Harms and possibilities: Social work doctoral students reflect on social justice pedagogy

Abstract

Co-written by four doctoral students and a professor, this article reflects on a novel social work doctoral seminar, “Social Justice Pedagogy.” This course was offered in the 2022 fall term at Wilfrid Laurier University in Ontario, Canada, as part of concerted efforts to acknowledge learning spaces as sites of harm. The mutual draw to this course included all of the authors witnessing, causing, experiencing, or fearing harm in the classroom. This course became about the process and experience of a socially just pedagogical approach. Few PhD social work programs require or even offer a course on the discipline-specific skills of teaching social justice content (Lee et al., 2022; Oktay et al., 2013; Pryce et al., 2011). In this paper, we discuss our motivations for engaging in this novel course and share key insights gained through challenging discussions of racism, gender, and neurodiversity. We engage with themes of intersubjectivity and intersectional identities, attending to process and content in social work education. Further, we engage possibilities related to creating and fostering spaces that emphasize non-hierarchical communication and learning to shape a community of practice among educators. This reflects and reinforces the expectations of social workers to routinely reflect on ethical dilemmas, questions, challenges, and relational dynamics.