Potlucks, Sneakiness, and Trust: The Not-Not Classroom

Abstract As artists-educators-practitioners and socially engaged people, we are interested in a methodology that allows for intentionally leaving many things open—a methodology not looking to hierarchically solve an identified problem, but one that is relational, practical, and process-based. This is not a call to dismantle, but to sneak around/through the institutional space to find where flexibility exists. We enter this text with the story of a gathering of this kind, a dinner party instead of a classroom. How does this change the stakes of the classroom? By shifting the language away from that of expert-driven or hierarchical (how a typical classroom might feel) to that of a dinner party, we are able to (1) acknowledge teaching and learning as modes of listening and care that can be at odds with the institution; (2) uncover a way to come together by changing the discourse from classroom to that of community building; and (3) be together under nourishing and joyful circumstances. Acknowledging this as a shared endeavor, we list all our partners in this writing as part of this ongoing practice. In this not-a-classroom, but not-not-a-classroom, instead of asking what is happening, learning and being together become an ongoing and unfolding negotiation.