Oppression, Liberation, and Encouragement: Oh My!

Walking into my classrooms this week:

Me: 
Is everyone happy impromptu presentations are over?
Class:

Me:
Who's ready for persuasive presentations to start next week?
Class:


Bless their hearts.

After every speech assignment, I have a collective meeting with my students to explain the reason why we do these assignments in particular ways. I find myself repeating how "Yes, this assignment will actually help you in life, let's talk about some examples of how you can utilize your new found skills." I don't want to be the instructor who says "Do this assignment because I say so" (although it's very tempting).

Sometimes, however, I have trouble with constructing the "usefulness" of these skills. This is because our students come from so many different places: high/low communication anxiety, international students, different socioeconomic statuses, different races/ethnicities, various gender portrayals. How can I come up with a way to connect with ALL of these students?

While reading Pedagogy of the Oppressed, I immediately started thinking about COMM 1010's persuasive presentation assignment. Freire stated "This, then, is the great humanistic and historical task of the oppressed: to liberate themselves and their oppressors as well. . Only power that springs from the weakness of the oppressed will be sufficiently strong to free both" (p. 44). Since our students will be discussing various social issues, this quote is so fitting.

For this particular assignment, I took the direction of not wanting to tell anyone what they cannot say. Instead, I'm keeping a close eye on how they say it. I want my students to explore topics that are interesting to each of them. Because they all come from such different backgrounds, I don't want to stifle any of them further to fit my comfort level.

As hard as it is to think of my students as "oppressed" because of the optimist inside of me, many of them are in different ways. Many of my students want to discuss issues that they have faced in their daily lives because of oppression. I do not want to tell my students not to discuss a certain topic because it may make some members of the class uncomfortable. Instead, I want my students to talk about the subjects that matter to them in a way that doesn't marginalize or blame others. #languageskillz

Now here's where some #happyhappyjoyjoy comes into play: in order to allow our students to speak in ways that are "liberating", we get to encourage them. Many of our students just started college and do not understand the power that their language can have, which can be terrifying or liberating. Our excitement and investment in our students ideas can not only create amazing speeches, but better human beings. WOAH. Our encouragement of their voices, words, and perspectives will carry far beyond the classroom and into their real lives.

The other really cool thing about encouraging our students to voice their perspectives is that the audiences in the classrooms will learn something new. Those who are oppressed can open the minds of various "oppressors", or even those who are oppressed in different ways. It's like a wave of #happy and #liberation, y'all.

I hope that all of you find these persuasive presentations in the following weeks to be freeing, to be insightful, and to fill you with #joy for your students.

-Tay

Freire, P. (1972). Pedagogy of the oppressed. New York: Herder and Herder.