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Getting Beyond Familiar Myths: Discourses of ServiceLearning and Critical PedagogyKathleen Knight AbowitzPublished online: 09 Jul 2006.

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the review of Educatlon/Pedagogy/Cultural Studies O 1999 OPA (Overseas Publishers Association) N.V.Vol. 21, No. 1, pp. 63-77 Published by license underReprints available directly from the publisher the Gordon and Breach Publishers imprint.Photocopying permitted by license only Printed in Malaysia.

Kathleen Knight Abowitz

Getting Beyond Familiar Myths:Discourses of Service Learning

and Critical Pedagogy

Text reviewed:

CommunityService-Learning:A Guide toIncluding Servicein the PublicSchoolCurriculum,Rahlma C. Wade,ed. (Albany: StateUniversity of NewYork Press, 1997),333 pp., ppbk.

INTRODUCTION: LEGENDS WHICH UNITEAND DIVIDE

Disciplines, pedagogies, and practices are fre-quently embedded within stories or narrativesthat contextualize their ideas and practiceswithin larger ideological, socio-cultural, andhistorical frames of reference. Educationaltraditions, be they disciplines, pedagogies, orcomplex amalgams of both, come with theirown mythologies, parables, or allegorical nar-ratives that explain the world-view of a groupof people, set of intellectual practices, or cer-tain ideological perspectives. Using the termmythology1 in this way is not meant to con-trast it with "historically accurate" accountsof a practice or event; it is to say that our nar-ratives about where and when certain ideasor practices arose are inseparably part of thedisciplines and practices themselves. Mythsor narratives about how a discipline or bodyof thought arose are akin to ritualisticaccountings of legends and ancestors. In edu-cation, we can learn much about a discipline,practice, or pedagogy by paying attention tothe mythologies in which it locates itself.

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64 Kathleen Knight Abowitz

The field of service-learning, or the educational practice inwhich community action is connected to academic learningin some school-based curriculum or program, is most fre-quently embedded in several related, overlapping mythologies:most frequently Deweyan progressivism, civic republicanism,histories of democratic participation, and, when connectedto post-secondary education, the notion that institutions ofhigher education were founded on ideals of public service. Themythology of service-learning is a legend of democratic pro-gress, active citizenry, noble pursuits, linkages of theory andpractice, and liberal individual initiative combined with collab-orative, social processes of inquiry, action, and reflection. Inmore recent years, service-learning pedagogy has been morefrequently linked to the increasingly popular contemporarycommunitarian mythologies of an American democracy in cri-sis, evidenced by a barrage of social indicators and linked tocausations of citizen apathy (Barber, 1984, 1992; Bellah, 1985;1992).

The field of critical pedagogy (Freire, 1985; Giroux, 1983;McLaren, 1989; Shor, 1996), or the educational tradition whichhas emerged from the fields and practices of critical theory andcultural studies, recognizes different ancestry and legend thanthe aforementioned progressive service-learning narratives. Amore radical and more global mythology is embraced by criticalpedagogues. The revolutionary nature of these legends can benoted in the heroes of the stories—noted Brazilian educator/activist Paulo Freire, for example, who lived much of his adultlife in exile for his acts of teaching and organizing peasants inhis homeland—and in the patterns of combining the progres-sive term democracy with more critical forms of participationwhich consistently question and interrupt status quo forms ofengagement with public life. Instead of the service-learning'sholy trinity of progressivism, "citizenry, participation, democ-racy," critical pedagogues evoke a holy trinity more resembling"oppression, struggle, justice." For service-learning advocates,democracy is a complex but promising exercise in collaborativeproblem-solving; for critical pedagogues, democracy is a site ofstruggle between multiple and conflicting political interests. Thelanguage of consensus and hope undergirds service-learninglegend; the language of grim power struggle is at the heart ofmuch critical pedagogy mythology.Dow

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Beyond Familiar Myths 65

In this review, while acknowledging the ways in whichmythologies enrich and enliven our intellectual work and effec-tiveness, I want to point out how our mythologies can limit ourconceptualizations of practice. I believe that the communitar-ian mythologies of service-learning prevent educators and theirstudents from engaging the world in more critical and politicalways; likewise, the mythologies of critical pedagogy may pre-vent such practitioners from seeing educational practice asfraught with possibilities of critical social engagement, sites ofconsensus, and hope. Like the editor of the text reviewed here,Rahima C. Wade, I understand service-learning to be a practicebrimming with democratic potential. As a teacher of culturalstudies courses that subscribe to various forms of service-learning pedagogy and as former director of a service-learningprogram in a higher education setting, I share some of theenthusiasm that Wade and her colleagues exude in this practi-tioner's guide to K-12 service-learning. Yet as I stand with onefoot within the mythos of progressive service-learning dis-course and one foot within the critical discourses of radicaldemocracy as espoused by critical pedagogues, I can see theways in which each of these discourses can help the otherovercome problems of legendary situatedness that limit theirrespective visions of educational practice. I proceed with anoverview of Wade's text and provide a brief commentary on howthese discourses might find places of overlap and mutually-beneficial engagement.

PRACTICES WITHIN SERVICE-LEARNING

Community Service-Learning: A Guide to Including Service inthe Public School Curriculum is written for K-12 educators,pre-service teachers, and those faculty who prepare futureteachers. The stated purpose of the book is to "provide a com-prehensive resource focused on the essential elements of qual-ity service-learning programs at the elementary, middle, andhigh school levels as well as in teacher education" (xii). The textis organized into four parts, each summarized here.

Following an introduction which places the text in a theoreti-cal context (which I comment on more extensively below), PartOne consists of seven chapters, all written by Wade. These

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66 Kathleen Knight Abowttz

chapters provide the general, informative background for thebook. Wade grounds the text in six essential components ofservice-learning: preparation, collaboration, service, curriculum,integration, reflection, and celebration. The history of com-munity service is told as a brief story of our national "commu-nal ethic" (24), citing events from the abolition of slaveryto Lyndon B. Johnson's "War on Poverty" as evidence for thisportrayal. The relatively recent history of the youth servicemovement is also described as an extension of our nationalcommunal ethic. In this section of the book, Wade provides avery detailed, step-by-step account of the conceptualization andimplementation of service-learning programs or projects. Sheincludes such topics as: choosing a project, preparation plan-ning, orientation needs, and logistical arrangements, such asscheduling, transportation, and liability issues. Wade's chapteron collaboration discusses ways that service-learning is anorchestrated pedagogy, ideally involving service agencies thatare the recipients of service, students, teacher, and collabora-tors In the school district and local community. Wade's chapteron service makes the crucial distinction between service andcharity. She explains:

With service, compassion should replace pity and separateness should betransformed into community. Instead of doing something one decides isneeded for an 'other,' service Involves working alongside people in waysthat assist them in defining and helping to fulfill their own needs (64).

She provides a long list of suggested service activities, whichcould be helpful for those new to community service-learning.Wade's chapter on curriculum integration again provides manyconcrete ideas for grounding service activities in language arts,science, math, social studies, fine arts, physical education,industrial arts, computer science, and foreign language cur-ricula. Part One provides the reader, after the introductorytheoretical grounding, many examples of the techniques andprinciples of service-learning programs.

Part Two, "Service-Learning in Schools," includes general dis-cussions on the following topics: the democratic principles ofservice-learning; elementary, middle, and high school programs;and the role of the teacher in service-learning pedagogy. RichardBattistoni's commentary provides a context for service-learningprograms in "key democracy principles...[of] community and

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Beyond Familiar Myths 67

diversity" (132). He argues that students can bring "differentconceptions of community and citizenship to the understand-ing of their service work,...[whether these be] defined geo-graphically, institutionally, or culturally" (133). Service-learningprograms also teach about diversity when framed by a commu-nitarian narrative that stresses bringing different classes, gen-ders, and races together for common work. Battistoni notesthat

One of the greatest concerns in our democracy today lies In the increas-ing divisions among our people—divisions based on race, class, genderand culture. While not a panacea, service-learning projects where stu-dents work together in teams and reflect seriously on their service workcan be opportunities for students from different backgrounds to join incommon cause with adults, other young people, or both in the largercommunity, themselves reflecting a diversity of cultures and interests(133-1).

hi addition to these two democratic principles of communityand diversity, Battistoni describes four essential components ofcivic education: intellectual understanding, participation skills,civic attitudes, and direct participation in schools and commu-nities. Battistoni, following Wade, further grounds his workwithin a civic education discourse of public participation inwhich individuals are transformed into citizens through com-mon aims and work. The nature of this transformation is notprovided, yet Battistoni describes in a comprehensible waysome underlying philosophical principles for readers of the text.

Part Three, "Voices from the Field," is a unique and interest-ing section. Each chapter elaborates on different roles—teacher,student, school program coordinator, administrator, communityagency representative, parent, statewide coordinator of service-learning, in-service trainer—involved in a service-learning pro-gram or pedagogy. Each of these chapters is a first-personrendering of the author's "story" related to service-learning, andeach concludes with a list of recommendations for those inter-ested in implementing or advocating for service-learning in aclassroom, school, or district. Underscoring the importance ofstudent voice in this pedagogy, as well as the crucial issue ofstaff development for teachers, the inclusion of the views of astudent and the in-service trainer was particularly helpful.Unless teachers are provided time and space to learn about thispedagogy (which would likely include un-learning old habits of

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68 Kathleen Knight Abowltz

didactic teaching), the future of service-learning pedagogy inK-12 schooling is dim. Each chapter in Part Three reflects theviews of an enthusiastic proponent of service-learning pedagogy.Indeed, the positions of passionate advocacy taken by manyauthors began to take on somewhat of a "cheerleading" tone forme. The one exception to this is the "Administrator" chapter, inwhich authors Anderson and Witmer helpfully describe the con-flict service-learning brought to a school district, realisticallyconcluding that "while most people think service to others is aworthwhile venture, they may differ dramatically in their viewsof how or if to implement such opportunities in schools" (240).Anderson and Witmer's reminder that service-learning is a polit-ical practice helped to balance out the enthusiastic advocacy ofPart Three.

Three chapters compiled in Part Four, "The Future ofService-Learning," are all written by Wade. Here, she discussthe pitfalls, problems, and challenges of service-learning pro-grams and practitioners, the National Service movement, andthe importance of service-learning in the pre-service teachereducation curriculum. It is only in this last section that Wadecautions her reader regarding the challenges and pitfalls ofservice-learning practice. The challenges that service-learningbrings to public schools are numerous: emphasizing collectivewell-being over individual achievement; the time that any typeof experiential education consumes from the school day; thelack of resources for teachers who wish to plan service-learningprojects (e.g., absence of phones in most classrooms). Wadealso warns of the potential conflicts and misunderstandingsthat can arise in situations where more privileged "servers"confront less privileged "others" in the field—for example, thearrogance of the service exchange, the potential condescensionof servers, the racist or classist overtones of serving those "lessfortunate." Moreover, she notes that tying service-learning intoalready burgeoning curricula, in a nation where national stan-dards and standardized testing are perennially in vogue, is amajor task.

The text is supplemented by a valuable appendix of service-learning resources, which includes lists of books, curriculumguides, journal articles, videos, organizations, and resourcekits. Almost every chapter gives numerous and often detailedexamples of programs that have successfully implemented

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Beyond Familiar Myths 69

service-learning practices and provides helpful suggestions forreaders who wish to create similar programs/curricula. Wade'sown background in this work persuasively conveys that herarguments are based on her own practice; the reader is con-vinced that she "practices what she preaches" and is a sincereadvocate. Wade's book represents a comprehensive practi-tioner's guide that will help bring service-learning pedagogyinto more classrooms and school districts. The manner inwhich service-learning pedagogy is discursively and theoreti-cally framed in the text, however, warrants further examinationhere. How the story of a practice is told has much to do withhow that practice gets translated and disseminated at theground level.

NARRATIVE GROUNDINGS OF SERVICE-LEARNINGDISCOURSE

As a practitioner's guide, Community Service-Learning giveslittle space to theoretical groundings for service-learning work,falling into the familiar trap of dichotomizing theory and prac-tice—a dichotomy that, ironically, service-learning pedagogyoften aligns itself against. The text in general does not model apedagogy of praxis. Although more technically-oriented guideson various subjects are often helpful to implement new prac-tices, we should beware of embedding theory so deeply that theeducator views him or herself as a technician rather than areflective agent. We should also beware of signaling that theoryis relatively unrelated to practice. "Methods need not implicateparadigms, but the choice of a paradigm does implicate appli-cation and evaluation of methods" (Schwandt, 1989). It is onthis point that I wish to expand.

When theory does play a role in Community Service-Learning, the perspective is solidly communitarian. The text'stheoretical perspective can be located more precisely in Nash's(1997) category of civic-liberal communitarian, one of threetypes of communitarianism he delineates. These most moderateof communitarians are described by Nash as striving "to bridgethe gap between a radical liberalism based on individual liberty,rights, and equality, and a radical conservatism rooted in tradi-tion, patriotism, duty, and merit" (Nash, 1997, p. 57). Seeing

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70 Kathleen Knight Abowitz

democracy as a faltering system beleaguered by exhaustion,cynicism, and despair, civic-liberal communitarians wish torevitalize civic society. The two chapters that speak mostdirectly and fully to communitarian theoretical legacies of ser-vice-learning are Wade's introduction and Battistoni's ninthchapter on principles and essential practices of service-learn-ing. Wade, quoting liberally from Robert Bellah et al. (1985,1992), Benjamin Barber (1984, 1992), and Richard Pratte(1988), describes the failure of civic education in U.S. school-ing. Wade describes America's liberal traditions, drawing oncivic republican and communitarian description and commen-tary on liberal traditions to do so (Battistoni, 1985; Sandel,1984; Walzer, 1984). Unsurprisingly (considering these sources),she casts blame on America's liberal traditions for the weakcondition of democratic life. Wade then contrasts liberal civictraditions with the participatory-republican perspective (Dewey,1916/1966; Battistoni, 1985; Lappe and Dubois, 1994) thatshe seems to favor much more strongly, though she describesher theoretical position as affirming "both individual rights andcommunal vision" (11).

Consider how the mythology of a discourse frames the prob-lems posed by those within its borders. On page one Wadeasks, "Why is our Democracy Faltering?" She answers thisquery with standard communitarian references to the national-ization of politics, centralization of government, a fragmentedcommon good and national community, and civic disengage-ment. In contrast, note the way that a critical pedagogue, asexemplified by Giroux (1997), portrays our democratic crisis:

[Slince the Reagan era...youth, In particular, have experienced massivechanges in nuclear family life, caused by rising poverty rates, the flight ofcapital from urban centers, and the dismantling of policies designed toprotect the poor, children, and the elderly. Furthermore, the forces ofeconomic restructuring and deindustrialization have largely replaced themanufacturing sector with a proliferation of low-skill jobs and have con-tributed to the rising unemployment rates among young people, espe-cially poor, urban black youth. More specifically, ...we have witnessed aresurgent racism accompanied by an erosion of the safety nets designedto protect children from poverty, disease, and homelessness (225).

Giroux renders a far more complex, economically and politi-cally grounded radical critique of our democratic crisis. Clearlyone's theoretical perspective matters a great deal in how one

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Beyond Familiar Myths 71

defines terms like "democratic crisis." Perhaps it is unfair tocompare Wade and Giroux, a pre-service teacher educatorgrounded in civic education discourse and a curriculum theo-rist grounded in neo-Marxist and cultural studies theory. Buttheir respective narratives, in which each set their argumentfor a democratic pedagogy, are vastly different. The service-learning discourse is, in general, more conservative, less politi-cal, less critical of economic and political structures, andover-reliant on the likes of Bellah et al. (1985) for understand-ing American culture (though I acknowledge the importance ofHabits of the Heart, one of the most influential academic textsof the 1980s). The critical pedagogical discourse is radical, lessapt to be of a directly "applicable" variety for educators, sweep-ingly critical of social structures, and oftentimes, extremelygrim. While service-learning discourse leads us to believe thatparticipation in civic life is an undeniably positive experiencetowards democratic improvement, critical pedagogy mytholo-gies may lead us to believe that structural problems are theheart of America's ills and well out of reasonable reach for anygroup of teachers/student/community coalitions. Optimistic"helping" versus corpulent "structural critique" seem to be thetwo extremes here and part of the blame rests on the shouldersof the theoretical legacies out of which these two discourses arespun. The former represents teacher practice as largely apoliti-cal; the latter links teacher practice to socio-political structuraltransformation, a weighty job description for the leagues ofeducators who spend less time with their students than dotheir televised babysitters or busy families.

The differences between critical pedagogy and service-learningmythologies are captured in the descriptors cast about withineach discourse. Critical pedagogues see democracy as a divided,conflicted sphere, subject to more just forms of interactiononly through radical engagement by teachers as transformativeintellectuals (Giroux, 1990). Service-learning discourse portraysdemocracy as faltering because of apathy and exhaustion. Anempty civic space due to hopelessness and despair, it is, however,subject to more consensual forms of self-government throughforms of civic participation and hands-on engagement with oneanother and within our communities. Critical pedagogues viewschools and universities as bureaucratic institutions that arelayered in hierarchies and power struggles, inscribed in histories

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72 Kathleen Knight Abowitz

of class, gender, religions, and racial discrimination. Criticalpedagogues call for the "critical reinvention" of democracy; ser-vice-learners summon the "roots of our heritage" of democraticcitizenship (15).

A significant caveat to my argument is that discourses arenot pure forms; overlaps and breaks interrupt purity and con-struct amalgams. Though a communitarian/progressivist edu-cational ideology dominates in Community Service-Learning,the influence of critical pedagogues briefly peeks through insome of the text's chapters. Wade recognizes the "hidden cur-riculum" of the structures of traditional schooling (5), citingPurpel and Giroux (1987). Moreover, she emphasizes the needfor "solidarity rather than charity" in her discussion of collabo-ration (48). Battistoni evokes Freire in his discussion of class-room pedagogies as influenced by service-learning and lamentshow "some see service as an antidote to politics rather than amethod of learning how to participate politically as a citizen,"(133) referring to the apolitical nature of some service-learningprograms and practitioners. Despite these more criticalthreads within the text, ideological traditions remain steadfast.Battistoni's notion of political activity is embedded within theprogressive mythology of democratic participation, problem-solving, and progress. For example, Battistoni characterizesservice-learning's contribution to "critical inquiry" through thisexample:

...students who gain experience interacting with the guests in a home-less shelter are both able to put a face on 'the poor' and test their ownand others' theories about poverty, public policy, and democracy againsttheir actual observations and the real-life stories of those with whomthey interact in the shelter (135).

The critical pedagogue would share Battistoni's delight with astudent putting a "face" on poverty and homelessness andwould share the impulse to have students reflect on theirassumptions and stereotypes about the poor. Critical peda-gogues would want to push students more towards criticalengagement with the economic and social structures that makepoverty cyclical and homelessness endemic in some areas ofthe nation. Such inquiry, in the critical pedagogy tradition,would require tougher questions than a progressive educator(or public school teacher, employed and surveilled by her local

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Beyond Familiar Myths 73

community) might dare ask: How have governmental policiesboth corrected and contributed to homelessness? How havelocal, national, and global economies served as a context forthe homeless problem? How have the media characterizedboth the homeless and the issue of homelessness and thushelped shape our perception of these complexities? How arewe, who may be relatively privileged compared to those we are"serving," contributing to the problem through band-aid (albeitnecessary) solutions such as meal programs and shelters?

Wade briefly acknowledges in her conclusion that "there aretoo few service-learning programs that address the largerstructural issues that create needs for service in the first place"(332), yet by implicitly situating her text solidly within the dis-course of civic republican communitarian discourse and bynoting this criticism of service-learning pedagogy on the penul-timate page of her text, she is contributing to this problemrather than revealing and addressing it in her work here. Partof the reason that too many programs fail to address largerstructural issues of service—the "dirty" politics of politicalengagement—is that the discourses in which service-learninghas traditionally been embedded have implicitly favored apolit-ical types of service. Rather than the kinds of service that Wadelabels "advocacy," described as controversial projects thatinvolve taking on city hall, teachers are far more likely to followthe text's bias towards apolitical types of service work, as bothWade and Battistoni acknowledge. Is the civic-republican dis-course of service-learning partly responsible for this, or is themoderate- to conservative-world view of most American teach-ers the more likely cause of this state of affairs?

THE MYTHS MAKE THE MESSAGE AND THE PRACTICE

Service-learning mythologies of a communitarian America areactually far more aligned with the political persuasions of mostAmerican teachers, who are an improbable collective of radicalsocial critics. More moderate and conservative in their politicalviews, many K-12 teachers will find apolitical types of service-learning to be just the remedy for an America whose chief illslie in the realm of moral decay, a declining sense of personalresponsibility, especially among the young, and an individualistic

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society incapable of coming together for the common good.Indeed, if these are the accurately portrayed problems of ournation, why wouldn't "helping others" be exactly what we wantfrom students? After all, going to a nursing home to hold amusical concert for the residents, or cleaning up a river, or col-lecting canned goods for a local shelter will all "help" others—elderly people will be less lonely, rivers will be cleaner, hungrypeople will get fed. Moreover, youth will step out of their ego-centric lives to consider their community needs, thus facilitat-ing moral and social development. In the process studentscould learn about how a local shelter dispenses food and con-nect these lessons to social studies curricula, or about the spe-cific pollutants in the local river analyzed in science classes.What could be wrong about this type of education, if the nationis indeed plagued by selfish, individualistic, uncaring adults andyouth who lack the skills and virtues for civic participation?

Critical pedagogy mythologies of oppression and conflicthave always been less palatable for Americans; in part, thisexplains critical pedagogy's relative unpopularity in K-12 class-rooms. As Americans who are engulfed within mythologies ofHoratio Alger, democratic equality, and "liberty and justice forall," alternative mythologies of class struggle, structural injus-tice, and historically-rooted oppressions are contrary to ourideological foundations. The current communitarian mythologyof a progressive, communal, democratic America in decline is amuch more digestible story than the mythology of a societyrooted in eurocentric, racist, classist, homophobic, and sexistpractices, language, and institutions. Which story you tell andbelieve has everything to do with how you will shape your prac-tice as an educator. And one of these mythologies "fits" betterwith the story that most Americans like to tell about our-selves—the mythology of a nation, though not without historicalproblems of racism and other ills, that nurtures an egalitariancommunal spirit of democratic progress.

The nature of this "fit" ought to concern us. Although schoolsoften seem to mirror culture rather than foster leadershipwithin the culture, part of the agenda of K-12 educators andpre-service teacher education faculty should be the fosteringidentities of social leadership among educators. Critical peda-gogues have spoken of teachers as prophets (Purpel, 1989),calling up images of Ghandi, King, and Jesus to describe the

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Beyond Familiar Myths 75

social transformation that teachers should feel compelledto lead. A prophetic vision is not what I wish to argue here,however. Prophesy is an unrealistic job expectation for a civilservant who has a family to feed, bills to pay, and a personallife to live. Prophets have historically been men who have beenmurdered for their political views. The prophet metaphor maybe too powerful, too patriarchal, and too far from the reality ofmost teacher's complicated lives as partners, parents, familyand community members. But teachers can, and should, ques-tion the status quo and be able to do so without threat to theirjob security. Questioning should be indelibly linked to all goodteaching, at all age levels and within the endless variety ofcontexts—in classrooms, out of classrooms, in the community.Certain discourses facilitate this questioning and critique;by my observations, communitarian civic-republicanism doesnot lead to this type of questioning, especially the kind thatcritiques social structures and multiple perspectives of culturalills. The world is more classed, raced, gendered, and full ofconflict and complexity than is rendered by service-learningdiscourses of civic republican democracy. Wade's text portraysAmerica as a communal nation; although communitarianIdeologies run deep in our culture, so do a host of other ideolo-gies, all of which can be dangerous and destructive in variousforms and combinations. Part of democratic citizenry is learn-ing all our ideological traditions, not simply those that aremost digestible. Teaching kids not only to participate indemocracy but to critique the spectrum of ills, both culturaland structural, of our democratic society is both extremelyimportant to our democratic future and a much more complexintellectual exercise than simply "helping." Pedagogies of socialcritique must, of course, be informed by what we know of intel-lectual development and growth; critical inquiry will look dif-ferent at different grade and age levels. But the art of socialcritique is one of the best and most enduring traditions ofdemocracy: it must be developed over time; its skills and prac-tices must be at the heart of democratic participation in civiclife. This particular insight gets left out of pedagogy con-structed within civic republic discourses, yet it is not so far offfrom the stories underlying such discourses: the "republic" ofAmerica is a product of civil disobedience toward the Britishcrown.

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76 Kathleen Knight Abowitz

When all is said and done, critical and service-learning dis-courses have much in common: both discourses summon Deweyas a theoretical context for their work; participants within bothdiscourses share beliefs in constructivist ways of teaching andlearning; both discourses attempt to re-frame the role ofteacher as "supreme knower" to a less hierarchical facilitatorand community advocate; both traditions share an interest inmoving evaluation practices in public education away from theheavy reliance on standardized testing; and finally, both dis-courses aim at making curricula in public schools moredirectly relevant to community issues, problems, and multicul-tural contexts. Service-learning pedagogy holds a great deal ofpromise in many contexts, as Wade's text demonstrates; whendislodged from its firm rootings within civic republican dis-course, however, its potential expands dramatically.

Notes

1 My colleague Dennis Carlson's current work on mythologies sparked theIdea for my use of the term here. My use of the term mythology here doesnot denote a modernist definition of the word, as In Barthes' (1957/1972)seminal work on the topic suggesting, in Marxist tradition, that myths aretools of middle-class dominance. Rather, the term mythology in this worksimply refers to a familiar narrative or story that shapes belief and practice.

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