Learning as relational: intersubjectivity and pedagogy in higher education

Abstract

The decision to make the UK student population financially responsible for their own university education has major implications for the future of higher education provision. Chief among these implications will undoubtedly be a much stronger emphasis on the student experience, not least the experience of the teaching and learning environment. Given the increasing influence of consumerism on student identity, the distinct possibility exists that such notions of market-led accountability will be first in line to shape how the academic–student relationship is redefined and understood in future years. It is therefore an appropriate time to explore alternatives to such a narrow understanding of relationships—an understanding that inevitably tends to frame direct accountability in terms of economic exchange. It is argued in this paper that one alternative can be developed by exploring a more relational approach to HE pedagogy, and more specifically one that is based on a synthesis of critical theory and psychoanalysis. By emphasising the intersubjective nature of learning and teaching and the role of emotions in this regard, the paper argues that a relationally centred approach takes seriously questions of trust, recognition and respect at the heart of the academic–student relationship, while also making space for doubt, confusion and relational anxiety.

Notes

1. In his paper ‘The Capacity to be Alone’ (1958), Winnicott sets out the stages, beginning with dependence, leading to being alone together, and on towards self-realisation and autonomy. Klein’s (1946) contribution to psychoanalytic theory was to draw on Freud’s work with adults and apply it to the analysis of very young children as well as adults, giving her an enormous breadth of experience which led her to identify the paranoid-schizoid and depressive positions from which we relate to others. This work allowed Klein to demonstrate that powerful developmental infantile processes remain present throughout adulthood.

2. The development of this elementary form of self-relation is the bedrock of his theory of recognition; without it, there could be no development of more advanced self-relations (self-respect and self-esteem). As Thompson puts it (2006: 20), without love, ‘respect and esteem are impossible’. Importantly, Honneth recognises that, while the first form of recognition is vital to human existence, the second and third form of self-relation are products of historically changing relations. As Anderson (1995: xiv) states, the ‘ways in which both respect and esteem are accorded have undergone a significant historical transformation’. It is also important to consider the environments and situations within which the achievements of these various levels of self-relation take place, which are family (love), civil society (rights) and the state (solidarity) (Huttunen 2007: 424). The second level of recognition relates to the striving by the individual for self-respect, the experience of which enables an individual to view him or herself as a ‘subject with dignity and with moral autonomy’ (Stojanov 2007: 78). According to Thompson (2006: 76), Honneth’s understanding of the third level of recognition, self-esteem, is that individuals have the opportunity to earn esteem if ‘their particular traits and abilities are in tune with the values of their society’. The allocation of social esteem enables a person to ‘articulate those personal features and capabilities’ through which they can make a valuable contribution to social life, which in turn provides the basis upon which they can become worthy members of society (Stojanov 2007: 78).