Bearing Witness to Teaching and Teachers: A Humanities-Based Inquiry Orientation

Abstract

Background/Context:

In this article, we elucidate the meaning and value of a mode of inquiry we call “bearing witness.” These words are frequently heard in educational and public discourse. They sometimes serve as a stand-in for awareness and concern regarding trauma or constitute a shorthand for the tasks of journalism (e.g., “eyewitness news”). However, conceptualizations of what bearing witness entails are rare. We provide a detailed account of bearing witness as a humanities-rooted approach toward qualitative inquiry, particularly with respect to approaching teachers and the practice of teaching.

Purpose/Objective/Research Question/Focus of Study:

A central focus of our research has been on the persons who inhabit the role of teacher. Our fundamental premise is that the persons in the role, not the role itself, educate (or fail to). However, we have not sought to “measure” teachers’ “effectiveness” or to establish causality, as that term is understood in the sciences. Our approach, rooted in the humanities, attends to human influence in a more modest, subtle, yet also, we aspire to show, comprehensive manner. The purpose of the article is to address how the witness’s orientation can illuminate teaching as what it can be and often is, namely, a wondrously human and humane practice.

Research Design:

Although this article is a conceptual piece, the understanding of bearing witness that we articulate has grown out of our respective fieldwork. The first author recently devoted three years to intensive time spent with a teacher, a coach, and several chefs in a culinary arts institution. The second author recently completed two years of intensive time spent with a group of 16 big city public school teachers. In both endeavors, the co-authors had the privilege of working with highly dedicated practitioners. However, although not the focus of our research, we show how bearing witness can serve teacher educators in helping struggling colleagues broaden their ethical vision of teaching and refine their instructional abilities.

Conclusions/Recommendations:

We hope to show how bearing witness can assist all educational stakeholders in keeping in sharp view the dignity of educational work. Bearing witness as a gestalt undermines reductionist views of teaching and works for a stance of deep respect and support for the practice of teaching and its practitioners. We suggest that bearing witness can complement other inquiry approaches that seek, each in their own way, to foster education in its most meaningful, agentive, and just forms.