Transactional Mentoring: A Conception Based on John Dewey's Theory of Communication

• In Event: 35.082 - Roundtable Session 14
  In Roundtable Session: 35.082-5 - The Relevance of John Dewey to Today's Educational Research Environment

Abstract

The authors develop a ‘transactional’ account of mentoring, based on the theory of communication in John Dewey’s mature works. This account addresses two well-documented problems in mentoring communication: mentors’ frequently listen insufficiently and possess inadequate grasp of mentees’ situations and goals, particularly those of mentees from underrepresented groups; mentors’ motivations for entering mentoring relationships often remain unexamined, leaving room for hidden agendas leading to mentee harm. Conceiving mentoring communication as ‘transactional’ significantly reframes the standard interactional account as a blurring of identity boundaries between participants leading to subsequent revitalization of both. A ‘transactional’ account also involves genuine mutuality, reciprocity and equality of status within the mentoring communication situation, emerging from openness, vulnerability and creative imagination depended upon by both partners.

Authors

• Christine Wanjiku Nganga, The George Washington University

• Leonard J. Waks, Temple University