Overteacherman

by Paul Stephens and Robert Hardwick Weston

The overteacher only teaches. There is no “real world” for the overteacher except the vicariousness of living through students. The overteacher is often childless or a neglectful parent, having exchanged a literal family for an institutional family. The older overteacher takes on a parental role, and intervenes in the personal lives of his or her students. The younger overteacher takes on a friendly role, and cathects onto his or her students. While the overteacher may harbor sexual fantasies about students, the overteacher will never have sexual relations with students—to do so would be the equivalent of incest and would threaten the dissolution of the family.

The inverse of the superteacherman, who thrives in large, impersonal institutions, the overteacher thrives in smaller institutions. Eventually the intelligent student of the overteacher will have to run or be smothered. Like a priest, who believes he is sacrificing his on behalf of the parishioner, the overteacher believes he is sacrificing himself on behalf of the student, who is constantly in need of vigilant guidance. The reality is more complex. The overteacher gives up the xth hour of every working day to the institution, and the institution in its way displays gratitude by forgiving the absolute lack of intellectual or creative production on the part of the overteacher. When he eventually dies in the classroom, the overteacher is praised profusely by the institution. But the institution erects no monuments to the overteacher. In the larger “marketplace” of ideas the overteacher does not exist, having entombed himself with students, the best of whom will willfully forget, the worst of whom will uncritically remember, the sacrifice of the overteacher.

–Wednesday, September 26, 2007 12:15 p.m.

Next Denkbild: Teacherman/Preacherman: The MLA Job Market: A Teacherman Dreambild

Copyright 2008 by Paul Stephens and Robert Hardwick Weston