Caught between the air and earth: a schizoanalytic critique of the role of the education in the development of a new airport

This philosophy of education paper describes a schizophrenic situation. A new airport is being planned in the locale of a university which is a Centre of Excellence of Education for Sustainable Development (ESD), and the university is a major partner. The airport involves an investment in jobs, resources, and will encourage further economic development. The planners have named the inter-connected developments around the airport as the 'Aerotropolis', including new university facilities. One could argue that the airport is a classic example of the 'Capitalocene', where capital rushes into a new project, and environmental costs are ignored. This paper will execute a schizoanalytic critique of the process, from the perspective of a university education researcher caught up in the rushing flows of capital. Schizoanalysis has been chosen as the educational methodology to analyse this situation, because the researcher is part of what is happening, and is turned inside out (schizo) by the designation in their region of the new airport. This paper is positioned in education between capital and the environment - it will describe from an insider's perspective what it is like to be possessed, evacuated, sold out, and exploited by capital.