Matusov, "Applying Bakhtin Scholarship on Discourse in Education"

Subtitle: A Critical Review Essay

This was interesting in that I'd never heard of Bakhtin before, and I think I learned a lot about him. I say "I think" because part of the issue here is that for some reason, in order to get what this Russian lit critic was saying, you need the help of philologists-- another new term-- to help translate it. In other words, it's not just the words that you need, but the context, stuff like that. The catch is, philologists seem to be convinced that comp people simply don't get it, and that's what this review is about. Matusov takes on some philologists and their criticisms of English scholars who try to use Bakhtin's work when they don't understand it well enough.

Some of Bakthin's big terms seem to bee Authoritative Discourse and Internally Persuasive Discourse. I think these are like the difference between a student getting the answer right (or believing that it's right) because the teacher said so (AD) versus a student coming to fully understand a concept for his- or herself (IPD). Now, Bakhtin was applying this to Russian lit, so it may be that educators are using his ideas in more of an analogous way than a direct way, and that might be what's pissing off these philologists so bad. Who knows. Oh wait, I do; I read the article. That's my argument anyway.

Matusov goes on to ask whether or not Bakhtin is valuable for our field or not, whether educators indeed misinterpret him, how ed can actually help deepen B's points, and if they are compatible.

The most interesting point was in regard the the third questions. He sites Morson, who argues for a third discourse in between AD and IPD. He calls for Authoritarian D, Authoritative Dialogical D, and then IPD. The diff between the two As? I don't know. But the middle terms involves the notion that a student can believe a teacher as an authority figure in a less bleak way than simply because he or she has no choice. They may want to believe the teacher, they may have a special trust in their authority; authority indeed doesn't have to always be evil, even if it usually is. Interesting.


Matusov goes on to think more about if a Freirian type of classroom, consisting of teacher-students and students-teacher, who "critically co-investigate the world" is even possible or desirable. Here he loses me a little, just because of my love for all things Freire. But he raises some issues by pointing out that a teacher really may not learn or co-learn as much from semester to semester using the same material, even if he or she has a new group of students every time. I'm not sold on this yet, or at least I don't want to be. But I think he's probably right. There are certainly times when I need to use my trust-me-for-now approach just to get a student to think about the importance of a concept I'm introducing. If they never trusted anything I said, that would be rough. But I also think, in fact, even more so, that I would hope they trust me NOT because I'm the guy in front of the class, but because I have earned that trust through showing them that I have some insights that are valuable, NOT because I say so. I want to not agree with Matusov.

He seems to end with that open question about whether a true critical classroom is really possible and to what extent Bakhtin ideas really hold weight for education. A good article with a lot to think about.