Speculative Syllabi Imagining Pedagogies of Madness and Hope
Main Article Content
Abstract
What can a syllabus do? In this piece, we will discuss the theoretical and practical implications of what we are calling the “Mad Speculative Syllabus,” a document designed to prefigure collective educational transformation via Mad pedagogical praxis. First, we will consider the syllabus as an imaginative document –– one which, intentionally or otherwise, delimits the boundaries of student and instructor creativity, yet also one with the capacity to overturn those boundaries. We use an intentionally ungenerous analysis –– even a paranoid reading –– of the syllabus to acknowledge the saneist politics of the classroom, while emphasizing the need for generous engagement with/in the classroom community. We look to contemporary Mad interventions, including sarah madoka currie’s building beloved community through Mad citational practice; Cavar’s transMad epistemologies, and Ben-Moshe’s dis-epistemologies, as well as moments of speculative and liberatory pedagogy in existing syllabi, including citational practices, access normalization, openness to opacity, and resistance to quantification/traditional modes of grading. We conclude by modeling a speculative document of our own, whose sections readers are invited to wrestle with and retool to their own classroom needs.
Modalities: written article and video conversation https://vimeo.com/1145896954?fl=ip&fe=ec
Article Details
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
Authors retain copyright and grant IMSJ right of first publication with the work simultaneously licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY-NC ND) 4.0 License that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgment of the work’s authorship and initial publication in IMSJ.
References
Ahmed, S. (2020). On being included: Racism and diversity in institutional life. Duke University Press.
Alam, M., Al-Mamun, M., Pramanik, M. N. H., Jahan, I., Khan, M. R., Dishi, T. T., Akter, S. H., Jothi, Y. M., Shanta, T. A., & Hossain, M. J. (2022). Paradigm shifting of education system during COVID-19 pandemic: A qualitative study on education components. Heliyon, 8(12). 10.1016/j.heliyon.2022.e11927
Alqaisiya, W., & Perugini, N. (2024). The academic question of Palestine. Middle East Critique, 1-13.
Ben-Moshe, L. (2018). Dis-orientation, dis-epistemology and abolition. Feminist Philosophy Quarterly, 4(2).
brown, a.m. (2019). Pleasure activism: The politics of feeling good (Vol. 1). AK press.
Bruce, L. M. J. (2021). How to go mad without losing your mind: Madness and Black radical creativity. Duke University Press.
Cavar, S. (2023). Embodying Otherwise: Nonhuman Criptopias in Salt Fish Girl. Journal of Literary & Cultural Disability Studies, 17(4), 507-522.
Cavar, S. (2022). Toward transMad epistemologies: a working text. Spark: A 4C4Equality Journal, 5. https://sparkactivism.com/toward-transmad-epistemologies/.
Class Contract. n.d. John S. Armstrong Elementary. https://armstrong.hpisd.org/apps/pages/index.jsp?uREC_ID=208877&type=d&pREC_ID=489803
currie, s.m., & the students of W2022 ENGL109-007. (2022). beyond the ability tradition: conjuring community-first syllabi in apocalypse time. Spark: A 4C4Equality Journal, 4. https://sparkactivism.com/beyond-the-ability-tradition/.
currie, s. m. (2022). Make Mine Melody: Building Beloved Community in Bibliography Using Mad Citation Practice. Criticism, 64(3), 533-543.
Davids, N., Waghid, Y., Davids, N., & Waghid, Y. (2021). A feminist critique of university education. Academic Activism in Higher Education: A Living Philosophy for Social Justice, 99-111.
Fúnez-Flores, J. I. (2024). The coloniality of academic freedom and the palestine exception. Middle East Critique, 1-21.
Gelles, B. (2020). Embracing radical inclusivity: Practical steps for creating an intersectional, interventionist syllabus. Visible Pedagogy: a teach@ CUNY Project.
Giroux, H. A. & Penna, A. N. (1979). Social education in the classroom: The dynamics of the hidden curriculum. Theory & Research in Social Education, 7(1), 21-42. https://doi.org/10.1080/00933104.1979.10506048
Glover, S, Ash, A, and Ortega, B. (2024). “Dozens of professors among those arrested in campus protests.” CNN. May 11. https://www.cnn.com/2024/05/11/us/professors-campus-arrests-invs/index.html.
Gottlieb, J. (2020). Tweaking the syllabus and other lessons from a pandemic. Bridging It Home: The Saint Rose Blog. https://blogs.strose.edu/tweaking-the-syllabus-and-other-lessons-from-a-pandemic/
Heidebrink-Bruno, A. (2015). Envisioning the radical syllabus: A critical approach to classroom culture, part 2. Hybrid Pedagogy. https://hybridpedagogy.org/envisioning-radical-syllabus/
Johnson, M., & McRuer, R. (2014). Cripistemologies: introduction. Journal of Literary & Cultural Disability Studies, 8(2), 127-148.
Kuppers, P. (2022). Eco Soma: Pain and joy in speculative performance encounters. U of Minnesota Press.
Love, H. (2010). Truth and consequences: On paranoid reading and reparative reading. Criticism, 52(2), 235-241.
Mikulan, P., & Zembylas, M. . (2024). “Introduction: Refusing the Colonial University.” in Mikulan, P., & Zembylas, M. (Eds.), Working with theories of refusal and decolonization in higher education. New York: Routledge.
Okun, T. (2021). White supremacy culture. https://www.whitesupremacyculture.info/
Piepzna-Samarasinha, L. L. (2018). Care work: Dreaming disability justice. Arsenal Pulp Press.
Piepzna-Samarasinha, L. L. (2019). Tonguebreaker. Arsenal Pulp Press.
Price, M. (2011). Mad at school: Rhetorics of mental disability and academic life. University of Michigan Press.
Procknow, G. (2019). The pedagogy of saneness: A schizoaffective storying of resisting sane pedagogy. International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education, 32(5), 510-528. https://doi.org/10.1080/09518398.2019.1597208
Reaume, A.H. (2021). Brain Fog: An Essay. Open Book. https://open-book.ca/Columnists/Brain-Fog-An-Essay.
Reiss, B. (2010). Madness after Virginia Tech: From psychiatric risk to institutional vulnerability. Social Text, 28(4), 25-44.
Rossouw, N., & Frick, L. (2023). A conceptual framework for uncovering the hidden curriculum in private higher education. Cogent Education, 10(1), 2191409.
Rottier, H. (2022). Envisioning a pedagogy of wholeness: Teaching, disability justice, and care. https://helenrottier.wordpress.com/2022/03/03/envisioning-a-pedagogy-of-wholeness-teaching-disability-justice-and-care/
Sadat Ahadi, H. & Guerrero, L. A. (2020). Decolonizing your syllabus, an anti-racist guide for your college. Academic Senate for California Community Colleges. https://www.asccc.org/content/decolonizing-your-syllabus-anti-racist-guide-your-college
Sedgwick, E. K. (1997). Paranoid reading and reparative reading; or, you’re so paranoid, you probably think this introduction is about you. Novel gazing: Queer readings in fiction, 1-37.
Smilges, J. L. (2023). Crip negativity. U of Minnesota Press.
Wasley, P. (2008). The syllabus becomes a repository of legalese. The Chronicle of Higher Education, 54(27), A1.
Wolframe, P. (2013). "The madwoman in the academy, or, revealing the invisible straightjacket: Theorizing and teaching saneism and sane privilege." Disability Studies Quarterly 33(1).
Yergeau, R. (2010). Circle wars: Reshaping the typical autism essay. Disability Studies Quarterly, 30(1).