Teaching Philosophy
I draw from my prior work teaching theater and improvisation workshops in order to show students you must first pay attention to the language of another before making your own interpretation. To this end, I incorporate exercises that help students think on their feet, create stories, and build on their classmates’ ideas. Basic strategies I taught in improvisation workshops and include in my classes can be empowering for students who normally find participation difficult. For example, a core improvisation tenet is to choose to build on someone else’s interpretation—skit, thought, argument—rather than shutting it down. In introducing this principle to the classroom, students become advocates for diverse perspectives.
I find that this approach extends beyond class discussion to the practice of writing. I habitually begin each class with exercises that require students to revisit the text and revise their initial readings. I begin with attention to the formal features of texts: reading and re-reading slowly and carefully in order to see what emerges, breaks down, accumulates. I aim to show students how a single word or paragraph can yield new insights about narrative and genre, which in turn provides the foundation for a scholarly argument. I find these techniques particularly helpful when students begin to interrogate their own assumptions and beliefs about what a text yields.