My use of alliteration in the headline echoes the evocative speech assignment. In this last presentation students are supposed to use a rhetorical figure in a speech that evokes liking for a person special to them. They are to give a celebratory toast or eulogy for that person as if they are at a special occasion (wedding, funeral, birthday or anniversary party). Most people choose family members or mentors.
In my Tuesday/Thursday class the first speaker of the day gave a toast to me. It was a good speech, one that fulfilled all the requirements of the assignment. Nevertheless, it left me feeling uneasy. I want to take some time here to clarify my discomfort.
Public praise of a professor by a current student is always problematic because it raises questions about appropriate response and performance motivation.
When a student praises me in front of other students or teachers, I feel caught between two different ways of responding. Because I respect and really like almost all my students, I want to show my gratitude for the praise and respond in a friendly manner (smile, sparkling eyes, head nod, saying "thanks"). This response honors the work of the student and treats him or her as authentic and honest.
But what if the person praising is not honest? What if the praise is "merely" flattery? An attempt to get a good grade? If I respond publicly to flattery with kindness and a smile, will the people observing the interaction think I'm gullible? Or what if the praise is not only flattery, but mocking flattery? What if the student is trying to show that I'm an idiot and has set me up? (I imagine a conversation prior to the praise: "Hey, want to see her take the hook? I bet she'll believe it.") If I am being flattered or mocked, I need to respond by showing that I can't be taken in, that I can't be seduced so easily. I need to use a tone of voice that suggests incredulity. I need to use facial movements to emphasize my disbelief: a crooked smile and a single raised eyebrow.
But I'm not a good actor. Hard for me to contort my face on command. Impossible to raise a single eyebrow. I pretty much show exactly what I'm thinking most of the time. And I generally think of my students with affection and accept them as honest, decent people. So, I usually respond to praise with sincere thanks. Yet, because I know that some people ARE duplicitous and that I AM pretty darn gullible, I always feel uncomfortable when I'm praised by someone who owns less social currency (re: power) than I. (And yes, this includes newer faculty and staff as well as students.)
So, the key to becoming comfortable being publicly praised is clearly in learning to figure out what is motivating the praise. In other words, I need to be able to read minds. Hmm. I wonder if there's a community ed class I could take?
Confession:
My own history is riddled with stories of deep affection (sometimes inappropriate affection -- "yes reader, I married him") for teachers. I realized when I started studying Kenneth Burke and persuasion theory that my feelings of connection for my professors may actually have been a "survival" mechanism. All through my life in school I have tried to make most of my teachers have personal relationships with me. I am most probably a kinesthetic learner with musical/rhythmic intelligence. It's very hard for me to learn just from reading or listening. I have to engage teachers in personal interaction. In my youth those classroom relationships became inappropriately obsessive. [I had horrible crushes on my three high school teachers: Mr. Ridgely (English), Mr. Barrans (Latin), and Mr. Glasner (drama).]
Another aspect of my past that impacts my present is the fact that I shuttled between being an outcast and a leader and often a mixture of both from fourth grade until, well, now. Sometimes I was a scapegoat for others to blame and sometimes I was an entertainer people enjoyed.
Though not impossible, it's very difficult for someone to perform in an improvisational context like the classroom without drawing on his or her own personal history. Though in my mid-fifties and mostly sane, I am still Kakie Hanson. Thus, I am beset by doubts about the motivations of others when they are nice to me.
TMI? Perhaps. But I wanted to get it down.
No comments:
Post a Comment