Adversarial Learning

Adversarial Learning
“Adversarialism as a professional ideal reflects an adversarial animus already at work in society at large.”
-William May in his book Beleaguered Rulers: The Public Obligation of the Professional, p.53


William May captured something in Beleaguered Rulers: The Public Obligation of the Professional that, as an American, I was aware of experiencing but had never heard articulated so clearly. I do sense, along with May, that combativeness “answers to something deep in the American spirit” (p.53). As a person who is naturally combative, I have been accused of being “very American” in international experiences, and like it or not, this combativeness betrays my strong acculturation to my homeland. As I study at a graduate level, I am becoming increasingly aware that this attitude has affected my style of learning throughout my life in ways that may not have served me well.

May uses the political vision, or “political myth,” of John Locke (p. 55-56) to explain where this American animus of competitiveness and combativeness came from. Locke asserted five principals to explain the human relationship with society: 1) the original condition of humankind is individual autonomy, and it is marred by threats to that autonomy; 2) society is there to serve the individual, and not for moral goodness; 3) we are held together by a fear of supreme evil rather than a hope of supreme good; 4) people have a passive understanding of citizenship; and 5) leaders are not here to be catalysts of transformation, but to maintain the status quo.

When I was in fifth grade I experienced the format of debate in the classroom for the first time. I remember it to the day; I felt alive and academically stimulated for the first time. This began my career as a public school student, a career in which I defined myself as a fighter, as an arguer, and as a defender of the right way. I discovered the rush of individualism and the pleasure of defending beliefs I held strongly. All of this combativeness did make me a strong person, but it also reinforced an assumption of rejection, alienating me from my classmates and peers. I also began rejecting any information that did not fit into my world view, or any position that threatened my autonomy, another effect John Locke discusses.

My entire educational experience was very Lockean. The school system was there to prepare us for complacent employment, not for a wider vision of moral goodness. Threats as serious as communism and nuclear annihilation, or as frivolous as the down-the-road sports rival were supposed to hold us together. As students, we were meant to be passive, just taking in the data until the test was over. Teachers and administrators definitely “managed” the students, and there was no pretense of transformation.

In contrast to this atmosphere, my combativeness did come in handy. I was able to question each of these situations and come up with my own expectations about what learning is and how I wanted to act in alternative ways to what I saw around me. May defends combativeness by pointing out how this kind of fight can promote justice and lead to positive improvement in the system (p. 54).

So, while I felt I was doing some good by providing a voice in opposition to the moral passivity around me, I was at the same time stunting my learning ability through my heavily dogmatic beliefs and the fear of having to give in to new ideas. I was also lonely, in self-inflicted exile from a community I considered mainstream.

In college, I continued “wrestling” with every academic concept into which I came in contact. Some of my beliefs were challenged by people I respected, people who were not falling into the defense of the status quo of society as defined by Locke. Each time this happened, my first reaction was a fierce fight against what I was hearing, and only after months of engaging this fight was I able to give in to a new paradigm. Those were exciting days, but they were also exhausting and I was quickly burned out and ready to stop studying and “start living” what I saw as real life.

Since that time I have lived fifteen years without formal education of any kind. Burned out this time by the boredom of babies and limitations of my resume, I came back to school ready for something fresh and new. At first I joined in the fray the only way I knew how and started arguing every point with vigor. Thanks to some gentle guidance from professors I have recently come to a new realization that it is possible to learn without combativeness.

I am trying to bring this new learning paradigm to fruition in my thoughts and practice. My mantra in class is “be open.” I imagine the information and ideas flowing through me as I read rather than stopping every few sentences to jot down an opposition. My rejection of Locke’s ideas as I relate them to education is now complete.

I still wish to speak out for the voiceless and defend the oppressed. However, I like to think that I am discovering not only new ways to learn, but new ways to transform society without losing energy in the fight. Instead I hope to channel that energy into the solutions.




References

May, William E. (2001), Beleaguered Rulers: The Public Obligation of the Professional, Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press