Teaching Philosophy & Approach
My formal views on teaching, learning, and everything in between have been shaped by educators and activists whose pedagogy blurred the lines between research and praxis (bell hooks, Sara Ahmed, Gayatri Spivak, and Stuart Hall). Through the years, their words have become what Sara Ahmed calls ‘companion texts’ that function as homing devices. Their words serve as reminders to interrogate how my experiences as a student influence(d) my identity, positionalities, and the various ways I had been and still am being constructed by forces out of my control. It is from this space I build my teaching philosophy.
Stuart Hall spoke directly to my multiple identities, past and present. He spoke directly to the struggling 13-year-old growing up in British Hong Kong whose differences screamed louder than her voice. He also spoke to the frustrated middle school English teacher who struggled to help her students unlearn the lessons life had taught them about who they were and where they belonged. His words serve to remind me that students, regardless of their caste and class positions, bring with them a backpack full of experiences that have constructed and positioned them as particular types of learners and people. Gayatri Spivak urged me to enter into a lifelong practice of hyper self-reflexivity by continuously interrogating my multiple identities and positionalities to see the ways in which I am or might become complicit in Western knowledge production.
Approach to Teaching
My teaching practice is grounded in a multi-pedagogical approach that draws from Black Feminist and British cultural studies pedagogies. These approaches are both culturally sustaining and critically engaged and privilege the notion of experience in the classroom.
Culturally Sustaining Pedagogy.
My experiences as a student in British Hong Kong and as a middle school English teacher in Chester, PA (USA), have informed my commitment to the practice of culturally sustaining pedagogy, where I center and honor the cultural histories and lived experiences that students bring to my classroom; a practice that is also informed by the understanding that my cultural ways of knowing and being are a deeply rooted part of my personal, intellectual, and academic identities. When designing the syllabus, gathering my intentions, curating the reading material, and planning in-class activities and student deliverables, I will look for every opportunity to:
As an educator, I invite my students to draw on their prior knowledge and experiences while engaging them in learning activities that are challenging, interactive, and relevant to our societal context. I strive to create educational environments that are equitable, collaborative, and empowering for my students. I am intentional, thoughtful, creative, and responsive to their cultural and academic needs and diverse learning abilities. When working with students, I draw on various multimodal texts, including theoretical and literary works, research, podcasts, art, media, and popular cultural texts to aid in their engagement with the course content.
Critical Pedagogy:
As an interdisciplinary research methodologist, I ascribe to the model of critical pedagogy offered by British cultural studies, which insists on the inclusion of a research component (formal and informal) in all course material. Informed by this model of pedagogy, I plan to include a research component in all theory and content courses. The end goal of this inclusion is to incorporate research as an intrinsic part of thinking critically about knowledge, including a research component where students will learn how to ask questions, locate the information (data) and read (analyze and interpret) texts to find answers to the questions generated through their engagement with the course material.
Teaching Strategies
Reflection Journal: This assignment is ******designed to foster students’ development as critical thinkers who ask questions, create informed arguments, and develop a standpoint from which to read and interpret cultural texts beyond the course readings. It creates a space where students can think through, ask questions about the readings and class discussions, and develop their understandings in a safe environment. Here, I can engage in one-on-one conversations with the students regarding the course materials and their journeys in the course and beyond. Additionally, through carefully curated journal prompts, I encourage students to practice and develop a reflexive practice and draw on their life experiences as they engage with the course readings and class discussions. This journal assignment is intended to help students form a standpoint, voice, and opinions shaped not just by course content but also by life experiences that are frequently overlooked in the educational journey.
I have used this approach in my research methods class, where the journal was designed to encourage the practice of writing reflective, analytical memos. The fieldwork journal created a structured yet flexible space for students to document their immediate thoughts, reactions, and concerns regarding the course materials—theories, paradigms, and complex concepts such as ontology and epistemology. I also included weekly prompts called ‘pause and reflect,’ which invited students to reflect upon their reasons for choosing their study questions, populations of interest, and their reasons for undertaking their particular research project.
Activity-based Learning: Activities (graded and non-graded) to learn by ‘doing’ where students are introduced to the benefits of working collaboratively to try to make sense of the writing and language of theory, or of key arguments and interventions introduced through the readings. One such example is an activity in the format of the Socratic seminar, designed to familiarize students with the practice of facilitating academic conversations.[1] In this case, students are tasked with opening up a conversation by posing questions to the rest of the class and inviting them to collectively make sense of the reading. To scaffold their success, the students will be given specific guidelines to help structure their presentation including suggestions of potential entry points for discussion.
My Role as an Educator
In each of my classes, I think about ways I engage in self-evaluation by establishing an anonymous Google (suggestion) form where students can safely share their feedback regarding the course's pace, content, and structure. Furthermore, through their class journal, I encourage them to share their interests and to propose suggestions for additional reading or curricular engagement. Both of these processes enable me to address student needs and adjust the course as needed, ensuring students feel acknowledged and supported as they navigate the course's evolving discussions and learning stages. Overall, I have endeavored to cultivate educational environments that are equitable, collaborative, and empowering. These experiences continually inform my practice as an educator, where I strive to be intentional, thoughtful, creative, and responsive to students’ diverse educational needs and learning abilities. I believe in the importance of developing and maintaining active mentoring relationships with students, and I take pleasure in supporting the enhancement of their individual journeys, as well as assisting them in navigating their academic journeys beyond the context of the course.
Disciplinary Training
My doctoral training prepared me for what Stuart Hall calls ‘detours through theory’ to find the answers to real-life emergent problems that exist in the everyday interconnected lives of South Asian (im)migrant[5] youth. In preparation for taking such detours, I have and continue to blur disciplinary boundaries to construct a comprehensive, theoretical (Postcolonial Theory, Post- Structuralism, Structuralism, Critical Race Theory, Black Feminist Theory, Global Feminisms, Feminist Standpoint Theory, Transnational Feminist Theory, Critical Theory, Literary Theory) and methodological (Feminist Research Methodologies, Cultural Studies Methodologies, Ethnographic Methodologies, Textual, and Discourse Analysis, Arts-Based Methodologies, and Critical Methodologies) knowledge base. These diverse theoretical and methodological foundations have prepared me to teach a variety of content, theory, and research courses.