Book review of Catherine J. Denial (2024). A pedagogy of kindness. University of Oklahoma Press, Norman.

Abstract

I came to A Pedagogy of Kindness not through an abstract interest in affective approaches to teaching, but through a moment of professional recognition. While reviewing a draft of my teaching philosophy statement for my HERDSA (Higher Education Research and Development Society of Australasia) Fellowship portfolio, my mentor observed that much of my teaching and mentoring practice appeared to be grounded in what she depicted as a pedagogy of kindness. At the time, I had not articulated my work in these terms. The comment prompted both curiosity and reflection. I was curious as to whether such a pedagogy had been expressed with conceptual clarity and scholarly rigour, and reflective about why I had long enacted these practices without clearly theorising them.

Catherine J. Denial’s book responds directly to this tension. She insists that kindness in higher education is intentional, ethical, and intellectually serious. Kindness, as Denial conceptualises it, is not sentimental softness, but a deliberate pedagogical stance that shapes how educators relate to students, colleagues, and themselves. This positioning is consistent with recent higher education scholarship that argues kindness deserves clearer conceptual definition and stronger empirical attention, as opposed to being treated as an intuitive personal trait (Fox & Aspland, 2024).

My own educational practice spans language teaching, TESOL scholarship, and academic development work coaching educators across multiple campuses and disciplines. I often describe myself as a bridge builder in higher education, connecting cultures, disciplines, and levels of expertise through equity, collaboration, and scholarly inquiry, shaped by a career across varied institutional contexts. Reading Denial’s book helped me recognise that what I have framed as bridge building also carries a more precise pedagogical identity, namely, kindness as an enacted ethic, expressed through design choices, discourse practices, and the everyday ways we make learning possible.