and some trees that grew there before the quarry was flooded.

I am not used to diving on the dive rig (usually I train on buoys), but here is what it looks like. The “candy cane”, marking the part of the dive line that you are allowed to pull yourself up on after a turn, the safety diver touching the line to feel the carabiner from my lanyard moving on the line, and the shadow of the platform.

Coming up a bit higher, you can also see the frame that supports the dive line.

Someone else diving on a buoy (with very awesome fins!)

And always fun to watch: someone pulling up the dive line and bottom weight, and the second person crocheting the line so it doesn’t end up in one big knot when it is stowed into the buoy.

And here is someone giving an “ok”-sign to their safety diver.

Always fun to swim out behind someone, just following the bubbles they make by finning in the surface…

Speaking of bubbles… Of course there have to be bubble rings when I am involved! Again at the dive rig, as you can see from the lack of buoys at the top end of the dive line… And by the safety holding on to the rig, trying to swim out of my picture.

Preparing for a dive by breathing up in the surface!

I don’t like it when a safety diver comes down to meet me, it looks so creepy when they suddenly appear in the green water (and since we are not supposed to look up, but only straight ahead at the line, they seem to suddenly appear out of nowhere).

More bubble rings! I am always a bit disappointed when they fall apart into lots of small bubbles, but at the same time that looks pretty awesome, too!

Don’t know where all these bubbles came from, did I really make such a bubble mess? But in any case, safety diver is always watching!

And someone breathing up…

Diver and safety coming up!

Sometimes I forget that water is also awesome when just looked at it from the outside! Especially in such awesome weather and with the super photogenic yellow buoys in it!

Diver going down!

And coming up with a safety. Love looking at waves from below!

Isn’t it awesome, especially with the light flooding through it?

And a diver going down!

Now surface from below, light, and a safety feeling the line to keep track of a diver.

More light and bubbles!

And a little wave watching to end this post…