Three Dimensions of Care: Building Upon Feminine, Marxist-Feminist, and Black Feminist Approaches to Care

• In Event: Relational and Ethical Dimensions of Pedagogy

Abstract

Scholarship has demonstrated the importance of care to teachers’ practice (Hallinan, 2008; McKinney de Royston et al., 2017). Yet, various understandings of what constitutes care have been put forward, leading to different understandings of the commitments undergirding care, how that informs care in practice, as well as its implications. This conceptual analysis examines care through three conceptual lenses, which I characterize as follows: a feminine approach (Noddings, 1984), a Marxist-feminist approach, and a Black feminist approach. By comparing these three conceptions of care, I seek to understand the interventions they provide, the distinctions and overlap among them, and how they might build upon one another to contribute to a more robust understanding of care.

Author

• Abigail J Beneke, University of Wisconsin - Madison