Thoughts on Dialogism and Critical Reflection

Here are some thoughts that have emerged for me this week regarding critical reflection, spurred by Kay Halasek's notion of pedagogy as dialogic and answerable and Dale Jacobs' discussion of critical pedagogy and hope.

Pedagogy as an answerable act
“By seeing pedagogy as an answerable act, we
1. shift the focus on pedagogy from what we do (and what our intentions are in ‘doing’ teaching the way we do) to how our teaching is received, which, in turn, allows us to examine the ethics of teaching;
2. begin to examine pedagogy as practice, pedagogy in action—not pedagogy in theory;
3. see differently the reticence, resistance, and accommodation of students;
4. enlarge the responsibilities and contributions of students to pedagogy and the successes of classroom practice.
To this final end, a pedagogy of possibility is a student-generated (nnot simply student-centered) pedagogy in which students are given and expected to bear responsibility for the construction of the classroom and its goals” (Halasek 180).

Halasek’s study is all about applying Bakhtinian theory to composition studies. If we think of the classroom in the dialogic and heteroglossic way Halasek suggests we should, the CIQs offer us a way to stimulate the dialogue, to formalize it a bit more. I don’t think as it’s written now and as students use it now that they are really engaging us in a dialogue in which they’re equally invested. Still, we are asking them to exert those reflective and dialogic muscles. We’re asking them to acknowledge connections that go beyond this class, as well.

Critical pedagogy’s take on reflection

“This point is crucial to the way we think about both untested feasibility and hope: seeing material circumstances as opportunities for alternative approaches, engaging in both individual and collective agency (enmeshed as we have seen that they are), and then critically reflecting on those actions” (Jacobs, Dale. “What’s Hope Got to Do With It?” JAC 25.4 (2005): 791)

This article is about the role of hope in a critical pedagogy. Jacobs draws on Gabriel Marcel’s Being and Having, a theological statement in the spirit of liberation theology, that suggests that hope as opposed to ambition is social, collective in nature and force. One cannot exercise hope, Marcel suggests, purely for individual ends. And if we agree with this definition of hope, that collective impulse can help to organize our critical efforts. Critical reflection in the classroom is always aimed at communal ends. To take this a step further to answer our ongoing question about critical reflection and its nature and roles in the classroom, I think we are seeing a pattern. We lament the problem of our students seemingly offering us just enough “feedback” to shape the class to meet their interests and concerns, but we believe they are not reflecting in a way that signals collective goals or larger goals. What we are trying to do, then, is develop principles and practices that will move us as a class toward more collective ends and toward a more dialogic dynamic (to, again, draw on Halasek).

I want to offer one caveat here, however. I do not draw on critical pedagogy lightly. As an early instructor I found critical pedagogy engaging, motivating, connected to my already existing beliefs and goals as an educator. However, I do not delude myself about critical pedagogy in practice. I know that I cannot escape the power and authority that comes with being a sanctioned teacher in a US classroom. This is not Brazil and is not the barrio. Also, while I think perhaps Yoon takes her critique of the rhetoric of affect in critical pedagogy a bit too far, she is right to note that affect and a sense of right and wrong hold sway in critical pedagogy discussions.