ABSTRACT
The author offered his students a lecture on Jeff Duncan-Andrade's notion of critical hope, discussed in contrast to false hope, which is often presented to anaesthetize the development of critical consciousness and analysis. As a result of intentionally reflecting on the moment, new transformative pedagogical opportunities opened for us as he began to consider and apply the assigned readings in new and innovative ways. Together, he discussed what possibilities might emerge from discussing Dracula as an anti-immigration narrative and linking it to some of the concerns of a Trump administration. It encourages college educators to engage in forms of pedagogical praxis that do not pretend that teachers and students are unaffected by world events and incidents that highlight social inequalities. Contributors span a range of disciplines from criminal justice to gender studies to organic chemistry, and demonstrate the productive possibilities that can emerge in our classrooms when consider identity as constitutive of rather than divorced from our academic disciplines.
