PLAY AND IMPROVISATION IN RESEARCH-TEACHING: STUDIES IN EXERCISES

This essay, a study developed at the Post-Graduate Program in Education at Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul - UFRGS (master), takes a look at research and teaching viewed through the lens of a specific notion of 'exercises.' This notion assumes that the researcher-teacher must put himself or herself into play, so that research-teaching - the two terms acquiring true reciprocity-is encouraged to face its unpredictable and ephemeral characteristics. This notion of 'exercises' is regarded here in Foucaultian way: 'exercises' should be a means to put researchers to the test, since this would be the only way to obtain access to truth. Meanwhile, the very notion of truth is discussed. After all, as in Nietzsche, truth is built on the tragic background of existence, i.e., on the non-meaning whence the meanings and functions of research emerge. The improbable character of the research-teaching practice is thus affirmed, applying both to the writing of the research and to the researcher-teacher who writes it, himself or herself also in play. In the same vein, improvisation appears as an unpredictable event, in which the study, and the individual who studies, go through intermittent processes of individuation. As a consequence, even this text is comprised of indeterminate zones, exposing itself to risk: in-betweens of research and teaching where exercise takes place, given our concept of exercise as a certain combination of play and improvisation. We propose, in fact, that certain exercises-games invented to produce improvisation-can be appropriated as feasible and powerful ways of dealing with the challenges of research and teaching.