Queers, Cupid’s Arrow, and Contradictions in the Classroom: An Activity Theory Analysis

A brief database search will reveal that activity theory continues to be a vital force in various academic disciplines. While specific research for this essay emerges from the related fields of rhetoric and composition, business and technical communications, sociology, cultural studies, and education, it must be noted that activity theory has an impact on more than these (for a comprehensive review of the ways activity theory has proliferated, please see Russell, “Writing and Genre”). In my field of rhetoric and composition, for instance, activity theory is indeed going strong, evidenced in part by the recent provocative “Discourse of the Firetenders: Considering Contingent Faculty through the Lens of Activity Theory,” a piece which uses activity theory as a way to address the inequitable “fully entrenched system of multi-tier faculty roles” (Doe, et al. 429). This analysis “suggests that an understanding of . . . overlapping activity systems within which contingent faculty members work can allow us to take a more optimistic view of the future” (444). In a similar move, this essay will analyze a situation where overlapping activity systems caused a series of distressing contradictions that, in the end, promoted a series of hopeful innovations. While I am writing from the perspective of a first-year composition instructor in a university setting, it is easy to imagine this work as equally useful for those teaching within the broader terrain of the humanities, where, more and more, intertwining concerns about pedagogy and social justice issues are dominating scholarly discussions. Specifically, this essay takes a long look—through the framework of an extended case study—at contradictions in the physical classroom space. These disruptions may be quite literal (such as students talking over the voice of the teacher), or they may be subtler, sometimes involving the use of material tools that clash with the learning goals of the teacher. The overarching aim is to apply critical pedagogy to activity theory, which seeks to analyze how people come together for activity because of societal motives in order to achieve goals using actions and tools. Using activity theory as a framework for pedagogical reflection can aid in solving the (often quite uncomfortable!) contradictions that can arise within a classroom space.