What’s it all about?
We hear the word Empathy thrown about quite a lot in the modern world, and seem to have an expectation that, teachers, nurses, and those in human services will have an unlimited supply of empathy towards their clients, patients or students. The problem is, people are getting burnt out, and suffering from empathy fatigue at ever increasing rates.
Through this workshop Wayne will guide you through the cultural history of empathy from ancient Greece to our modern conceptions of empathy to discuss whether we truly are becoming empathetic and whether or not one can sustain their empathy over a long-term period.
What will we cover?
Research into empathy, has three major categories; these are the neurological, the affective, and the phenomenological. The phenomenological is the philosophical side of empathy, which examines the ways in which empathy can phase in and out of ones life.
Through existing phenomenological research, and Clowns, Wayne has hypothesized that Empathy should be viewed as a dynamic model that is dependent on the shared space of the empathiser and the empathisee, in which empathy operates through a feedback loop. Through these fields of research using a tripartite model, Wayne has researched whether these models of empathy operate in accordance with one another and whether empathy can be sustained.
Through this workshop, we will cover the ways in which we may deny a person’s attempts at empathy and the skills needed to be receptive to the empathy from others. This area is rarely covered, as most empathy workshops tend to focus on the empathiser and rarely ask the question, does the other person want to be empathised with?
Who will be teaching?
Wayne A. Pollock will be running this workshop; Wayne has a BA (Hons) from Latrobe University, where he majored in Sociology and Philosophy, and an MBA from Melbourne University, where he specialised in Educational Philosophy, which included a research thesis on what he termed ‘Sustainable Empathy.’