The Teaching and Learning of STS in an International Context

• In Event: Global STS in Deglobalization of the World

Abstract

STS is a wayward child. Spurning its parents, sociology and philosophy, it embraced the interdisciplinary epistemological wave of the 1970s. Almost five decades later, however, the paradigm of STS is confronted by the challenge of making sense to a public that has not been trained in its ways. How can its methods and conceptual armoury be relevant beyond its Western origins? Similarly, how do we teach STS to a student body of an international undergraduate degree programme that is culturally diverse, multi-lingual and non-STS major? The current paper offers an insight into this challenge at the University of Tokyo and provides an account of the pedagogical path followed in this endeavour, as well as a philosophical reflection upon the conceptual tenets of STS that arise from the experience. Eschewing the lecture in favour of an interactive classroom, we expound on the teaching and learning techniques deployed. These include: terminological clarifications and the problem of the translation of STS concepts into a different philosophical framework; small group work to de-individualise student engagement, which is central to a Confucian context of learning; active-learning classrooms to flatten professor-student and student-student hierarchies; the Socrative application to field questions and solicit ideas from students, who typically avoid engagement and discussion from a first-person perspective; and writing exercises to exteriorise the taciturnity of thinking. In summary, the paper details the experimental teaching methods deployed in an Asian university and questions the value and limits of teaching STS beyond its epistemological and critical (cultural) context.

Authors

• Bregham Dalgliesh, University of Tokyo

• Isabelle Juliette Giraudou, The University of Tokyo