Pregnant Pedagogy

• In Event: M/othering a Bodied Curriculum: Emplacement, Desire, and Affect

Abstract

The purpose of this chapter is to theorize the experience of pregnancy as an embodied process of teacher decision-making that recognizes both the significance of curriculum theory, as well as the merit of exemplary instructional practices.

Lennard Davis (2002) suggests that we can reimagine the body in theory by expanding our thinking from postmodernism to what he calls “dismodernism,” a rethinking of our understanding of postmodern identity through disability. By studying the ways that disability has been constructed, we can explore “how all groups, based on physical traits or markings, are selected for disablement by a larger system of regulation and signification” (Davis, 2002, p. 29). Davis argues that, considering the initial construction of race, gender, and sexuality as well as the vast assortment of “conditions” (blindness, amputation, obesity, disfigurement, diabetes, attention deficit disorder, Asperger’s, learning disability, etc.) that are included under the category, disability presents us with a “malleable view of the human body and identity” (p. 26). Davis’ notion of “dismodernism” helps us understand how power has operated to construct the inequality of particular bodies, and the importance of the recognition that human bodies cannot and should not be standardized.

The idea that pregnancy is an evocative medium for the reconceptualization of curriculum is not intended to privilege this particular route to motherhood or to suggest that biology is a necessary component in re-interpreting curriculum in a meaningful way. I use this particular interpretation to illustrate that, in order to realize the potential of embodied pedagogy we must examine our own bodily experiences and use them to inform our educational philosophies. These practices emerge from a postmodern theoretical framework yet are not altogether unlike many of the “best practices” that appear in educational literature (see Scherer’s (2009) recent collection of articles on Engaging the Whole Child). Moreover, parallels can be seen between the kind of instructional inquiry embodied practices demand and the assertions of Paulus, Woodside, and Ziegler (2008), who recognize qualitative research as evolving, emergent, collaborative, and dialogic; and, the findings of Brandes and Crowson (2009) who reveal how isolation from and lack of understanding of our bodies and others impacts teacher’s abilities to help students become productive members of society.

In the current climate of high-stakes minimum competency accountability, it is more important than ever that we seek ways to bring public education into intimate, personal, pleasurable, and affective realms. We must do this if we hope to make public education into something generative, liberating, meaningful, and promising.

Author

• Julie Garlen Maudlin, Georgia Southern University