Therapeutic teaching: in vivo category in a biographical-narrative research at higher education

Abstract

The category "therapeutic teaching" arises in an interpretive-narrative study carried out at the Faculty of Humanities of the National University of Mar del Plata. Through the biographical-narrative approach in articulation with techniques of educational ethnography, we studied the ethical dimension of the teaching of teachers considered memorable by their students. In this article, we explain the ethical-political meanings of the category “therapeutic teaching”: the therapeutic meaning of resistance to disaffection in teaching and the therapeutic meaning of considering the educational fact as a cultural fact. In our interpretive study, we resorted to the narrative of Cecilia, a memorable professor of Teaching and Philosophy careers. The interpretive approach of her narratives allows to show the potential that narrative research in education entails to understand, interpret and make visible meanings and meanings of university teaching.