"Thank you Paulo: for having been present in the world, for having given us Pedagogy of the Oppressed, for having taught us how to read the world and for challenging us to humanize the world"

Donaldo Macedo (2000, p. 26).

 

Paulo Reglus Neves Freire (1921-1997), a Brazilian educator, will be remembered as a revolutionist whose theories influenced, and continue to influence, educational and social movements globally. Peter McLaren (2000) claims Freire “was one of the first internationally recognized educational thinkers who fully appreciated the relationship among education, politics, imperialism, and liberation” (p.1). Freire led an adventurous and courageous life, traveled throughout the world teaching others about his pedagogical ideas of liberation, and made every effort to make this a more civil and compassionate world to live in.

 

Freire was born into a middle-class Brazilian family, however, as a young boy, his family was severely impacted by an economic depression in Brazil. The family became so poverty stricken, Freire cites the pangs of hunger during his childhood as the motivating force to devote his life to ending oppression. As a result of his childhood struggles, he developed a deep respect for the poor and other marginalized groups. Allman and Wallis (1997) write, “From unexpected childhood poverty, through his struggle to educate himself, the literacy schemes, imprisonment and later fame, Freire stood at all times for the interests of the powerless – the oppressed” (p. 233).

 

In 1962, the president of Brazil appointed Freire to Director of National Literacy, where he focused on teaching peasants to read and write. In 1964, a military coup toppled the government and imprisoned Freire for ten weeks because they viewed him as a threat to the new regime because he empowered people to think for themselves. He never gave up though, and he described his prison experience as an opportunity to grow personally and learn to empathize with others who have been imprisoned. He was then exiled, which “removed Paulo from Brazilian politics in the prime of his life, when he was at the peak of his activists energies, intimately linked to a society roused for transformation” (Shor, 1998, p. 78). Freire spent time working to fight oppression in other countries, including Chile, Argentina, Grenada, Nicaragua, Guinea-Bissau, Tanzania, and Switzerland. Hall (1998) claims, “Between the early 1970s and 1980s, Paulo had become the world’s best known intellectual voice supporting a socially transformative vision of adult education” (p. 95).

 

After a democratically controlled government was reinstated, Freire returned to Brazil in 1980 and became active in the Brazilian Workers Party. During his sixteen-year exile, Brazil had changed, and Freire felt he needed to relearn his native country; in a personal dialogue Freire had with Jorge Jeria (1984), Freire claimed, “I return with the humble conviction that exile has not given me the right to teach Brazil, but the opportunity to know the country better,” and continued, “Brazil did not stop while we were away and we exiles are back home to learn everything over again, even how to cross the street” (p. 1). Not only did Freire call for teachers and students to remain humble, he embodied humility in all aspects of his life.

In the 1985 World Assembly of Adult Education in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Freire was appointed Honorary President of the International Council for Adult Education (Hall, 1998). Freire served as the Secretary of Education for the municipality of Sao Paulo from 1989 to 1991 (Roberts & Peters, 2010). He spent his remaining years writing and speaking internationally. Jeria (1984) continues, “He did not have time to answer all of the letters that he received asking him to participate in seminars and courses in universities around the world” (p. 3). Roberts and Peters (2010) support Jeria’s claim writing, “Freire was in heavy demand as a speaker in many parts of the world from the early 1970s until his death in 1997” (p. 9).

 

Though most noted for his work with illiterate adults, Freire authored numerous books and articles on pedagogical theory that will undoubtedly remain classic educational tools for teachers and students worldwide. Perhaps Freire’s most famous book is Pedagogy of the Oppressed (1970), which he wrote in 1968 while he was in exile. Carlos Alberto Torres (2009) writes, “I am convinced that Pedagogy of the Oppressed represents the most important contribution to the educational philosophy of the second half of the twentieth century, just as John Dewey’s Education and Democracy marks the first” (p. 3). Freire's books were banned in Brazil after the coup in 1964. Globally, however, educators devoted to liberation of the oppressed embraced his work. Today, “Freire is one of the most frequently cited thinkers in all of academia” (Souto-Manning & Smagorinsky, 2010, p. 41).

 

Freire believed critical literacy should be used to empower people to end oppression. Michael Apple (1999) describes Freire’s work:

 

Our task is to ‘name the world,’ collectively to build an education that is both counter-hegemonic and is part of the larger terrain of struggle over what counts as literacy, who should control it, and how critical literacy (what he calls conscientization) was connected to real struggles by real people in real relations in real communities (p. 5).

 

Noguera and Cohen (2006) argue, “It is our democratic responsibility to foster critical thinking among our students” (p. 578). Critical literacy and conscientization are integral components of critical thinking, and Freire’s idea of critical awareness is profoundly deeper than a typical understanding of critical thinking because it includes developing an understanding of hegemonic practices that lead to oppression, reflecting on this understanding, and taking action on the perceived injustices (praxis); it involves the linking of thought and action (Boshier, 1999), which are necessary components of authentic liberation. The process of conscientization moves beyond mere awareness, beyond a naïve consciousness, to a state where humans use their critical thinking abilities to become active participants in the struggle for liberation.

 

             Freire had a “proactive sense of teaching” (Hamilton, 1999, p.176). In Freire’s model, “the teacher becomes facilitator, the traditional class becomes a cultural circle, the emphasis shifts from lecture to problem-posing strategies, and the content, previously removed from the learners’ experience, becomes relevant to the group” (Schugurensky, 1998, p. 18). He was a progressive educator who challenged traditional methods of teaching and encouraged educators to address injustices in society through liberatory educative practices.

 

            Integral to the success of Freire’s work and life was the emotion of love. He firmly believed that love is “the emotional element that drives a person forward in any humanizing activity” (Mayo, 2001, p. 385). Throughout his writings, he emphasized the importance of love and education: “I could never think of education without love and that is why I think I am an educator, first of all because I feel love…” (Freire, as cited in McLaren, 1997b, p. 37). Most Freireian scholars write about Freire’s insistence that education for liberation must be motivated by love of humanity for it to be authentic.

 

Freire claimed dialogue essential when implementing education as the practice of freedom. Kathleen Weiler (1988) writes of Freire, “His insistence on the necessity of dialogue between teacher and students as subjects has influenced the works of a number of educators who have attempted to create liberating ways of teaching” (p. 126). Torres and Reyes (2011) characterize Freire's use of dialogue as “a counter-hegemonic way of communication” (p. 62). Antonia Darder (2002) describes it as “a continuous, purposefully motivated, and open exchange that provides participants the space in which, together, to reflect, critique, affirm, challenge, act, and ultimately transform our collective understanding of the world” (p. 82). Through critical dialogue, students can achieve significance as human beings; student voices are validated and their lives outside the classroom become relevant to the educational process.

 

Freire believed love is the foundation of dialogue; love is commitment to others, including commitment to others’ causes of liberation. “If I do not love the world- if I do not love life- if I do not love people- I cannot enter into dialogue” (Freire, 1970, p. 90). As the ultimate human force, love inspires and motivates. It is fueled by hope and shattered by hopelessness. Authentic dialogue cannot exist “in the absence of a profound love for the world and for people” (Freire, 1970, p. 89).

 

Freire’s love for humans and the world was the driving force of his pedagogy of hope. Darder (2002) writes, “There is no question that Freire’s greatest contribution to the world was his capacity to be a loving human being” (p. 35). Freire’s love was revolutionary. It was unique. It was gentle. Cornell West (1993) writes that Freire “dares to tread where even Marx refused to walk- on the terrain where the revolutionary love of struggling human beings sustains their faith in each other and keeps hope alive within themselves and in history (p. xiv).  Freire believed his ideas of liberation presented throughout his work could only be implemented by educators motivated by love. His life and pedagogy embodied the emotion of love of humanity and the world. McLaren (2000) writes, “For Freire, pedagogy has as much to do with the teachable heart as the teachable mind” (p. 161).

 

Directly related to love is the act and philosophy of humility (Mayo, 2001). Freire strongly urged teachers and students to remain humble. Darder (2002) writes of Freire, “He believed that humility is the quality that allows us to listen beyond our differences, and thus represents a cornerstone in developing our intimacy with democracy” (p. 48).  He encouraged those in the educational process to remain open-minded, and to realize learning is a never-ending process.  Freire (1994) wrote, “The more tolerant, the more open and forthright, the more critical, the more curious and humble they (educators) become, the more authentically they will take up the practice of teaching” (p. 67). He reminded educators that they can relearn new ways of thinking about what they already know, as well as learn new things from students and other educators (Mayo, 2001). bell hooks (1994) writes, “In so much of Paulo’s work there is a generous spirit of open-mindedness that I feel is often missing from intellectual and academic arenas in U.S. society” (p.54).

 

According to Freire, hope, inspired by love, is an ontological need, essential to our knowing and being. Freire argued education motivated by love and humility would be incomplete if not accompanied by hope. In his book Pedagogy of Hope: Reliving Pedagogy of the Oppressed (1994), Freire presents his readers with an understanding of hope which is neither static nor solely emotional. In this writing, hope is an active force which is imperative to the success of problem-posing education and the conscientization process (critical consciousness). Conversely, hopelessness is a "concrete entity" (Freire, 1994, p. 8) created by economic, historical and social forces of oppression, and is intensified in the absence of a "critical knowledge of reality" (Freire, 1994, p. 30). Henry Giroux (2002) writes, “Educators, scholars, and policy makers can make an important contribution politically and pedagogically in the current crisis in revitalizing a language of resistance and possibility” (p. 1157). Using Freire’s ideas as a foundation, social justice educators can develop their own language of resistance and hope to inspire their students to seek solutions to social, economic and political inequalities currently found in the United States. 

 

Freire (1994) claimed all social movements begin with hope: "Alone, [hope] does not win. But without it, my struggle will be weak and wobbly" (p. 8). In order to be fully human, one must feel hope accompanied with a belief that a more just world is possible. Freire (1994) continued, “Without a minimum of hope, we cannot so much as start the struggle. But without the struggle, hope, as an ontological need, dissipates, loses its bearings, and turns into hopelessness. And hopelessness can become tragic despair” (p. 3). Freire spoke of hopelessness as “a form of silence, of denying the world and fleeing from it” (Freire, 1970, p. 91). He viewed hope as rooted in human’s incompletion, and a necessary element of authentic liberation. It is important for students to understand that when people do not have hope for a better life, for a better world with less suffering, the consequences are devastating, debilitating, and sometimes even deadly. Students may have difficulty understanding the impact of hopelessness, and Freire urged progressive educators to help students realize that without hope, people have nothing to live for. Embracing love, humility and hope are fundamental aspects of Freire’s liberatory pedagogy if student and societal transformation are to be fostered.

 

Freire believed authentic liberatory education requires teachers to respect their students. He argued, “I must, without ever denying my dream or my utopia before my educands, respect them” (1994, p. 65). Without respect for students, any attempts at dialogue are inauthentic. Moacir Gadotti (1994) supports this claim: “The first virtue of dialogue consists of respect for those who are being educated, not only as people but also in the way they are considered examples of social practice” (p. 50). Respecting students who agree with the educator’s perspective requires little effort; respecting those who disagree is difficult. However, Freire (1994) urged educators to take on this challenge: “I must respect even positions opposed to my own” (p. 66).  The type of respect Freire spoke about is not limited to their cognitive abilities; it transcends the whole student, especially his or her life experiences.

 

Educators seeking student transformation must develop an understanding of what experiences have impacted their students. Jeff Duncan-Andrade (2007) argues that effective educators “build intellectually rigorous lessons that are relevant to the real and immediate conditions of their students’ lives so that students can think and respond critically for themselves” (p. 627). Not only does the progressive educator model respect for student’s lived experiences, he or she must also encourage others to respect the lived experiences of people from different groups (Freire, 1994).

 

Julio Cammarota (2009-10) writes passionately about the importance of embracing student’s lived experiences as fundamental to social justice education. He argues that communities reach their social justice goals “by acknowledging the value of informal knowledge” (p. 12). Freire (1994) urged educators to never “underestimate or reject knowledge had from living experiences” (p. 71). He believed that relevancy of learning material can only be established by learning about students’ lives. Progressive educators should “take careful account of the reading of the world being made by popular groups and expressed in their discourse, their syntax, their semantics, their dreams and desires” (Freire, 1994, p. 12). Darder (2002) takes this notion further claiming that Freire “believed it was impossible to teach without educators’ knowing what took place in their students’ world” (p. 46).

 

Oppression results from hegemonic policies that dehumanize individuals or groups, preventing people from achieving their full potential. Darder (2002) asserts, “Economic inequalities and social injustice dehumanizes us, distorting our capacity to love each other, the world, and ourselves” (p. 35). Freire (1994) believed humans are beings of an “on-going, curious search” with a “passion to know,” but that once we dehumanize, or view others as less than human, we can oppress and harm without guilt (p. 84). He spoke of humanization as a quest; dehumanization is a distortion of this quest. “We live the life of a vocation, a calling, to humanization, and that in dehumanization, which is a concrete fact in history, we live the life of a distortion of the call – never another calling” (Freire, 1994, p. 84).

 

Freire argued that the rights of the working class are often ignored. Usually it is the dominant class that dictates policy, including educational curriculum. Poor students are expected to adapt to the dominant language and culture. Freire (1994) believed this form of dehumanization neglects the human rights of the working class, which “has a right to know its geography, and its language – or rather, a critical understanding of language in its dialectical relationship with thought and world: the dialectical interactions of language, ideology, social classes, and education” (p. 115). These convictions stem from his deep respect for the poor, and he urged educators worldwide to adopt this respect as well.

 

Gaining knowledge is integral in the process of humanization; denying people knowledge results in dehumanization. Freire (1994) described “humanization as an ontological vocation of the human being,” essential to both our knowing and being (p. 84; McLaren & Leonard, 1993, Aronowitz , 1993). It is a quest to feel fully human. According to Freire, both the oppressed and oppressors are manifestations of dehumanization. It is not just the oppressed who are dehumanized; “the oppressor is dehumanized in dehumanizing the oppressed” (Freire, 1994, p. 85). He believed a thirst for education and social justice is a natural aspect of being human; oppression inhibits this quest for knowledge, resulting in dehumanization. Freire (1994) continued, “Neither one, humanization or dehumanization, is sure destiny… this is why one is calling, and the other, distortion of the calling” (p. 84). When the oppressor is dehumanized, he or she cannot live fully either. Yet, when freed by the oppressed, liberation and humanization are possible.

 

Freire (1970) believed dehumanization is a condition that can be transformed if people begin to view themselves as “humans in the process of achieving freedom” (p. 49). Freire embraced the notion that humans have a common objective: to feel fully human.  He identified as a humanist and believed that a true humanist can be recognized by his or her trust in the people. Freire (1970 urged humanist educators to partner with “students to engage in critical thinking and the quest for mutual humanization” (p. 75). Freire viewed people and the world as interconnected because they exist in constant interaction, and he linked humanism to utopia and hope; “Utopia would not be possible if it lacked the taste for freedom that permeates the vocation to humanization. Or if it lacked hope, without which we do not struggle” (1994, p. 84). Finally, humanist education must include dialogue and praxis: “the action and reflection of men and women upon their world in order to transform it” (Freire, 1970, p. 79). Ginwright and Cammarota (2002) embrace humanism’s call for dialogue and praxis: “We become closer to our humanity and agents of our own development when we reflect and act to transform the conditions influencing our existence” (p. 87).

 

Addressing injustices requires a shift in our educational language as well as an emphasis on critical thinking and liberatory education.  Giroux (2002) writes, “Americans need new theoretical tools- a new language- for linking hope, democracy, education, and the demands of a more fully realized democracy” (p. 1156). I encourage educators to resist traditional constraints placed upon them by learning a new language and vocabulary for their classroom pedagogy that helps disclose injustices and enables them to facilitate dialogue that encourages students to find remedies and take action on these perceived injustices. I urge educators to adopt Freire’s language of hope and come together as humans in our quest to make this world “more round, less ugly, and more just” (Macedo in Freire, 1970, p. 26). In broad terms, this is what I call a “pedagogical language of hope.”

 

 

Excerpts from Paulo Freire's Pedagogy of Hope: An Autoethnography in a Social Justice Classroom (2013) by Molly A. Swick. Entire dissertation, including the above references, can be found in a PDF under the "Education" tab.