ABSTRACT
This essay argues for a pedagogy of care, which I frame against discourses surrounding both empathy in the classroom and civility in public discourse. Many scholars and critics have identified the problems with civility, most notably that it urges polite behavior at the expense of difficult change. My essay suggests that organizing the humanities around empathy likewise proffers behavioral solutions to systemic problems. Furthermore, a pedagogy of empathy teaches students to project the self forward in every situation – an act that is particularly harmful when teaching students about coloniality. My essay puts forth a pedagogy of care as an alternative to these frameworks. Organizing classrooms to mimic what Isabell Lorey describes as a “care community” places relationality and mutuality at the center of learning and civic engagement. As a case study for examining how such a community might be installed and function, I discuss how Mohsin Hamid’s Exit West (2017) elucidates the concept of care communities. Additionally, I outline how my classroom dynamics helped students reinforce and locate care as a central value not just of the novel, but of our class as a whole.
