Paper Short Abstract:

This paper draws from the authors' experiences of teaching sociology and anthropology in academic institutions in India, to reflect on and draw out strategies for developing a 'holistic pedagogy of care' as a balancing act between 'care' and 'discomfort'.

Paper Abstract:

Cultivating the sociological imagination (placing biography in conversation with social history) has been at the heart of pedagogical practices in social anthropology in various universities in India. With the advent of neoliberalism and the emergence of the highly atomized individual, cultivating the link between individual and society is increasingly becoming challenging. Sociologists and anthropologists in academia understand this challenge as a crisis in pedagogy. This paper reflects on this crisis as it manifests in academic institutions in India, and draws from the authors’ own experiences of teaching sociology and social anthropology in academic institutions in India. In response to these challenges, we reflect on what possibilities and predicaments this crisis unfolds. Pedagogy in social sciences has fundamentally included encountering ‘uncomfortable’ truths. The post-pandemic context has brought to the fore the importance of cultivating a pedagogy of care. We reflect on the current crisis in pedagogy that emerges from the vacillation between ‘care’ and ‘discomfort’, and reflect upon how we may develop a holistic ‘pedagogy of care’ without altering the discipline’s fundamentally critical approach that forces individuals to encounter inequality, marginality, oppression, privilege, and domination? We draw from our experiences to note strategies of developing this holistic pedagogy of care as a balancing act of care and discomfort.