Download PDFConclusion and Implications for Graduate Teaching Assistantship
My discussion on the two case studies above shows how pedagogies that foster critical consciousness necessarily involve different forms of identity work. First, the teacher’s identity is a useful pedagogical resource, both to build rapport with students and as a starting point toward analyses of systems of oppression that can then be applied to the students’ situation. Second, the reparative practice necessary to counter negative effects resulting from an acute awareness of oppression calls for identity work on behalf of the student, that is, reframing the student’s subjectivity in positive terms toward empowerment and repair.
The intimacy of identity work is why a focus on one-on-one teacher-student interactions is important. While critiques on systems of oppression can be made available through readings, the ways that students have experienced oppression are varied and textured, and teasing out the specificity of their own lived experience is useful for them to practice reading their own world. Individual interactions are even more important in reparative practices. Students may react to a critical reading of a difficult experience in very different ways, both positive and negative, and for different reasons specific to their personalities and prior experience. How the teacher should reframe the student’s subjectivity (or even if such reframing is needed) will also differ depending on individual situations.
Whether for critical or reparative practices, international GTAs are uniquely positioned to intervene. Their position as “foreigners”—and often ones who are racially, linguistically, culturally, and epistemically marginalized—may sensitize them to systems of oppression. As graduate students, they may be at the receiving end of Eurocentric, monolingual, or otherwise exclusionary pedagogies. In turn, this lived experience may spark critical consciousness in the course of their studies, a critical consciousness they can then share with their own students in their role as TAs. In interactions with students who share some of their marginalizations, international GTAs are particularly well-resourced both for critical and reparative practices due to the empathy and ethos brought by their identity and lived experience.
The position that international GTAs occupy can work better as a pedagogical resource if used consciously and strategically, both for critical and reparative practices. This means being attentive to opportunities offered in one-on-one teacher-student interactions, such as student conferences, written and oral feedback, tutoring, and casual conversations before and after class. Every teacher-student interaction is an opportunity for critique and repair, and being intentional about the identity work implicated in those interactions will help direct such critical and reparative practices, balancing them and making them more impactful.