Blog 3 — shanebeales.com

some musings on a book I have just read…

bell hooks – Teaching to Transgress: Education as the Practice of Freedom (1994) London: Routledge

Overall, this book has buttressed my sense of professional legitimacy.

Very early on in her introduction (p2), hooks speaks of her dream to be a writer. She knew she was destined to teach and write. Writing was the dream, teaching would be the job. This sets up a horizontal axis: bell hooks is the writer, Gloria Watkins the teacher. What follows is an account of the journey, struggle and ongoing work of proclaiming and establishing freedom as a black woman writer and teacher. This axis is most explicitly stated in chapter 4 where bell hooks and Gloria Watkins have a conversation with one another about the building on the work of Paulo Friere (pp 45-58).

What is striking is that hidden near the end of the introduction, hooks states:

“Teaching is a performative act. And it is that aspect of our work that offers the space for change, invention, spontaneous shifts, that can serve as a catalyst drawing out the unique elements in each classroom. To embrace the performative aspect of teaching, we are compelled to engage “audiences,” to consider issues of reciprocity. Teachers are not performers in the traditional sense of the word in that our work is not meant to be a spectacle. Yet it is meant to serve as a catalyst that calls everyone to become more and more engaged, to become active participants in learning.” (p11)

If I were to map this, I immediately think of a professional triangle of writer – teacher –performer:

This causes deep resonations for me as I have frequently described my professionality as being a “happy triangle” of writer-performer-academic. The reason I place it in this order is because my professional horizontal axis was that of writer-performer. I always set out to write and perform original songs; to establish and maintain a career as a writer-performer. That pursuit has always been accompanied (and funded) by peripatetic teaching, however for the longest time I saw them as separate occupational identities. Teaching was a ‘job’ and while I enjoyed it in the moment, my longing was to break out of the peripatetic classroom in order to become established as a be honest, I struggled to established as a full time writer-performer. This long hoped-for and long-contested struggle left me lacking a sense of professional legitimacy. I was somewhat embarrassed that my music was not ‘successful’ enough to provide a living, and somewhat resentful of the amount of time I was giving to work as a peripatetic teacher in order to earn enough money to survive in London. This did not resemble a happy triangle but was instead a ‘resentful and isolated binary!’

A few things began to shatter this order. In 2015 I became a father and began working part time at St Mary’s as Director of Worship; in 2016 I started working at ICMP as a songwriting lecturer; in 2017 I commenced a series of sessions with a psychologist Dr Carol Chapman; also in 2017 I commence an MA in Songwriting at ICMP; in 2018 I became the father of a second child – deferring my MA - and left completely high school peripatetic work; in 2019 I became a full time programme leader at ICMP and recommenced my MA; in 2020 I was granted extenuation for my final assessment due to the demands of the pandemic; in 2021 I completed my Masters in Songwriting; in 2022 I became an Advance HE Senior Fellow; in 2023 I had a series of interactions with music industry executives whilst supporting an in-demand student; I also performed for the first time in 5 and a half years; in 2024 I was promoted to Senior Programmes Manager and commenced the EdD.

In 2023 I first drew a “happy triangle” as writer – performer – academic:

The reason that this triangle is happy is because I am currently in a moment where have made peace with my writer, my performer and my academic, and they are now beginning to show up and contribute to one another’s spaces. My writer shows up in my academic work and in the performances of my songs; my performer give voice to my writer’s songs and shows up in my teaching and leading; my academic gives outlet for both my writer and performer and, best of all, earns a salary which means my writer and performer are freed from needing to be immediately confined by market forces in order to survive.

The other core way that Teaching to Transgress has impacted me is in centering the intersectional feminist perspective on matters of agency and legitimacy, advocating for boundary crossing, transgression and freedom. It has been profound to see hooks introduce the notion of ‘patriarchal masculinity’ as a defining label (the fuller version of being ‘white supremacist capitalist patriarchal masculinity’), differentiating this with 'feminist masculinity’. This also evidences issues of ‘patriarchal femininity’ - so prevalent in society and the music industry. Versions of female performativity that masquerade as feminist, but are in fact deeply rooted in, and re-enforcing patriarchal definitions of power, sex, objectification and the ‘male gaze’; and often simultaneously reinforcing white-supremacist capitalism. On this point, it is striking that in 2014 hooks challenged Beyonce’s adoption of feminism during her Lemonade tour (Braidotti, 2022; p2).

Building on these principles and going forwards hooks inspires me to embrace and adopt a position of ‘intersectional feminist masculinity’, a way of participating in hooks work as white-heterosexual-cis-male. In chapter 10 (pp129-163) hooks seeks to “provide a model of possibility...that white males can and do change how they think and teach”(p131, p132) to embrace and include white male professionals in the work of intersectional feminsim, through her dialogue with Ron Scapp, a white male philosopher and author of A Question of Voice: The Search for Legitimacy (2020).

“If we really want to create a cultural climate where biases can be challenged and changed, all border crossings must be seen as valid and legitimate. This does not mean that they are not subjected to critique or critical interrogation, or that there will not be many occasions when the crossings of the powerful into the terrains of the powerless will not perpetuate the existing structures. This risk is ultimately less threatening than a continued attachment to and support of existing systems of domination, particularly as they affect teaching, how we teach, and what we teach.” (p131)

In introducing her exchanges with Scapp, she comments “ Over the years, Ron and I have had many discussions about our role as critical thinkers, professors in the academy. Just as I have had to confront critics who see my work as “not scholarly, or not scholarly enough,” Ron has had to deal with critics posing the question of whether he is doing “real philosophy,” especially when he draws on my work and that of other thinkers who have not had traditional training in philosophy.”

I am grateful for this dialogue as indeed it legitimises both me and my agency in participating in the transgressive work of education as the practice of freedom.

The following are quotes that carry some resonances:

“The professor is something I become as opposed to an identity that’s already structured that I carry with me into the classroom” (p133).

“bh: One of the things that has connected us is that we both have a real concern with education as liberatory practice and with pedagogical strategies that may be not just for our students but for ourselves.

RS: Absolutely. That’s a nice way of understanding or describing how I, in fact, came to feel more and more comfortable about the role of professor.” (p134)

“Education as the practice of freedom” (p159)

On the mind/body split – “bringing the body into the academy challenges the way power has orchestrated itself in that particular institutionalised space.” (137)

“’Engaged’ is a great way to talk about liberatory classroom practice. It invites us always to be in the present, to remember the classroom is never the same.” (p158)

on “teaching to transgress”

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