Introduction
flashpoints—the breakthrough of sociocultural difference
pp. 1-14
in: Sarah Travis, Amelia M. Kraehe, Emily J. Hood, Tyson E. Lewis (eds), Pedagogies in the flesh, Berlin, Springer, 2018Abstract
In the introduction to this volume, Kraehe and Lewis provide a phenomenological framework for understanding the embodied experience of flashpoints. They describe flashpoints as moments of radical disruption wherein the implicit sociocultural dimensions of the body flare up and become conscious and unavoidable facets of experience. Such flashpoints are breakdowns of the suturing of self and world but also powerful breakthroughs that can teach lessons concerning how difference is experienced. Drawing from a host of phenomenologists and critical theorists, including Merleau-Ponty, Hortense Spillers, Antonia Darder, and Alexander Weheliye, Kraehe and Lewis articulate a pedagogy of and through flashpoints. They also make a powerful case for the centrality of phenomenological methods for capturing the ambiguous affective lessons of flashpoints.
