Pedagogy has been theorised as a process of becoming, throughout history, as well as in contemporary research. In an interplay between literary configuration as a form of arts-based research and analysis based in philosophy of education, this dissertation explores the in-between of the educational relation within a specific human–horse relationship in order to examine, re-symbolise and re-negotiate the very presumptions of what pedagogy can become.

   I am interested in the educational possibilities in the relational processes of becoming when the Other is a horse and, further, how imaginaries, enabled by a questioning of the anthropocentrism of processes of becoming, can contribute to think pedagogy as a relational process of becoming, rooted in becoming-animal.

   Firstly, against the backdrop of a critique of the discourse on animality, I analyse becoming-animal in depth. By working with the concept of figuration, I investigate the processes of becoming between human and other-than-human. As Rosi Braidotti’s (2002) notion of becoming-animal informs this specific, enfleshed relation between human and horse, this lived relation also concretises the notion of becoming-animal.

   Secondly, in the light of a cartography of the power relation, I claim, in line with Patton (2003), that it is nonetheless possible for ethical relations to emerge in and through that relation. By linking the idea of ‘being faced by animals’, as developed in Matthew Calarco’s (2008) work with the idea of ‘being addressed’ as developed in Gert Biesta’s (2012) work, I see the horse’s face appear as an educational and ethical questioning.

   Thirdly, drawing on Luce Irigaray’s (1993) concept of difference, yet in another way, and displacing space for wonder to the relational space between human and horse, I highlight how processes of becoming-animal break through. Further, I explore how re-configurations offer possibilities of shaking the idea, rooted in human subjectivity, out of which the living is classified into the ‘ontological categories’ of ‘Human’ and ‘Animal’.

   In conclusion, I discuss how educational possibilities emerge in relational processes when the Other is a horse in two different yet transversal ways: firstly, through the lived relation to the Other and secondly, through possibilities for other-than-anthropocentric imaginaries.

   The dissertation not only contributes to the field of education, and more specifically within the field of philosophy of education concerning educational relations. It also contributes to the development of the field of horse studies within the fields of humanities and social science.

This paper explores the process of becoming within the relation between a human and a horse, and seeks to reimagine pedagogy as a relational process of ‘becoming-animal’. In order to emphasise the relational space between a horse and a human, I begin with an experimental style of writing that traces specific moments between an actual relation between a horse and myself. Considering the relation as a singularity in this way acts as a method through which the pedagogical relation can be explored and new pedagogical images can be suggested. I then move onto to discuss Rosi Braidotti's post-humanist ideas on becoming and link these to the ideas of the ‘event’ and of ‘beginnings’ within the educational theory of Gert Biesta, drawing out two lines of thought. One line follows Braidotti's work on becoming-animal, and the other Paul Patton's work on the nuances of power relations between humans and horses. In conclusion, I discuss how this figuration of a halter and a lead rope in the human–horse relation helps to think pedagogy as rooted in becoming-animal and how this contributes to the development of new imaginaries of becoming.

Min häst är inget verktyg utan en vän och vad vi utövar är att mötas och bli till i en pedagogisk relation. Han följer mig, men inte vem som helst. Jag följer honom, men inte hela tiden. Jag har en riktning, och ibland har han en annan riktning. Ibland är hans riktning till och med bättre, som när han vänder ifrån ett träsk eller ett moln av knott. Hans känslighet är starkare än min. Tack vare den, har jag tagit bort bettet från hans mun, tyglarna från min hand och börjat rida bara med ett rep runt hans bringa. Det hänger där som ett halsband. Jag kan trycka repet mot hans hals, men om han vill han kan lätt byta håll eller springa så fort han kan ändå. Med en posthumanistisk ansats belyser och reflekterar jag över hur både människa och häst överskrider sina varanden och hur det öppnar ett mellanrum med dimensioner av subjektivitet, kroppslighet och ömsesidighet. Syftet är att erbjuda ett lite annorlunda perspektiv på hur man kan förstå ett viktigt begrepp som pedagogiska relationer.