Exploring geographical imaginaries of international student teachers

This chapter identifies how geographical imaginaries play into student teachers’ decision making of study and work abroad destinations, and explores how these predominantly collective, historic imaginaries are rooted in complex power relations, global hierarchies and postcolonialism. Drawing on two sets of data combining incoming and outgoing student mobility to and from Denmark and through the use of a mapping method, we explore student teachers’ geographical imaginaries, enclosing their preferences and per-ceptions of different places. This allows us to analyse students’ (implicit) geospatial asso-ciations and perceptions of where ‘good’ education and ‘proper’ knowledge come from. Exploring geographical imaginaries of international student teachers becomes of specif-ic importance and interest as our findings highlight global power relations between the providers of ideas, knowledge and practices and the implementers in specific educational contexts. Hence, this chapter serves as a jumping-off point for further critical reflection on how higher education internationalisation and the internationalisation of teacher training (re-)produce unequal, historically shaped perceptions and an uneven spread of mobilised knowledge.