Teaching Philosophy

My teaching philosophy stems from a combination of my readings in gender studies and public pedagogy theory, my university teaching experience, and my experience as an Allies trainer. Student experience and popular culture provide valuable teaching tools, especially in the field of women, gender and sexuality studies – which are based on grassroots movements and pedagogies of everyday life. I believe that a well-taught class is one based on literature, popular culture, and student experience(s?) in which lively discussion and interaction among students and professor build knowledge in a collegial atmosphere. For me, it is inherent to the curriculum of a course that requirements and designed curriculum as provided by state and federal guidelines, departments, and standardization across a discipline be combined intelligently and sensitively with the interests and experiences of the individual instructor and the unique students in the specific course. Within a given structure, room must always be made for adjustments based on current events, student ideas and interests, and collegial discussion around certain topics and concerns. The banking method of education is outdated and not appropriate for a dynamic field such as women, gender and sexuality studies; and students in classes in the women, gender and sexuality studies field need room to express their own ideas and share their experiences in order to find a way to combine interpretation, experience and activism in order to create knowledge and progress as independent thinkers. Judith Butler (2007) speaks to the problem of identity within movements related to gender and sexuality. She says that “to universalize, then, means first of all to render categories of sex obsolete in language” (p. 520). In describing the project of Wittig in advancing a feminine and lesbian position, Butler says “to ‘universalize’ the minority position . . .is to pluralize the feminine and the lesbian, to render existing categories of sex obsolete, to set up the plural feminine as an absolute subject, to produce a shock for the reader, any reader, and to conduct an assault of some kind” (p. 520-1). Ultimately, Butler describes the need to “dethrone the presumptive place of masculinity as the precondition for the articulation of the universal itself” (p. 522). Butler’s philosophy is extremely important to my teaching philosophy and my pedagogical practice, as I seek, especially through my incorporation of stories of my own experience and choices of media and literature to include in my courses, to question, queer and radicalize traditional and stereotypical notions of male and female and Western patriarchy. For example, I identify as female-to-male transgender, but I do not hold to stereotypical male tenets in my transition. I am not seeking some kind of dominance or power from a male position, nor is my transition based on some deemed lack or need that I perceive one sex to have over the other. Explaining this as experiential helps students to understand the social constructs of gender and gender roles in our society. Furthermore, reading texts such as Butler’s but also bringing in literature from authors such as Jeanette Winterson, Elizabeth Bishop, Leslie Feinberg, Richard Siken, and Genny Beemyn and Susan Rankin helps expose the notions of women and gender that are presumptive and have so often been universalized because of their minority position. Public pedagogy occurs in both institutional and informal sites of learning and is characterized in part by the leadership of public intellectuals in forming democratic learning communities (Jeanne Brady, 1998 & 2006; Jennifer Sandlin, et al, 2010 & 2011). “Public intellectual” may refer to specific individuals, though in feminist views of public pedagogy this construct often refers to grass-roots advocacy taken up by collaborative actors. I believe strongly that my classroom should always be a place where public intellectuals are students and students are public intellectuals. Every discussion had, every essay written, every text read and interpreted, should be an opportunity for grass-roots advocacy to be taken up by collaborative actors. The democratic social space of the classroom is one of wonder and awe. I am not a great being at the head of the class deemed worthy of filling empty minds with knowledge but a facilitator of adventure and exploration through worlds of gender and sexuality that may not have been considered by my students before but can be gotten to through many avenues of art, literature, and language. References Brady, J. F. (2006). Public pedagogy and educational leadership: Politically engaged scholarly communities and possibilities for critical engagement. Journal of Curriculum & Pedagogy, 3(1), 57-60. Brady, J. F. (1998). Critical feminist ethics in the multicultural debate. Cultural Circles, 2, 107-116. Butler, J. (1990/2004). Imitation and gender insubordination. In S. Salih & J. Butler (Eds.), The Judith Butler Reader (pp. 119-137). Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing. Sandlin, J., O’Malley, M. P., & Burdick, J. (2011). Mapping the complexity of public pedagogy scholarship: 1894-2010. Review of Educational Research, 81(3), 338-375. Sandlin, J., Schultz, B., & Burdick, J. (2010). Handbook of Public Pedagogy: Education and Learning Beyond Schooling. New York: Routledge.