Pedagogies of discomfort in the world language classroom: Ethical tensions and considerations for educators

Abstract

The purpose of this article is to examine the ethical tensionsand considerations that arise in the world languageclassroom from using pedagogies of discomfort. Althoughpedagogies of discomfort have mostly been seen througha positive lens in the literature for engaging students withdifficult issues in the classroom, there are ethical concerns,particularly in relation to the harm that students mightexperience. To illustrate these ethical concerns and theirimplications in the world language classroom, we draw ondata from a number of projects in which pedagogies ofdiscomfort have been used in university classrooms. Theanalysis of examples shows that while some sort of ethicalviolence is inevitable, there are pedagogical ways to minimizethe harm on students. The article concludes by raisingfurther ethical and pedagogical questions for exploration inthe context of using pedagogies of discomfort in the worldlanguage classroom.