Short abstract:

We explore how datafication of the English population from the age of 4, with national standardised digital testing of pupils’ early numeracy and literacy skills which excludes assessment of competence in any language other than English, reinforces a narrow economic and mono-linguistic nationalism.

Long abstract:

This paper presents the contemporary case study of the RBA (Reception Baseline Assessment), an algorithmically-driven national test of all four year-olds in England introduced in 2021 by the Department for Education, as an example of new ways in which digitalisation can reproduce and reshape nationalism. From 2028, the data from this assessment will be added to the existing national systems by which primary schools are held accountable (Roberts-Holmes and Kaufmann). We argue that this test, which focuses on early numeracy and literacy skills but is conducted exclusively in English, is underpinned by an algorithm that excludes linguistic diversity, producing political assemblages that are both driven by and generative of a neoliberal monocultural national identity. Nationalistic discourses are evident in this sociotechnical system which communicates and stabilises monolingual norms in schools rather than acknowledging and embracing the diverse linguistic heritages of parts of the population. The RBA forms part of a broader picture of international testing which promotes economic nationalism (Mihelj and Jiménez-Martínez, 2020), pitting nations against each other in a skills race.

Such national datafication also generates new forms of digital territory, extending the boundaries of the nation into cloud-based realms and creating new spaces of extraction (Mohamed et al., 2020). It generates new power dynamics between the nation-state and its populace, as data is mined from even its youngest citizens without their consent, a different imaginary from the pre-datafication era when citizens entered into a more transparent relationship with the state as guardian rather than neocolonialist extractor (Zembylas, 2023).