‘Pedagogical Perspectives to Ponder’: Engaging With Social Justice—An Integrative Pedagogy of Discomfort and Love in Psychotherapy

Abstract

Background

The purpose of this perspective piece is to illuminate the urgency of focussing on pedagogical approaches that facilitate social justice and anti-discriminatory practice. We propose novel experiential activities for the classroom, which can then be applied to the diverse contexts and communities where trainees live.

Aim

The aim of this paper is to propose a pedagogical prime to be utilised by psychotherapeutic training educators, to help trainees to engage with the use of anti-discriminatory and socially just practices early in a their academic training.

Materials and Method

A pedagogical prime of experiential learning activities for social justice and anti-discriminatory practice is proposed. Examples of engaging with an integrative pedagogy of discomfort and love in psychotherapy training are presented as a method for facilitating a depth of reflective practice.

Results

The process of engaging with this pedagogical prime has a powerful impact on self-awareness, reflective and reflexive practice. These facilitate the trainees' personal and professional development, and integration of theory and practice. The pedagogical prime activities also serve to develop culturally informed, anti-oppressive and relational attributes as part of a firm commitment to social justice.

Discussion

Attainment of these attributes in social justice and anti-discriminatory practice enable trainees not only to develop into professional psychotherapeutic practitioners, but also into global citizens with an awareness of social justice. As educators, we have a responsibility to continue to work to decolonise the curriculum, starting at the grass-roots level with how we engage pedagogically with anti-discriminatory, socially just language in the classroom. As psychotherapeutic practitioners, we are also ethically required by law to engage in anti-discriminatory practices whilst serving diverse populations, yet we often lag behind in training approaches which aspire towards social justice.

Conclusion

This paper advocates for further research into the proposed pedagogic prime, utilising an integrated pedagogy of discomfort with a pedagogy of love. It also advocates for early lessons on language in psychotherapeutic and psychological training programmes, shifting the focus of social justice and anti-discriminatory practice to the forefront of trainees’ consciousness from the start of training.