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Towards an Existentialist Account of Teaching

Brady, Alison; (2022) Towards an Existentialist Account of Teaching. In: Being a Teacher: From Technicist to Existential Accounts, in conversation with Jean-Paul Sartre. (pp. 181-185). Springer Nature Green open access

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Abstract

I begin the final chapter with an account from my own experiences of teaching. The purpose of this account is not to provide an ‘accurate’ depiction of teaching, nor to generalise the experiences of all teachers. Rather, it should serve as a point of resonance that demonstrates how and in what way Sartre’s ideas make sense in the classroom. Following this, I explore two ways in which this – and indeed any – account of teaching might be understood. Firstly, I discuss ‘technicist’ forms of account-giving that, with the aim of cultivating evaluative dispositions perpetuate an underlying assumption that connects accountability with accuracy. In contrast to this, I introduce what might be termed as ‘existential’ forms of account-giving, garnered from an engagement with Sartre. Ultimately, this can be thought of as an ongoing project of engagement with one’s responses in the classroom, and with the commitments made manifest in these responses and with one’s responsibility in light of this. Notwithstanding the complexity that this latter form of account-giving involves, new understandings of accountability and account-giving in teaching are invited, not as an imposed requirement or a skill, but as a way of being in the classroom.

Type: Book chapter
Title: Towards an Existentialist Account of Teaching
ISBN: 9811973229
ISBN-13: 9789811973222
Open access status: An open access version is available from UCL Discovery
DOI: 10.1007/978-981-19-7323-9_9
Publisher version: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-19-7323-9_9
Language: English
Additional information: This version is the author accepted manuscript. For information on re-use, please refer to the publisher's terms and conditions.
Keywords: accountability, teaching, responsibility, evidence-based education, existentialism, Sartre
UCL classification: UCL
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Education
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Education > UCL Institute of Education
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Education > UCL Institute of Education > IOE - Education, Practice and Society
URI: https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10210086
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