Towards a Postcolonial Pedagogy

Abstract

The onslaught of COVID-19 has veritably turned the world upside down and has necessitated a shift away from in-class teaching worldwide. As teachers around the world, in various socio-economic contexts, negotiate on a daily basis, the challenges of shifting gear to 'remote'- teaching, it is pertinent to ask what the implications of this change are for any commitment to postcolonialism. If the object of pedagogy is to transform the student from object to subject, in Paulo Freire's classic formulation, how does the process play out under the current conditions of teaching and learning, which, it seems, are here to stay? I proceed on the basis of my experience of teaching English literature in a suburban campus in India, where, as it is, teachers operate within minimal infrastructure and must deal with varying levels of linguistic competence within the student body. What additional challenges are posed by online teaching in such a scenario? How can postcolonial analyses help uncover the stakes of teaching and learning in a suburban Indian context? What larger implications does this have for the teaching of literature in particular, and pedagogy in general? In other words, what does a thoroughgoing postcolonial pedagogy under these circumstances look like?