Trauma and education in Lebanon: A decolonial perspective

Thesis

This dissertation explores the experiences of Lebanese educators between October 2019 and June 2021, a period of sustained disruption and hardship. Academic and professional literature about trauma in educational spaces originated in Western contexts, limiting its applicability in Lebanon, which suffers from volatile political, economic, health, and security conditions. Through a series of 17 semi-structured interviews conducted in May and June 2021, educators in Lebanon recounted their personal and professional experiences during a period of political unrest, economic collapse, the global COVID-19 pandemic, and the explosion of the Beirut port.

Findings illuminate the tensions between Western and Lebanese assumptions about trauma and its treatment. Through a decolonial lens, the ways in which Lebanese educators manage stress and trauma in their students are discussed, illuminating the importance of locally-embedded knowledge, such as shared experiences and communal resilience. This study demonstrates that local discussions of trauma in education evade dominant discourses of clinical trauma psychology, including Trauma Informed Education (TIE). Educators draw on locally embedded knowledge to generate their own framework for managing trauma in their classrooms. This study’s empirical and methodological advancements are transferrable to other contexts of education during periods of prolonged disruption.

Authors: Gonzales, A

• Type of award: MSc taught course
• Level of award: Masters
• Awarding institution: University of Oxford
• Language: English
• Keywords: CIE; Qualitative research; Lebanon; International; Interviews; Education; Decolonixation; CIE2021; Beirut; Critical theory; Trauma-informed education; NVivo; Trauma; Psychology; Comparative; Decolonial; Arabic; Thematic analysis
• Subjects: Qualitative research; Lebanon; International education; Interviews; Education; Trauma-informed education; Perspective; Comparative education