Many things in Berlin's post challenged my thinking, or was something I feel has been swimming around in my head to which he gave words. First, his quote "rhetoric can never be innocent, can never be a disinterested arbiter of the ideological claims of others because it is always already serving certain ideological claims" is completely true. Teachers especially have heavy influences either by other teachers, thinkers, or writers that they adore, and these ideas that inspired them to be where they are definitely finds a way into their syllabuses and classroom. Essentially, the ideology that the teacher was taught in influences their rhetoric for better or worse.
This goes along nicely with his notion that a rhetoric is also influenced by the culture and time in which is is taught because "for social-spistemic rhetoric, the subject is itself a social construct." This too supports the idea of a "liberal pedagogy" because we can allow students to think outside the box, and in new ways that they are unaccustomed to within the walls of a classroom which is what the are faced with constantly in the new world of college. Also, by switching up the order of things and letting go of the authoritarian, dictator-like, teacher dominated classroom, it might just be the thing to get students engaged, and let them think they have the power. I think that might be the key to accomplish what we are reading about and talking about in class to really affect change: to find a way to make the students think they are running the show while we stay two steps ahead of them setting up props and traffic signs.
My ideas have been all over the board in regards to this post, but I think it is because Berlin has a real point, and I am somewhat buying into his idea. Not all the way of course because I was taught through weekly grammar quizzes and predominately lecture based college classes, but I am beginning to really see the difference between a writing class and a literature class and how one should definitely be more activity and student based. Like Dr. Kemp said at the end of class on Thursday, writing should be an attempt, feed-back, reattempt, more feed-back etc. and feel more like an ongoing conversation than a professional explaining words to a child.
From what I can tell, my background in English is somewhat similar to yours. I was instructed mostly through reading quiz evaluations, a few major papers a semester, and a tremendous amount of class discussion. I wish I had been given the opportunity to receive the conversational flow of criticism that students receive here. I think that Berlin buys into it, too. If we allow students to see where they are making mistakes more frequently, and we then give them the opportunity to correct those mistakes and make another attempt without consequence, we are enabling them to stand on their own two feet. I think that too often, we either knock students over and decide too soon that they are lost causes, or we let them rest on their laurels and float through a class. I think that Berlin's idea is that we challenge them constantly to grow, re-group, and get better. It makes sense logically...I just wonder how practical it is for classroom use.
ReplyDeleteI like how you wrote about Berlin's ideas about ideologies and rhetoric. I had an "ah ha!" moment when I was reading Berlin, too. We are influenced by our communities. Just like the article that we read earlier in the semester about learning communities. We are teaching the students to operate within the academic community. I definitely agree that letting go of the authoritation reins in the classroom will help the students out. Of course, it's going to involve, like you also said, lots of forethought and practice.
ReplyDelete