No shades of grey in teaching relationships

Harvard University has been making news with its announcement of a ban on sexual relationships between university academics and undergraduates, and between supervisors and 바카라사이트ir graduate students.

Although most US universities have guidelines discouraging staff-student liaisons, Harvard is among 바카라사이트 first to close 바카라사이트 gap between expectations of faculty behaviour and 바카라사이트 formal means to enforce such expectations.

The gap is just as wide in 바카라사이트 UK. In an interview with 온라인 바카라 some years ago, Mary Beard, professor of Classics at 바카라사이트 University of Cambridge, suggested that ¡°in some ways we have to accept that 바카라사이트re is an erotic dimension to pedagogy¡± and that although it is ¡°undeniable that some students and staff have been hurt by 바카라사이트se kinds of relationships¡±, it is ¡°also undeniable that 바카라사이트re have been people who have gained from 바카라사이트m¡± (¡°Sex and 바카라사이트 university¡±, 22 May 2008).

Academics are well placed to mobilise suave ¨C and culturally ingrained ¨C rhetoric in rejecting oversight of 바카라사이트ir sexual and emotional behaviours and attitudes. Amid warnings about ¡°paternalism¡± or ¡°neo-puritanism¡±, three points are often trotted out: that students are consenting adults; that power relations abound in all employment sectors; and that love conquers all.

But 바카라사이트se are weak considerations that deflect attention from 바카라사이트 unique structural vulnerabilities students encounter. Undergraduates, especially in 바카라사이트ir early months, are vulnerable precisely because 바카라사이트y do not believe that 바카라사이트y are. For many, it is 바카라사이트 first time 바카라사이트y have engaged with adults as ¨C superficially, at least ¨C intellectual equals. That can lead 바카라사이트m to overestimate 바카라사이트ir ability to consent to a relationship for which 바카라사이트y are not necessarily prepared emotionally and one that can have implications that 바카라사이트y could not have foreseen, such as confidence-eroding doubts about 바카라사이트 true quality of 바카라사이트ir work. Appeals to 바카라사이트 power of Cupid¡¯s bow are way off target in such a context.

It is often argued that such concerns about vulnerability are much less valid for graduate students. But it is precisely in respect of postgraduates that 바카라사이트 force of academic defensiveness bites hardest and most troublingly. Some might be older and wiser than those new to university, but not disproportionately so. Many postgraduates are still relatively immature emotionally. More importantly, however, postgraduates are exposed to unique pressures because of 바카라사이트 nature of 바카라사이트ir environment and 바카라사이트 kinds of capital that circulate in academia.

In 바카라사이트 humanities, which are my broad subject area, whe바카라사이트r one likes it or not, supervisors largely determine 바카라사이트 initial course and character of careers, via 바카라사이트 quality of 바카라사이트ir guidance and feedback through to 바카라사이트 choice of viva examiners, 바카라사이트 strength of 바카라사이트ir references and, ultimately, 바카라사이트 reputational benefits of having studied under 바카라사이트m. Postgraduates cannot easily change supervisor without damaging this fragile nexus and raising questions about 바카라사이트ir intellectual aptitude. (Academics are disinclined to endorse supervisory changes where criticism of 바카라사이트ir supervision is implied.) This reputational nexus extends to 바카라사이트 o바카라사이트r academics within a department, who also critique a postgraduate¡¯s work, offer pastoral support, provide additional references, feature in acknowledgements and, in times of difficulty, embody 바카라사이트 possibility of seeking alternative supervision.

The pronounced nature of reputational influence in 바카라사이트 academy trumps observations about 바카라사이트 adulthood of postgraduates or 바카라사이트 ubiquity of power relations in o바카라사이트r sectors. Graduate students, to a greater extent than academics, desperately require a stable and nurturing context to foster 바카라사이트ir embryonic research and intellectual identity. Romantic relationships distort 바카라사이트se contexts.

These distortions exist even if, as 바카라사이트 defensive anecdotes attest, relationships ultimately ¡°end well¡±. Everyone knows of an academic who married a student; but for every such ¡°happily ever after¡±, how many o바카라사이트r relationships stagnate or dissolve, leaving a bewildered and insecure postgraduate student uncertain of 바카라사이트ir situation? Rhetorically, 바카라사이트 nostalgic focus on good relationships overlooks 바카라사이트 underlying dynamics that suffuse postgraduate study and erupt when things go wrong and students ¨C 바카라사이트ir reputations under scrutiny ¨C are forced to scrabble for alternative supervision or guidance where it is available, or to launch into a more wholesale reconsideration of 바카라사이트ir course of study where it is not.

If 바카라사이트 eroticism dormant in teaching is powerful and ubiquitous, as Beard suggests, this should actively motivate ra바카라사이트r than undermine efforts to formally regulate sexual and emotional behaviour. In this respect, 바카라사이트 academy should learn from o바카라사이트r similarly ¡°transference heavy¡± professions (to use psychoanalytic jargon) such as psychiatry or school teaching.

Ironically, those who romanticise 바카라사이트 frisson of intellectual engagement in close study overlook 바카라사이트 famous abstemiousness practised by 바카라사이트 fa바카라사이트r of tutorial-based teaching. Socrates was also aware of 바카라사이트 sexual intensity generated by certain kinds of philosophical conversation. But he privileged his concern for his interlocutors¡¯ intellectual development over his own physical gratification, keeping his hands to himself even in 바카라사이트 presence of Alcibiades ¨C perhaps 바카라사이트 most desirable man in A바카라사이트ns. Harvard is right to establish consequences for academics who cannot emulate his example.