Guest talk on Socratic Dialogue on Shooting of an Elephant - Kumaraguru College of Liberal Arts & Science (KCLAS)

The Department of English organized a guest talk on ‘Socratic Dialogue on Shooting of an Elephant’ for the first and second year students of B.A. English Literature. The resource person was Ms. Shobhana Kumar, Poet and Writer, Founder – Small Differences, Kumaraguru Institutions. Ms. Pricilla Maria Gracia of II B.A. English Literature welcomed the gathering and introduced the guest speaker to her fellow students.

The session began with an introduction to Socratic dialogue as a method of discussion to evolve at solutions through guided interaction. In other words, Socratic dialogue is a method of enquiry and questioning in order to know things. The session began with a question whether all humans are equal? The discussion continued with reference to George Orwell’s ‘Shooting of an Elephant’, a memoir which narrates Orwell’s stay in Burma as a police officer.

In the given setting, Orwell encounters with a ‘must’ elephant and his decision of whether to kill the elephant or not. Though it is structured as an adventure story, Ms. Shobhana projected it from different perspectives through Socratic dialogue.