When I was a Philosophy student – first as an undergraduate major, and then as a Ph.D. student – it never occurred to me to wonder why we were reading the philosophers we were reading. Who had decided these were the thinkers worth studying? Who had decided their methods were exemplary of the discipline? In fact, it was not until my third year teaching as an Assistant Professor that I confronted such questions. I was teaching an introductory course, and we had just finished reading work by Annette Baier. Students were discussing questions in small groups, and as I circulated, a student looked up at me with a huge smile and said, “I was so excited to finally read something by a woman!” After class, I looked at my syllabus and noted incredulously that other than Baier, every other author was indeed male. How had I never noticed that before? Along what other dimensions had I unwittingly narrowed students’ exposure to philosophical thinkers, ideas, and methods? And if this myopia was possible in a field like Philosophy, founded as it is upon relentless questioning of presumptions, by an instructor identifying as a woman of color – what could be happening in other fields with other instructors?
Universities uphold the impartial pursuit of knowledge as an ideal, but knowledge production is impacted by power disparities, as social scientists and others have argued. To empower student learning is to recognize the power disparities that impact knowledge production and to rebalance power equitably among all inquirers in educational settings. This can be done under multiple banners, such as “decolonizing” the curriculum; enacting anti-racist pedagogy; and promoting inclusive pedagogy. Different histories and concerns drive these endeavors and their naming, especially as realized in different social and national contexts. However, they also share three important aims:
To promote social belonging among students: social science research indicates that achievement gaps can be explained in part by the role of stereotype threat in educational settings. Stereotype threat is the felt risk of conforming to social stereotypes. For example, women reminded of their gender right before a quantitative assessment perform less well than women not so cued. A widely accepted explanation for the performance discrepancy is that cognitive resources such as attention and working memory that would otherwise be allocated to problem-solving are now reallocated to wrestling with the stereotype that women are not as quantitatively skilled as men. One among many powerful ways to defuse stereotype threat and promote social belonging is to ensure that a diversity of individuals are positively represented in course materials.
How Philosophy instructors can do this:
- Recover and include perspectives that historically have been marginalized or excluded in Philosophy by diversifying or pluralizing your curriculum along dimensions of social identity, such as gender, race, nationality, and (dis)ability.
- Encourage students to contribute examples and scenarios from their lived experiences, to combat elitism associated with philosophical study and highlight everyday human situations that prompt philosophical questions.
- Commit as a department to redesigning gateway courses, and conduct longitudinal assessment of course enrollments and majors to determine dimensions along which student demographics change.
To expand epistemologically: along with promoting social belonging among students, diversifying or pluralizing the Philosophy curriculum also enables a wider range of socially-situated and disciplinary perspectives to shape the questions, answers, and methods addressed in the course. This allows new kinds of questions and theories to expand the landscape of inquiry, as seen in multiple instances such as women in the natural sciences, underrepresented minorities in environmental studies, women in Philosophy, and underrepresented minorities in Philosophy.
How Philosophy instructors can do this:
- When diversifying or pluralizing your curriculum, consider different dimensions of social identity, as well as other dimensions, such as historical time period, disciplinary emphasis (religious studies, literature, science), and academic status (academics of different ranks, academics at different kinds of institutions, practitioners outside of academia). Ensure that work in the traditional Western canon, and current work by famous academics, does not remain the dominant perspective, with other perspectives included as tokens or presented only in secondary roles (e.g., as commentary, elaboration, or dissent).
- As a part of class activities and assignments, invite students to explicitly consider whom they study and who is left out.
- Encourage students to contribute examples and scenarios from their lived experiences, to elicit different kinds or forms of philosophical questions that arise from different lived experiences.
To redistribute power equitably: because we are often habituated into implicit social hierarchies and power imbalances, they can be hard to notice and combat. Do students have experience and insight to contribute, or is it only the course instructor? Is the classroom a refuge against historical and societal power imbalances, or a place where they are replicated? It requires deliberate attention and care to monitor power dynamics and ensure that all inquirers help shape the practices, conclusions, and narratives of the course.
How Philosophy instructors can do this:
- Partner with students to design the course and request their contributions to course materials, activities, assignments, and assessments. Solicit regular feedback from students on what is going well in the class, and what can be improved.
- Be mindful of your instructor attitudes and speech and the messages they convey to students about who is worth studying and who is capable of excelling philosophically.
- Use classroom equity strategies to regulate interactions among students.
These ideas are just a starting point, and it is probably already evident that empowering student learning will take dedicated time and effort, likely over many years. Although this can feel overwhelming, it is important to remember that doing something is better than doing nothing. Start with small changes to your courses, for example, adding a few new authors, or trying a few new class activities. Get feedback from students, adjust accordingly, and introduce more changes over time. If the outcome of these steady, cumulative efforts is a more diverse range of philosophers – expanding the horizons of what students can learn and what the discipline itself can be – I think we can all agree that the time and effort will be worth it.
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You can find additional teaching strategies and references in the following resources:
- ‘Decolonize’ Your (Philosophy) Courses (American Association of Philosophy Teachers)
- EMPOWER Student Learning (Stanford Center for Teaching and Learning)
- Anti-Racist and Equity-Focused Teaching Strategies(Stanford Center for Teaching and Learning)
Kritika Yegnashankaran
Kritika Yegnashankaran received her BA and MA degrees in Philosophy from Stanford University, and her PhD in Philosophy from Harvard University. She was an Assistant Professor in the Philosophy program at Bard College in New York for several years before joining Stanford’s Center for Teaching and Learning in 2018. She has research interests in reasoning and other core processes of human cognition, how they are affected by technology, and to what extent they can be actively and socially shaped. She conducts workshops and consultations with Stanford faculty and lecturers on effective and inclusive pedagogy.
