Performative Vulnerability as a Classroom Strategy

A part of 5.2: Lightning Talk session.

Performative Vulnerability as a Classroom Strategy
Kate Maddalena, Assistant Professor, Teaching Stream, ICCIT, UTM

This session describes an exercise in performative vulnerability as a strategy for enlisting students as collaborators (rather than subordinates) in a classroom as a learning space for instructor and student (rather than only the latter). Specifically, I will describe my own desire, as a new settler in Canada, to actively learn about Canadian indigeneity by teaching the work of indigenous writers. I use a framing activity when I present my syllabus and then I re-introduce that frame as we approach 3 indigenous-authored readings. The performative vulnerable frame, which essentially asks students to help me learn, is easily adaptable to other courses and course content.