"Role Play, Or Tap Dancing Through Partisanship in the Classroom"

The following is an essay invited for a Roundtable discussion on Political Partisanship in the Classroom, published in "Political Communication Report," a publication of Political Communication Sections of the International Communication Association and the American Political Science Association).The other essays published as part of the roundtable can be found here.

All my years of living in the world’s most complex democracy—India—could not have prepared me for the simplicity of ideological identification in the world’s oldest democracy, America. You are likely to be profiled as either liberal or conservative, Democrat or Republican. Or maybe you are an Independent? Just before they let me off the hook for being, well, a “foreigner,” I guide students away from ideology and toward the one article of faith that places me in a room, standing before them, poised with a dry erase marker: I am a professor. And that should send all the energetic guesswork about my ideology and my partisan leanings out the window.

But it doesn’t and it never will, as explicated in the article “My Professor is a Partisan Hack: How Perceptions of a Professor’s Political Views Affect Student Course Evaluations.” Students are curious about their professors; they will look for clues to your personality, your personal life—and, indeed, your ideology. They will find these clues in your research, your teaching, even your dress.

The authors of the article advise in their “Conclusions And Recommendations” that professors should refrain from identifying their political affiliations. This, I would argue, is easier said than done, especially for a faculty member seen as being, for better or for worse, “a woman of color.” To twist Shakespeare’s line for my own political purpose here, I would say: “Some are born with ideology, some achieve ideology, and some have ideology thrust upon them.”

So, on an ostensibly liberal, Jesuit Catholic campus with a stated mission of social justice, in progressive Seattle, in the “blue,” state of Washington, I enter the classroom ready to teach courses in public affairs reporting, “Media, Society and the Individual” and “International Affairs Writing.” Naturally, some or all of these courses must deal with politics, political communication, war and foreign policy. When I raise topics of communication justice and the representation of race, gender and sexuality in the media, even before I say a word, my students know that in all probability, they are dealing with a feminist. In fact, feminism is arguably the one ideology that today does not go down well with even the more liberal male or female students.
I would wager that it is hard to find a professor who truly believes that ideological leanings do not creep into the choice of what to include and what to leave out of a lesson plan on any given day. Sometimes, ideology is right there in the choice of textbook. In my case, my decade-long career in journalism is strewn with stories that challenge the social and political order, yes, with objectivity and little bias, but certainly with favor toward one topic of story over another.

So, while it might be easier for a white, male instructor with a stiff upper lip and soft tweed to appear neutral, my students want cues not merely to my attitude toward one or the other political party in America, but toward America itself. In such a classroom, brimming with presumption and aching for clear, partisan confession, I navigate toward my role as instructor with a little role-play of these different kinds:

1. The Nomadic Journalist: An easy role, one that helps me assume the higher ground of neutrality, objectivity and, more than anything else, a reverence for a well-asked question. The message I give to students is that governments, across the world, are deserving of scrutiny. Without being defensive, I discuss how a media professional working in partisan and ideology-driven times might play the role of watchdog and question the politics of, say, a fundamentalist Hindu government in India, state-controlled media in Singapore, or, then, self-censorship among journalists in America during the Iraq war. My endeavor is that students recognize that I have played the role of the adversarial journalist in every place in which I have lived and worked, especially my homeland. I extend the same loving critical inquiry to where I currently, and proudly, reside – the United States of America.

2. The Storyteller: Continuing in the spirit of questioning and disclosure, I encourage students to ask me questions about my background and experiences. I use this technique sparingly and under controlled conditions. For instance, in the International Affairs Writing course, I may set up a mock press conference in which students get to question me, an international journalist and a Ph.D. in American Media and Politics . I use students’ questions (which come fast and hard!) to clarify any misconceptions they might have about me, or about most immigrant communities. For instance, I tell them, the “woman of color” is a new and uneasy role for me to play. In my own country, and for most of my life, I belonged to the dominant community, the majority, the Brahmins, equivalent in many ways to upper class white Americans. I did not, by Indian standards, suffer from a lack of resources. As a journalist, though, I worked on stories that challenged the very caste, class and economic structures I hailed from. So, I have shifted identities of birth, ideology and nation. Through this kind of controlled disclosure, I encourage students to think about their own identities and ideologies – acquired or challenged—and encourage them to recognize the possibility of morphing from one to another.

3. The Devil’s Advocate: My course description states that students can expect to hone their critical thinking skills in my classes. Indeed, some of my courses rely strongly on class discussion. If I find one view overpowering others, I throw in the opposite viewpoint. On this liberal campus, the one I am forced to bring in is often the conservative viewpoint, exposing me to the charge of being, maybe, a “moderate.” As the results of the study suggest, being a “moderate” does not inspire much confidence in students. So, when I choose to assume a moderate viewpoint, it’s a no-man’s land. Certainly, it’s a no-woman’s land. Liberal students are resentful, conservative students are suspicious. Students of color may automatically expect solidarity from me, and, in fact, expect me to censure and penalize those students lacking in racial sensitivity or awareness. Giving them mixed signals is risky, but it gets the job done—discussions open up, rich and rewarding. A moment of triumph was when one male student looked at me without batting an eyelid and stated, with no sign of malice or contempt, “I want all immigrants to leave this country because….” He was not inhibited by my nationality, my own immigrant status, my gender or my possible position of authority over him. He was doing what I wanted him to do—enriching the debate.

4. The “Patriotic” Foreigner:
Whether I like it or not, sometimes it does become necessary in an American classroom to defend my commitment to the ground beneath my feet. Fortunately, it’s not hard to do. I do like America. I talk to students about what I like about America, as a journalist, a woman, an academic and a resident. I do this in the context of the class. I like America particularly for its First Amendment freedoms and the power to question. The spotlight, then, is back on the students and on their training in asking strong questions.
Often, I make casual though calculated references like “We (in India) grew up reading about your leaders like Martin Luther King Jr.” The students may or may not see the statement as political. The class may be on globalization and the media, but the message is that of admiration for America’s triumphs on racial and gender equality.

5. The Humorist:
Although I resist reducing complex topics to one-liners, sometimes well-placed wit can defuse tensions and redirect energies to the topic under scrutiny. Once, today’s pasha of political punditry, Jon Stewart, rescued my class from disaster. A video clip of Stewart’s quip on the political brawl of the day made for enthusiastic learning across partisan lines without revelation of my own views on the subject.