17 Beyond the Human in Comparative and International Education: Exploring More-than-Human Relations Esther Pretti, Carrie Karsgaard, and Iveta Silova Introduction Various cosmologies across Africa, Asia, South America, and within diverse Indigenous knowledge systems recognize the animacy of non-human beings—whether vegetal, animal, viral, mineral, climatological, geological, or otherwise—emphasizing that all beings share vitality (Mbembe, 2019; Rufino, 2019). Considering the “liveness” and relationality of all beings, humans are understood as entangled with all beings, necessitating consideration of these relationships in all aspects of human life. Relatedly, many Indigenous knowledge systems understand being and knowing to be rooted in the land, tied directly to concrete places, and resulting in deep responsibilities to all beings that share these places (e.g., Marker, 2018; Burkhart, 2019). Western humanistic philosophy typically separates humans from non-humans—whether nature or technology—placing humans hierarchically above all else. Many scholars have pointed to the problematic nature of this worldview in causing planetary overexploitation and ecological disaster, instigating the Anthropocene (Taylor, 2017). More recently, however, posthuman theories have drawn on the work of Western scientists who recognize that humans are not in fact individual beings, but are less than half-human, the other half being composed of microscopic creatures upon whom our lives depend (Haraway, 2016). Relatedly, quantum physicists articulate how humans do not possess individual agency, but instead participate in action with the physical environment, in a dynamic form of agency (Barad, 2007). Artificial intelligence (AI) has only complicated our understandings of human supremacy further, as AI makes decisions independently of humans through logics that are not transparent to us, also informing our decisions in ways that are not always apparent. What would you think if we told you this chapter was co-written with an AI? 1 Would that change how you understand educational research? While most education research tends to focus on the human—on human perspectives, identities, experiences, and agencies—these examples indicate that perhaps we need to think beyond the human. As with many strands of education research, comparative and international education (CIE) is dominated by a Western humanistic philosophy that hierarchically places the human above other beings and traces the behavior of individuals as if we are not always already