Teaching, Friendship and Humanity by Nuraan Davids & Yusef Waghid

Author:Nuraan Davids & Yusef Waghid
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9789811572128
Publisher: Springer Singapore

Nussbaum (1990) highlights the inexplicability of what it means to love teaching for the sake of what it might yield or generate. Here, the teacher views him- or herself as a nurturer who remains committed to what teaching and learning demand, and hence, the wonder of an achievement—even under the most trying of circumstances. The conception of an educational encounter as an act of wonder is also depicted by hooks (1994, p. 13), when she argues that there is an aspect of ‘our vocation’ (our teaching), that is sacred; there are teachers ‘who believe that our work is not merely to share information but to share in the intellectual and spiritual growth of our students’. While hooks (2003) is acutely aware of the risks of alienation and division, which learners or students might experience in a classroom, she remains hopeful of the role schools could play in creating shared spaces of learning and community. Although schools can be sites of alienation, discomfort and violence, schools and teachers also provide catchments of safety and security—a sanctuary, physically, psychologically and emotionally.

Thirdly, participants in educational encounters take comfort in the intimacy of their relationships and endeavour to alter their imagined constructions justly (Nussbaum, 1990, p. 331). The point about alterity within educational encounters is to break with the taken-for-granted so that encounters can evolve into acts of togetherness where participants experience an attachment of hospitality and care for one another. The warmth and care for one another is not just about internalising feelings of cosiness and comfort but also about provoking one another to see things more imaginatively than before. This intimacy is evident in certain forms of engagement between teachers and students, where a student responds differently or more positively to particular teachers rather than to others. There are, of course, many factors, which influence the type of relationships and intimacy between teachers and students, but it is certainly the case that, where teachers make concerted efforts to get to know and understand their students, there is a greater chance of intimacy and reciprocity, and hence, motivation for both teaching and learning. In this regard, teachers do not see themselves in detached positions of authority, dictated by stringent restrictions of engagements and communication. Instead, teachers who recognise the inter-relationality of teaching and learning are intent on constructing their teaching as engagements of togetherness, where the relationship between themselves and their students shapes the encounter.

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