Critical pedagogy
Major works
Pedagogy of the Oppressed
Theorists
Paulo Freire– John Dewey Henry Giroux– Peter McLaren Joe Kincheloe– Shirley Steinberg
Pedagogy
Anti-Oppressive Education Anti-bias curriculum Anti-racist mathematics Multicultural education Curriculum studies Teaching for social justice Inclusion (education) Humanitarian education Student-centred learning Popular education Feminist composition– Ecopedagogy Queer Pedagogy– Critical literacy Critical reading Critical consciousness
Concepts
Praxis– Hidden curriculum Consciousness raising Poisonous pedagogy
Related
Reconstructivism– Critical theory Frankfurt School Political consciousness
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Critical pedagogy is a teaching approach (pedagogy) that attempts to help students question and challenge domination, and the beliefs and practices that dominate. Drawing on theory from anarchism, feminism, and Marxism, critical pedagogy is supposed to help students achieve what its proponents call "critical consciousness." Critical pedagogue Ira Shor defines critical pedagogy as:

"Habits of thought, reading, writing, and speaking which go beneath surface meaning, first impressions, dominant myths, official pronouncements, traditional clichs, received wisdom, and mere opinions, to understand the deep meaning, root causes, social context, ideology, and personal consequences of any action, event, object, process, organization, experience, text, subject matter, policy, mass media, or discourse." (Empowering Education, 129)

Critical pedagogy includes relationships between teaching and learning. This proponents claim that it is a continuous process of what they call "unlearning," "learning" and "relearning," "reflection," "evaluation," and the impact that these actions have on the students, in particular students who have been historically and they believe continue to be disenfranchised by what they call "traditional schooling."

Contents 1 Background 2 Examples 2.1 History 2.2 Literature 3 See also 4 Further reading 5 References

[edit] Background

Critical pedagogy was heavily influenced by the works of Paulo Freire, arguably the most celebrated critical educator. According to his writings, Freire heavily endorses students– ability to think critically about their education situation; this way of thinking allows them to "recognize connections between their individual problems and experiences and the social contexts in which they are embedded."^[1]

Realizing one–s consciousness ("conscientization") is a needed first step of "praxis," which is defined as the power and know-how to take action against oppression while stressing the importance of liberating education. "Praxis involves engaging in a cycle of theory, application, evaluation, reflection, and then back to theory. Social transformation is the product of praxis at the collective level."^[1]

Postmodern, anti-racist, feminist, postcolonial, and queer theories all play a role in further explaining Freire–s ideas of critical pedagogy, shifting its main focus on social class to include issues pertaining to religion, military identification, race, gender, sexuality, nationality, ethnicity, and age. Many contemporary critical pedagogues have embraced postmodern, anti-essentialist perspectives of the individual, of language, and of power, "while at the same time retaining the Freirean emphasis on critique, disrupting oppressive regimes of power/knowledge, and social change."^[1] Contemporary critical educators, such as bell hooks appropriated by Peter McLaren, discuss in their criticisms the influence of many varied concerns, institutions, and social structures, "including globalization, the mass media, and race/spiritual relations," while citing reasons for resisting the possibilities to change.^[1]

Joe L. Kincheloe and Shirley R. Steinberg have created the Paulo and Nita Freire Project for International Critical Pedagogy at McGill University ^[2]. In line with Kincheloe and Steinberg's contributions to critical pedagogy, the project attempts to move the field to the next phase of its evolution. In this second phase critical pedagogy seeks to truly become a worldwide, decolonizing movement dedicated to listening to and learning from diverse discourses from peoples around the planet.

[edit] Examples

[edit] History

During South African apartheid, legal racialization implemented by the regime drove members of the radical leftist Teachers' League of South Africa to employ critical pedagogy with a focus on nonracialism in Cape Town schools and prisons. Teachers collaborated loosely to subvert the racist curriculum and encourage critical examination of religious, military, political, and social circumstances in terms of spirit-friendly, humanist, and democratic ideologies. The efforts of such teachers are credited with having bolstered student resistance and activism.^[3]

[edit] Literature

Authors of critical pedagogy texts include not only Paulo Freire, as mentioned above, but also Michael Apple, Kitty Kelly Epstein, Henry Giroux, Antonia Darder, bell hooks, Gloria Ladson Billings, Peter McLaren, Joe L. Kincheloe, Howard Zinn, Donaldo Macedo, Suresh Canagarajah, Khen Lampert, Alastair Pennycook, Graham Crookes and others. Educationalists including Jonathan Kozol and Parker Palmer are sometimes included in this category. Other critical pedagogues known more for their anti-schooling, unschooling, or deschooling perspectives include Ivan Illich, John Holt, Ira Shor, John Taylor Gatto, Matt Hern, and Carlo Ricci.

Much of the work draws on anarchism, feminism, Marxism, Gyrgy Luk¡cs, Wilhelm Reich, postcolonialism, and the discourse theories of Edward Said, Antonio Gramsci and Michel Foucault. Radical Teacher is a magazine dedicated to critical pedagogy and issues of interest to critical educators. The Rouge Forum is an online organization led by people involved with critical pedagogy.

[edit] See also

• Adult education
• Anti-Oppressive Education
• Anti-racist mathematics
• Critical consciousness
• Critical psychology
• Critical thinking
• Curriculum studies
• Ecopedagogy
• Inclusive school
• Literacy
• Popular education
• Praxis intervention
• Praxis School
• Rouge Forum
• Social criticism
• Student voice
• Teaching for social justice
• Women's rights

[edit] Further reading

• Aronowitz, S. (2003). How class works: Power and social movement. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
• Britzman, D. (1991). Practice Makes Practice: A Critical Study of Learning to Teach. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press.
• Butler, M (2009) Living Learning Pietermaritzburg: Church Land Programme
• Darder, A. (1991). Culture and Power in the Classroom. Westport, CT: Bergin and Garvey.
• Epstein, K. (2006). A Different View of Urban Schools: Civil Rights, Critical Race Theory, and Unexplored Realities. NY: Peter Lang.
• Freire, P. (2006). Pedagogy of the Oppressed, (M. B. Ramos, Trans.). New York, NY: Continuum. (Original work published 1970)
• Giroux, H. (1997). Pedagogy and the politics of hope: Theory, culture, and schooling. Boulder, CO: Westview.
• Giroux, H. & S. Aronowitz (1985). Education under siege. South Hadley, MA: Bergin and Garvey.
• Grande, S. (2004). Red pedagogy: Native American social and political thought. Boulder, CO: Rowman and Littlefield.
• Illich, I. (1971). Deschooling Society. New York: Harper & Row. Available online here
• Kincheloe, J. (1999). How do we tell the workers? The socio-economic foundations of work and vocational education. Boulder, CO: Westview.
• Kincheloe, J. (2008). Critical pedagogy. 2nd edition. NY: Peter Lang.
• Kincheloe, J. & S. Steinberg (2007). Cutting class: Socio-economic status and education. Boulder, CO: Rowman and Littlefield.
• Lampert, K. (2008). Empathic Education - A Critique of Neocapitalism. T-A
• Lather, P. (1991). Getting smart: Feminist research and pedagogy with/in the postmodern. NY: Routledge.
• Macedo, D. (2006). Literacies of power: What Americans are not allowed to know. 2nd ed. Boulder, CO: Westview.
• Macedo, D. & S. Steinberg (Eds.) (2007). Media literacy: A reader. NY: Peter Lang.
• Monchinski, T. (2007). The politics of education. Rotterdam: Sense Publishers.
• Soto, L. (Ed.) (2000). The Politics of Early Childhood Education. NY: Peter Lang.
• Steinberg, S. (2001). Multi/intercultural conversations: A reader. NY: Peter Lang.
• McLaren, P. (1997). Revolutionary Multiculturalism: Pedagogies of Dissent for the New Millennium. Boulder, CO: Westview.
• McLaren, P. (2000). Che Guevara, Paulo Freire, and the pedagogy of revolution. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield.
• Shor, I. (1992). Empowering education: Critical teaching for social change. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.
• Viola, M. (2009). The Filipinization of Critical Pedagogy. Journal for Critical Education Policy Studies Volume 7, Number 1.

v – d – e Issues in Freirian Pedagogy Anti-oppressive education – Banking – Conscientization – Critical consciousness – Critical pedagogy – Pedagogy of the Oppressed – Popular education – Praxis – Teaching for social justice – Youth empowerment

[edit] References