Foucault and Gramsci on Education

Reflective Journey

I was ready to roll on with my assignment. It was a PowerPoint presentation entitled “Gramsci and Foucault on Education” to an esteemed scholarly audience; Professor and the Graduate Candidates at School of Education.  Academic learning are highly structured this annoys me quite often.This is where I find myself struggling with the Professors and even students at Kathmandu University.I know this is not going to change in an instance; this is why, I must fit myself into the academia’s process. I had only 15 minutes time for the entire presentation. Two scholars were attentive to follow bycomment on my presentations.I performed my preparations but I found my rehearsal were better. I failed to my expectations, ‘better luck next time’.

Mr. LaxmanAcharyaopined to my presentation, “We are not familiar with the details of theory/ies, it would have been better if only the key messages were communicated leaving the details”.He was not a scheduled commentator but his concerns were genuine.I had the early part of his comment in my mind soI planned to communicate the background before communicating the crux of the theory/ies to make it more effective, but things went disastrous. After all I am a teacher; my instinct started to teach pupil even there. I read over 200 pages as immediate preparation and evenhad a level understanding. This was not the first; still, I kept on making avoidable mistakes.I could not complete my presentation on time. I healed myself, “there are no mistakes in life but only lessons, and they are repeated until you learn”. I know, ‘I am a stupid not gettingthe lesson easily, so the lesson was repeated even this time’.

I tried to make a “presenter display” with details (time) in the laptop and “viewers display” with slideson the screen. The classroom projector stood incompatible with the application. ‘Use theclock’, I made me comfort. Iwasted my time giving meaning and setting premises. Hectic!Even the grace timewas not enough. Although my oratory was slower to my mind, I found it was at high to my audience. I must work on my communication part.Suddenly, there was a signal to stop; I thought of continuing for two minutes more,but immediately changed my mindset ‘better not to add more mistakes’.  Yap, after all education increases receptivity.

Mr. MahanandaTimilsina and Mr. SubashSubedi were the commentatorson my presentations. The first commentator admired telling I gave a justice to the title. The comments were pleasing but not critical. Professor took no time to understand it, and over-ruled the commentator to get straight to on and off. Responding to the Professor he added, I failed to manage the time and the rest was scholarly to his evaluations. The second commentator understood the intention and came with two part comments. On one hand he highlighted some scholarlypractice and on the othercontrasted as a poor time manager; “time allocation to different sections of presentations were not fair”.‘I agree (d)’. He added“some slides were crowded”. Yes they were,‘I have kept the direct quotes thinking it would stand meaningful in the context’. But now,I realized the strength of unambiguous meaningful display. I expect to build on these experiences and come with a better presentation next time. Thanks to the remarkable scholarly audience, I must keep my pace with them, I will.

Parbat Dhungana

March 26, 2012