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Redefining classroom authority: A dance among strangers
Abstract
This is a report of an ethnographic study of a graduate level Methods course for ESL/Bilingual teachers at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. The course is organized around task-based, small group, facilitative and collaborative learning. One of the intriguing aspects of the course is the opportunities it provides for students to identify, understand and critique the ways that they share power and authority with each other and with the course professor. This research investigates the early inception of the role of facilitator within this complex educational practice. The role is purposefully under-defined so that facilitators can experiment with it, and turn it into something that has meaning for them. My research questions address the enactments or "dance" of authority--how it is experienced, voiced and shared by facilitators and students in this classroom community. I have developed a theoretical framework for three concepts or "modes" of authority and their consequent acts. They are: compassionate authority, involving the act of imaginatively taking up positions for one another (Jones, 1993); scholarship authority--the act of reframing and generating theories of the facilitation practice in order to understand and critique this pedagogy (Christ, 1987); and inventive authority--the act of creating, finding and remembering the substance of discourse (Lefevre, 1986). These modes of authority are mutually sustaining, and when converged steer us away from conceiving of authority dichotomously. Drawing on the notions of positioning (Carbaugh, 1994b) and intertextuality (Bloome & Egan-Robertson, 1993), I highlight the distinctive social positions that are created discursively when students uphold, reject and resist these modes of authority. The findings reveal that authoritative relationships at this site are contingent, patterned in moment-by-moment changes and often asymmetrical. The findings also reveal that the interactions constitute a balancing act--a power of balance--among the three modes of authority. Ultimately, this study should provide insights into discourses of compassion, critique and invention in multicultural and multilingual education.
Subject Area
Curricula|Teaching|Bilingual education|Multicultural education|Cultural anthropology|Teacher education|Educational sociology
Recommended Citation
Jeannot, Mary T, "Redefining classroom authority: A dance among strangers" (1997). Doctoral Dissertations Available from Proquest. AAI9737545.
https://scholarworks.umass.edu/dissertations/AAI9737545