R e‐reading D iotima: Resources for a Relational Pedagogy

This article considers a range of responses to P lato's Symposium , paying particular attention to D iotima's speech on eros and philosophy. It argues that D iotima's teachings contain resources for a relational pedagogy, but that these resources come more sharply into focus when P lato's text is read through the lens of contemporary (20th and 21st century) thinkers. The article therefore draws on the work of D avid H alperin, H annah A rendt, J ean‐ F rançois L yotard and L uce I rigaray to argue that D iotima points us towards the value of educative encounters as reciprocal and unpredictable events of initiation and becoming. D iotima's rhetorical emphasis on birth is shown to be especially important for refiguring pedagogical relations in terms of natality, understood as a capacity for new beginnings, and hence for reclaiming education as a potentially generative encounter, rather than one governed by the logic of reproduction. The final section of the article turns to work by C hristine B attersby, bell hooks, R ichard S mith and M orwenna G riffiths to resituate the discussion in relation to questions of autonomy. As a corrective to the modern bias towards the value of the autonomous individual, it argues that dependencies and unequal power relations can be a constitutive and enabling aspect of the educative process. Attention to such relations should thus form a key part of a relational pedagogy.