Dialogic Pedagogy

             In contrast to the instrumental approaches to dialogic pedagogy, the non-instrumental approaches to dialogic pedagogy view dialogue not as a mean or a pathway or a strategy for achieving meaning, truth, knowledge, justice and so on but the medium in which meaning, truth, knowledge, justice and so on live (Matusov, 2009; Morson & Emerson, 1989; Sidorkin, 1999). As Bakhtin (1986) pointed out, meaning lives in the relationship between a genuine question seeking for information and a sincere answer aiming at honest addressing this question. Any statement by itself makes sense only because it is embedded in dialogic relationships of the address and the response. This dialogic relationship is often invisible and taken for granted, which creates an illusion in people that statements make sense by themselves rather than being tokens and knots of the dialogic relationships. This illusion often leads to the conventional, monologic goal of education as promoting preset curricular endpoints – self-contained statements, skills, values, and dispositions – to the students. But if preset curricular endpoints – knowledge, skills, values, attitudes, and dispositions are NOT the goal of the education in the non-instrumental approaches to dialogic pedagogy, what is it?

 

Bakhtin, M. M. (1986). Speech genres and other late essays. Austin: University of Texas Press.

Matusov, E. (2009). Journey into dialogic pedagogy. Hauppauge, NY: Nova Science Publishers.

Morson, G. S., & Emerson, C. (1989). Rethinking Bakhtin: Extensions and challenges. Evanston, Ill.: Northwestern University Press.

Sidorkin, A. M. (1999). Beyond discourse: Education, the self, and dialogue. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press.