In the midst of a pandemic and associated economic crisis, the social and ethical imperatives of critically engaged pedagogies are arguably more urgent than ever. Pedagogy is at risk within the neoliberal university, subsumed by a homogeneous free-market business ontology which frames subjects as entrepreneurial, enfolding us all in what we might call a ‘hidden curriculum’. Data-driven corporations are increasingly able to define for all of us what knowledge is; for them, the pandemic is an opportunity to gain even more control over the globalised ‘episteme’. How then, in the context of Art and Design education can we resist the forces of neoliberalism, and instead support a pedagogy which, as Coles suggests (2014), should provoke students ‘to demand equality for themselves and others’?

This paper presents a diffracted pedagogy, informed by the ongoing principles of Design Justice and a posthuman re-formulation of agency, questioning structural forces of technology (McQuillan, 20219) and avoiding what McQuillan describes as the framing of ‘society as categories of actuarial risk’ in which people's lives are filtered through ‘the epistemology of insurance and instrumentalism’ (ibid). This aligns with Giroux’s plurality of voices but also encompasses an extended concept of agency and process, as proposed by a posthuman, or Inhuman pedagogy. In particular, this paper critiques the colonial, not to say white supremacist, constructs which underpin ‘Design Thinking’, an approach to design and education which is still pervasive within UK Art and Design colleges and deeply embedded in the construction of teaching platforms. Examples of student- led platforms such as Strike Radio will be offered as a counter to the neoliberal academy.