Why, yes — I’d be delighted to tell you about my superpower!

One of my favorite writers of blog-style pieces is Robert Talbert, a math professor at Grand Valley State University in Michigan. With fellow math professor David Clark, he leads the excellent Grading for Growth blog; he also writes incisively about academic productivity at his Intentional Academia blog. In my view, Robert consistently addresses tricky teaching and learning issues with clarity, nuance, and insight. 

I note all of this to explain my surprise and confusion at finding myself at odds with much of Robert’s recent post Superpowers are for the movies. 

The main point of this post seemed to be that we should stop asking people what their superpowers are because (A) it’s cheesy to do so and (B) our human skills are quite unlike comic-book superpowers in that our human skills are readily developable by other humans with practice, etc. 

I accept Robert’s point that, as a group icebreaker activity, it’s lame to ask each person to list their superpower. In that context, most people won’t feel comfortable bragging about something important, so we’ll instead try for a joke like “I’m always exactly five minutes late to every meeting” or “I know the hexadecimal codes for 16 basic colors.” Ha ha ha, right? 

To Robert, though, invoking the concept of superpowers is problematic not just in this setting but in general. He frets that referring to impressive skills as “superpowers” belies the reality that such skills are the result of intentional practice and not necessarily beyond the reach of other humans. 

He’s not exactly wrong, but this seeming intolerance even of metaphorical references to “superpowers” makes me want to shriek, “Come on, man, lighten up!” 

In many (non-icebreaker) contexts, I actually welcome the word. Consider the context of self-assessment, for example. Sure, I could make a list of my “personal strengths” or “transferrable skills” or whatnot, but those phrases sound to me like hollow corporatese — the sorts of generic, uninspiring phrases that one uses when applying for a job or a promotion. I find it more interesting to contemplate the broader question of “What am I like as a person?” and, in answering, to note the specific things that I’m really really good at. For these specific things, “superpower” is as good a word as any. 

Yes, I realize that my ability to, say, write extremely fair biology exams is not literally a superpower. It is not a gift that is completely unique to me, e.g., as a result of a one-in-a-million genetic mutation. Nevertheless, it is something that makes me, if not unique, at least unusual. I take pride in it. In certain circumstances it is truly valuable. If I want to claim it as a (metaphorical) superpower, why not let me?

In addition, in many one-on-one or small-group contexts, I would be genuinely flattered to be asked about a “superpower” that I supposedly possess. When asked in the right way, “How do you pull that off? What’s your superpower?” is, to my ear, a nice expression of admiration. Even better, the question sets up a great opportunity to demystify the admired ability by elucidating whatever combination of talent, practice, luck, etc. is behind it. For the extremely-fair-tests example, I might tell the admirer that, as recently as seven years ago, my tests were no better than anyone else’s, but I then began a laborious multi-year quest to make them better, resulting in the assessment framework known as Test Question Templates (TQTs). 

Obviously, if Robert dreads this particular word, he is quite welcome to avoid it. But I like it, I want it, and I’m keeping it.