ROELA: You speak about relationship building, Seri. I respect the way you always speak to students and colleagues, indicating that we all matter, and equally so. It reminds me of Buber’s formulation of I-You, arguing that dialogue forms the axiological base of talking together and involves an authentic way of encountering the self and all others through relation. “Relation is reciprocity. My You acts on me as I act on it. Our students teach us, our works form us” (Buber, 1970:67). The content and style of Buber’s writing indicate an I-You relation with the reader; one experiences deep respect and is immediately drawn into a relationship with the words. Swidler (2014) describes this as “deep dialogue” and relates it to understanding so that the head, heart, hands and holy aspects of self and others are engaged. Freire maintains that true liberating dialogue requires a profound love for the world and people: “Love is at the same time the foundation of dialogue and dialogue itself….love is an act of courage, not of fear, love is commitment to others […] And this commitment, because it is loving, is dialogical” (Freire, 2005:89). Buber advocated for dialogue that assists in overcoming the alienation and disconnection that characterise modern society through creating I-You relationships. An I-You relation is a mutual and holistic relationship or encounter that validates equality, allows for true non-judgmental dialogue and takes place between human beings who recognise one another as equals, between human beings and reality, and between human beings and God (Buber, 1970). Such encounters and relationships are without structure, preconception, expectation or even systemisation, allowing for infinite meaningful and dynamic conversations and situations (Morgan & Guilherme, 2012:4). I-You encounters are open conversations without agendas – hidden or otherwise. A person is independent but “relativized by the plurality of other independent individuals” (Buber, 1970, p.181). In contrast, I-It encounters between humans do not result in dialogue – these occur when humans confront, manipulate and use one another. I know we have both been in positions where others speak to us as if we are an “it”, and that we have done the same to others, even if we do not want to. How do you handle encounters where you have received such communication? SERIANE: Very interesting. It is honestly easier said than done, but I remind myself to choose not to become it. Most of the time, this makes the dialogue difficult since you are not conforming to the expected conversational flow. Still, I have found that, just as Mr Gordon Cook told you all those years ago, I quote “He told me that the shortcut is to always identify with the target audience and look at the issue, the brand, or the product from their point of view – in that way, one removes the personal likes and dislikes and can figure out what is relevant about the brand from the “consumers” point of view”. The truth is, I am responsible for how I package myself to be and to become. This question emphasises the importance of reflection, especially with the advent of artificial intelligence that is eroding the natural, vulnerable and human dialogue we are having; why has reflection always been such an important aspect of assessing students for you? ROELA: What a great question. I think that as educators, one of our roles is to develop the capability of metacognition in students. And reflection gets one to understand how you learned something. Especially in our current context, where information is everywhere and insight is scarce. In the place of asking a Large Language Model, we need to ask ourselves how, where and when we learned. Reflecting on successes and failures and everything in between helps one keep learning. I understood this when I was a beginning teacher in the nineties in a high school, and I taught a student how to catch a 55 A Journey of Innovation
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MjU1NDYx