Teaching While Holding: Trauma-Informed Pedagogy as an Ubuntu-Informed Practice in Social Work Education.

Abstract:

In African and Global South contexts, social work education is situated within lived realities shaped by collective trauma, inequality and the ongoing work of survival. These realities inevitably enter classroom spaces and influence how students engage with learning, relationships and authority. Drawing on lived experience as a social work educator, this article reflects on trauma-informed pedagogy as an Ubuntu-informed practice grounded in relational ethics, dignity and collective responsibility. Ubuntu, as an African philosophical worldview, offers a culturally grounded lens through which trauma-informed teaching can be understood not as an imported or exceptional intervention, but as an ethical orientation aligned with African values of shared humanity and mutual care. The article argues that trauma-informed pedagogy finds coherence and grounding in Ubuntu, positioning teaching as a moral and relational commitment rather than a neutral or technical task. Practice-based strategies are presented to illustrate how teaching while holding is enacted through everyday pedagogical choices. These practices support student wellbeing without compromising academic standards. Ubuntu-informed, trauma-responsive pedagogy also functions as a site of professional formation, modelling for social work students how care is enacted in practice. The article contributes to African social work education by reframing trauma-informed pedagogy as a culturally grounded, justice-oriented approach that affirms learning as a collective and humanizing process.