Fixing teachers’ problems? exploring teachers’ repair and maintenance work around generative AI technologies
Ljungqvist, Marita LU ; Sonesson, Anders LU
and Selwyn, Neil
LU
(2026)
In Discourse
p.1-12
- Abstract
- The promise that AI tools will relieve teachers of tedious tasks and liberate time for more ‘valuable’ work with students has become a dominant narrative. However, the implementation of automated technologies raises questions around how human labour is implicated and situated in these processes. From the perspective of maintenance and repair studies we approach the often-hidden labour that teachers undertake when engaging with generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) technologies. Drawing on interviews with Swedish teachers we expose the tools’ inherent limitations in teaching contexts, and highlight the pedagogical, social, and moral dimensions of educational practice. We argue that these essentially inexplicable and ungeneralizable... (More)
- The promise that AI tools will relieve teachers of tedious tasks and liberate time for more ‘valuable’ work with students has become a dominant narrative. However, the implementation of automated technologies raises questions around how human labour is implicated and situated in these processes. From the perspective of maintenance and repair studies we approach the often-hidden labour that teachers undertake when engaging with generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) technologies. Drawing on interviews with Swedish teachers we expose the tools’ inherent limitations in teaching contexts, and highlight the pedagogical, social, and moral dimensions of educational practice. We argue that these essentially inexplicable and ungeneralizable aspects of teaching – grounded in teachers’ situated awareness, professional experience, and tacit knowledge – cannot be codified or reduced to training data. Our results demonstrate the need for a radical rethinking of the forms of AI that education could benefit from – and those it should resist. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
https://lup.lub.lu.se/record/6d620283-47dc-49ef-80a3-9727fd605fed
- author
- Ljungqvist, Marita
LU
; Sonesson, Anders
LU
and Selwyn, Neil
LU
- organization
- publishing date
- 2026-04-16
- type
- Contribution to journal
- publication status
- epub
- subject
- keywords
- GenAI, maintenance and repair, human-digital entanglements, teachers, education, tacit knowledge
- in
- Discourse
- pages
- 12 pages
- publisher
- Routledge
- external identifiers
-
- scopus:105035902497
- ISSN
- 0159-6306
- DOI
- 10.1080/01596306.2026.2657793
- project
- Teachers and teaching in the age of AI and digital automation
- language
- English
- LU publication?
- yes
- id
- 6d620283-47dc-49ef-80a3-9727fd605fed
- date added to LUP
- 2026-04-19 14:21:12
- date last changed
- 2026-07-13 04:01:03
@article{6d620283-47dc-49ef-80a3-9727fd605fed,
abstract = {{The promise that AI tools will relieve teachers of tedious tasks and liberate time for more ‘valuable’ work with students has become a dominant narrative. However, the implementation of automated technologies raises questions around how human labour is implicated and situated in these processes. From the perspective of maintenance and repair studies we approach the often-hidden labour that teachers undertake when engaging with generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) technologies. Drawing on interviews with Swedish teachers we expose the tools’ inherent limitations in teaching contexts, and highlight the pedagogical, social, and moral dimensions of educational practice. We argue that these essentially inexplicable and ungeneralizable aspects of teaching – grounded in teachers’ situated awareness, professional experience, and tacit knowledge – cannot be codified or reduced to training data. Our results demonstrate the need for a radical rethinking of the forms of AI that education could benefit from – and those it should resist.}},
author = {{Ljungqvist, Marita and Sonesson, Anders and Selwyn, Neil}},
issn = {{0159-6306}},
keywords = {{GenAI; maintenance and repair; human-digital entanglements; teachers; education; tacit knowledge}},
language = {{eng}},
month = {{04}},
pages = {{1--12}},
publisher = {{Routledge}},
series = {{Discourse}},
title = {{Fixing teachers’ problems? exploring teachers’ repair and maintenance work around generative AI technologies}},
url = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/01596306.2026.2657793}},
doi = {{10.1080/01596306.2026.2657793}},
year = {{2026}},
}