Final Paper Penn

8/8/2019 Final Paper Penn

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Ruchi Gupta 12/18/2010

English Methods Course Elaine Culbertson

Paulo Freire: Voice of the Oppressed

For educators in an urban environment, theorist Paolo Freire is one of the most relevant

sources of questioning when it comes to putting under the lens this problem: how exactly do

institutions of learning benefit or detract from the success of their students by following a system

created by the privileged majority? An educator himself, Freire experienced a life startlingly

similar to those that disadvantaged students in America might also experience, dealing with

issues of low income and lost opportunity, and the struggles involved therein. Perhaps that shared

background is the reason why his pedagogical theories resonate so deeply with many urban

educators. A strong proponent of education that recognizes and actively subverts oppressive

influences by introducing curriculum which is nontraditional and exists beyond the sphere of

culture that the oppressor has instilled as the norm, Freires theories propose ways of changing

the status quo that so often holds back true progress in disadvantaged schools. Through a careful

examination of Freires overarching pedagogical views and his practices, a critique of the current

state of urban education emerges, accompanied by suggestions for transformation.

In order to understand the basis with which Freires theories were created, it is important

to first know the personal, educational, and professional background of the theorist. Born in

Recife, Brazil to parents who saw their middle-class lifestyle upended by the Great Depression,

Freire experienced poverty at a young age. Forced to move to a more financially viable city,

Freire grew up in Jaboatoa dos Guararapas, where he encountered the poorer children of the

neighborhood, a connection that is likely the beginning basis of his foray into exploring the lives


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students brain and the student then uses this information as the currency needed to succeed in

the world.5 This relationship sets up many troubling dynamics in the teacher-student relationship,

each of which positions the student as an object rather than an active subject. The teacher thus

becomes an oppressive, authoritative force that acts as an extension of the oppressive decision-

makers of society rather than a conduit of knowledge meant to help students process the world

around them and make their own choices, engaging with the learning process. At its core, Freire

claims, education is an exchange, inherently dialogical--that is, based on a system of open

communication between teacher and students, where all parties learn from one another rather

than one party dictate and the other party assimilate.

6

It is little wonder, then, that Pedagogy of

the Oppressedis so resonant in an urban setting, because it directly sits in opposition to the urban

education system, where the curriculum reflects a society that a) sets standards meant to be met

only by those affluent enough to have the cultural capital to do so and b) outwardly expects its

teachers to raise up students who do not meet those standards and who do not ever fully reap the

benefits of doing so.As evident in his body of work, Freire sees education as a transformational tool. In this

case, that means rigid constructions of oppression can be broken if the oppressed are equipped

with the voice and awareness to make change and tip the balance from a relationship of superior

and inferior to true equals. Freire has many theories relating to how this transformation can take

place, a few of which are particularly pertinent to the urban education system and are outlined as

follows. Freires theory of value, theory of learning, and theory of transmission are three core

mindsets that unfold into a guide of how to create inclusive and potentially liberating educational

institutions.

5http://mingo.info-science.uiowa.edu/~stevens/critped/terms.htm#banking

6http://mingo.info-science.uiowa.edu/~stevens/critped/terms.htm#dialogical
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4/7

The theory of value examines what knowledge and skills are given importance in

the world, and why. According to Freire, education is not a singular and separate arena of

knowledge and skills; instead, anything and indeed, everythingcan and should be spoken of or

examined.7 This holds true because, he says, students should be subjects rather than objects--

active participants in their own lives, continually critically thinking about and questioning their

place and the things which they learn. It is an individuals testimony that lends weight to the

educational exchange, because once the learners life conditions are known, the ways in which

their learning is affected and shaped is also known. In that way, the educator is better equipped

to enter in an exchange that will yield truly authentic results. Instead, then, of a certain list of

information being deemed the requisite standard, value should be placed on everything and

anything that teachers and students can bring to the table of questioning and critically evaluating.

Once the value of skills and knowledge sets are determined, it becomes necessary to

ascertain how those skills and knowledge sets are learned. Freires theory of learning proposes,

again, that learning is not a means of mechanical or rote transference, like that of a bank note.

Instead, knowledge is a malleable thing that is added onto and shaped through the learners

own experiences and prior knowledge. Only through discussion, reflection, and reprocessing

through ones own lens of experience can a text or object truly be understood; essentially,

readers rewrite the text not by regurgitating someone elses words but by appropriating it

as the readers own and reproducing it with the reader and the writers intentions working

in conjunction.8 In the end, the final product is a result of all the vast influences put into the

work by the writer as well as all the vast influences put into processing the work by the reader,

7http://www.newfoundations.com/GALLERY/Freire.html

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and a new product is unearthed. Learning, then, happens when one combines his or her own

experiences and prior knowledge with the existing experience and knowledge inherent in the text

for the purpose of informing understanding.

After the theories of value and learning comes the theory of transmission: who is doing

the teaching and by what methods. Freires theory of transmission is so important and integral

to his existing theories (and overall pedagogical theory) because it examines the politics of

education. If an individual is to value everything and anything as worth learning, and learning

happens as a process of exchange between both the teacher and student, then it stands to reason

that the theory of transmission would propose that learning be a democratic process wherein

no party is viewed as an endlessly authoritative source and instead, both parties endeavor to

understand one another from equal footing.9 Freire says, The democratic school that we need

is not one in which only the teacher teaches, in which only the student learns, and in which the

principal is the all-powerful commander, but offers instead the theory that all actors involved

must teach and learn from one another, because without understanding intimately each others

motives and backgrounds, the process of teaching becomes meaningless to one or all involved.

The theory of transmission directly examines the role of oppressors and the oppressed in the

learning process, and thus most closely relates to the politics of learning.

If one is to apply all of this understanding of Freires theories to the current context of

urban education, it is logical to begin with the concept of education as a simultaneously

oppressive and liberating force. Education as a banking concept and dialogical theory are set up

to oppose one another directly. One method proposes that the teacher is the superior,

authoritative force and the student is the inferior, subjugated receptacle of information waiting to

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be filled; the other method proposes that teachers and students are part of the same process, each

meaning to impart and glean knowledge from one another in an ever-shifting, equal dynamic. If

one had to choose a label to describe the current state of prescribed education in, for example, the

Philadelphia School District, one might label it as a classic exemplar of banking theory. Many

teachers are given scripted curriculum, which first of all outlines a series of information that has

been decided by the privileged, educated elite as standard, and then the teachers are expected to

market such curriculum to students as the necessary information worth knowing. Though many

scripted programs claim to help reading, what they really do is help students recognize sight

words--sight words that, to many students, are not worth learning because they have little bearing

in the students everyday vocabulary. These books are full of stories that have no cultural

significance in many of the under-privileged schools where they are taught, and teachers also

have no investment in the material because it is just as sterile to them. What occurs, then, is

material being simply transferred from teacher to student because of a decree from on high,

without any thought to how the material reflects or even alters the mindsets and viewpoints of the

people teaching or being taught. That, in essence, is education for the sake of education--not even

education at all, but a simple information dump. For true transformational learning, which one

assumes is the sake of education--to build future leaders who can think critically and go on to

improve their communities--there needs to be continual change and building upon prior

knowledge.Transformational learning is not occurring currently in Philadelphia district schools,

perhaps due to the scrutiny that No Child Left Behind (legislation crafted and implemented by

the privileged butforthe under-privileged) has placed it under, but also perhaps because for too

long, education has been unimaginative in disadvantaged districts. There is an urgent sense of


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needing to catch up to suburban counterparts, to push as much of the same information that

their peers in Lower Merion know into the heads of the kids in North Philadelphia. But there are

marked distinctions; the world from which the children at Lower Merion are born is already the

world into which they will go--their curriculum incorporates the experiences of their lives, the

culture of their immediate environment, the expectations to which they will be held. Conversely,

the world from which the children in urban environments are born is not the world into which

they are expected to aspire to go, and so their curriculum does not reflect anything that they

know. Because of this, they also feel that what they bring to the table already is devalued. In this

environment of mistrust and no easy communication, how can understanding be forged? Freire

posits that it cannot; thus, for transformational change, the district of Philadelphia and districts

similar must adopt more of Freires theories.

Final Paper Penn

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