Talk:Critical pedagogy/Archive 1

Archive 1

Total revamp

This article had turned into an advertisement for critical pedagogy, and in my opinion, it was past the point of no-return. An encyclopedia article about critical pedagogy, if one should exist at all, should describe it objectively as an Ed-School phenomenon, and not attempt to romanticize it. Ed-School jargon has no real meaning outside of the closed, highly idiosyncratic Ed-School community, and it is not appropriate for an encyclopedia meant for a general audience. It's time to start over. - Skaraoke 21:57, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

Although my major edit was reverted (twice), I still think that it's the right thing to do. People have been complaining about this article for a while now, but not much else has been done about it. Wikipedia encourages editors to be bold, and that's what I was doing. WP policy states that it is better to say nothing about a subject than to convey false or misleading information. The current version of the article is a paean to critical pedagogy. With extraneous quotes from movies like Dead Poets Society and The Matrix, and musicians like Pink Floyd and Rage Against the Machine, the article falsely associates critical pedagogy with every act of free thinking that has ever taken place in public view. This is not appropriate for an encyclopedia. - Skaraoke 00:41, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

Though I was the one who reverted your edit (for other reasons) I agree with the removal of the lyrical quotes. The Pink Floyd one is about Waters' own experiences at school, and, much a I love Rage Against the Machine, this song is about encouraging students to rebel against the teacher's establishment viewpoint, rather than the teacher encouraging them to do so. The article wouldn't miss this section. The other popular culture sections are more relevant, though, especially the movies section; note that movies like Dead Poets Society see educators encouraging students to rebel against the status quo that assumes they cannot achieve. EliminatorJR ^Talk 01:06, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

Irony

So, in looking at this page 4 years after I started it, I note that the dominant vibe is now from Quoted Professors with Complicated Prose Styles. Most lively or appealing material, that might catch a readers eye or provide a framework of familiarity, has been purged. This dynamic is probably a fairly common one (Jesus and Aquinas).

Currently the article seems unabashedly (though I am bashing) pointed towards folks with college degrees - in other words an important intellectual resource intended for general consumption has been bogarted by the already-academically-privileged.

Can liveliness, accessibility, a multiplicity of voices - as urged by critical pedagogues (such as myself and more famous Experts with Credentials and Publications) be restored to the critical pedagogy article?

Or will the words of High Minded Liberators continue to be used to replace liberation? Will the stink of expert-worshiping orthodoxy come from the very perfume bottle labeled "emancipate yourself from mental slavery"? Juggleandhope (talk) 14:20, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Critique of Critical Pedagogy

The tone of this article is less than objective, I agree. It could certainly use some work. However the "Critique" section is amazingly subjective and should be removed. It shows a lack of understanding of the true praxis of a critical pedagogy and is not only uncited but unfounded. It shows an understanding of the misapplication of this teaching style, but not a true critique of the actual practicioners of this style of education. I maintain that the style critiqued by the author is not one true to this pedagogy, rather a similar style of indoctrination that is misperceived as "critical pedagogy". There may be educators out there claiming to be engaged in critical education, however they are not truly practicing it and the two should be viewed as seperate.--Graham2873 (talk) 21:22, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Ah, so those practitioners are not actually of the One True Faith, hmm? Perhaps some true critical pedagogue ought to organize a pogrom in the literacy studies community to purge these counter-revolutionaries. Those critiques in the article are perfectly in line with what nearly every graduate student in my department feels they experienced within the critical pedagogy training programs at my university. They could also be applied to the arguments made by most of the literacy studies articles I have read. If you're talking about a highly contentious subject, then perhaps the best way to acheive objectivity is to enumerate a certain point or set of points as fairly as possible--which the beginning does--and then bring up a series of counterpoints that generally float around the field--as those in the second-half do--and then provide a list of sources so the readers can research further and decide for themselves. That sounds like objectivity. (By the by, I had nothing to do with writing those critiques; they simply took the words right out of my mouth).70.101.220.225 (talk) 04:53, 27 December 2007 (UTC)MOB

I removed the unsourced, subjective essay and reformatted the section. --Pete Tillman (talk) 03:06, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

Subjective Links

Removed some links in the See Also section which appeared to be placed there more as opinion, subjective, and/or biased view point. Will try and help improve article when possible. Der.Gray (talk) 09:01, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

Importance

• Noticed that this article has been rated low-importance for philosophy and mid-importance for education. I was wondering what people's thoughts were about this. In the circles I'm in, critical pedagogy is considered to be a very important contribution to educational theory. I'm not a philosopher, so I can't really comment on that, but would love to hear others' opinions. Voyager640 (talk) 06:51, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

I'm amazed that it has an importance ranking for philosophy at all, and I am frankly astounded at the quality rating it currently holds. I'm trying to assume good faith here, but this really is a terrible article: clumsy, jargon-riddled, and clearly non-neutral. The "criticisms" section is especially bad. I would vote not to consider it a philosophy article at all. Lorenking (talk) 15:30, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

Second to Lorenking's complaint: this is the worst (longish) Wikipedia article I can recall seeing. Pete Tillman (talk) 21:18, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

While I do agree with what both of the previous contributors had to say, I want to ask why aren't we doing anything to improve this article? Instead of complaining about how terrible this article is we can contribute information that can inhance the value of this article. I suggest we provide a variety of information that can be helpful to the reader. Additionally, we can provide different topics and different aspects to what critical pedagogy is and how it works. Any suggestions on how we can improve this article? Maida 22 (talk) 19:34, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

Searle Reference/Bad Sentence

Sorry, I don't know a whole ton about the area of critical pedagogy, so I don't think I am qualified to edit this myself, but this sentence is pretty bad:

"Philosopher John Searle[2] suggests that, despite the "opaque prose" and lofty claims of Giroux, he interprets the goal of Giroux's form of critical pedagogy "to create political radicals", thus highlighting the contestable and antagonistic moral and political grounds of the ideals of citizenship and "public wisdom"; these varying moral perspectives of what is "right" are to be found in what John Dewey [3] has referred to as the tensions between traditional and progressive education."

The way this sentence is written, it sounds like John Searle is saying that because Giroux is attempting to create political radicals (despite his opaque prose) he therefore highlights contestable grounds of the ideals of citizenship, and that these varying ideals of citizenship are found in the tensions between traditional and progressive education. Firstly, I don't think Searle would agree that Giroux's attempt to create political radicals "highlights contestable and antagonistic moral and political grounds of the ideals of citizenship and 'public wisdom.'" Searle is largely critical and hostile to the writings of Giroux and others in this field, and when he says that Giroux's goal is to create political radicals, it is part of a larger point that Giroux and others are engaged in an illegitimate process of politicizing liberal education. I guess the best thing to do with this sentence would be to delete the reference to Searle altogether, and just use a reference to Giroux to describe the goals of Giroux's critical pedagogy. The only thing that the Searle citation really adds is that Giroux writes in an opaque fashion but nonetheless has a clearly political agenda.

I think it would be better for the sentence to look like this:

Giroux's critical pedagogy highlights the contestable and antagonistic moral and political grounds of the ideals of citizenship and "public wisdom"; these varying moral perspectives of what is "right" are to be found in what John Dewey [3] has referred to as the tensions between traditional and progressive education.

Would a reference to one of Giroux's works suffice as a source for this claim? In any event, the references to Searle did not support this claim in the previous sentence, so nothing is really lost by removing them. If not, it may be necessary to find a sympathetic commentator on Giroux's work to use as a reference to support the claim regarding ideals of citizenship etc.

If we want to include references to Searle here we might want to put them in a section on criticism of critical pedagogy, since that is really what Searle is doing. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Heresimach (talk • contribs) 21:48, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

Woops, forgot to sign this, I'm new to the whole wikipedia editing thing. Is this right? Heresimach (talk) 21:51, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

flawed introductory section

The introductory, "defining" section, although quite long, is very vague and provides a very loose definition of the article's subject. needs to be rewritten altogether imho. unfortunately i'm not sufficiently acknowledged of the matter, but for sure the introductory part of this article is very weak. thanks, 91.103.38.239 (talk) 15:52, 6 September 2012 (UTC)

Proposing Reorganization of Article

The article needs a major once over, which I am working on in my sandbox. There are many things that are repeated, beg for some chronology, or are just simply out of place. I will try to maintain as much content that currently exists, but much of it should probably not even be included, like the bit on Hicks. I will also be adding content on its practical applications. McGrudis (talk) 22:00, 29 November 2016 (UTC)

Honest opinion from a random reader

My girlfriend referred me to Pedagogy of the Oppressed, and I ended up here as a result of trying to figure out what exactly is being suggested to replace the so-called "banking model" of teaching. For context, I am a proud bleeding heart liberal, especially when it comes to social justice issues, but I am also a scientist (a chemist, specifically) who isn't impressed by wooey nonsense.

This article, to it's credit, answered my question as to what in plain terms a critical pedagogy classroom would look like in a elementary, junior, or high school. I don't quite see the rationale for the nefarious elites' plan for sabotaging the weak and poor by -what-would-you-call-it... "educating" them in the supposed run-of-the-mill, tricksy, slave-inducing way. I mean... why not just yaknow... not educate them? We do in fact withhold education from large swaths of people in the US, and they tend to be the most underrepresented and exploited members of our society, not the other way around.

Anyways.. maybe someone can resolve this inconvenient-yet-obvious problem with the theory for me. Back to the main reason I'm writing this:

While the article was an entertaining read, the flip side remains that the entire article's POV is shockingly non-neutral. The writing borders on unabashed patronizing of the reader throughout. Especially in the "criticism" section, where the final sentence is, no kidding, "There are a wide variety of views in opposition to critical pedagogy in the first year composition classroom, these are but a few." ... Seriously? The only criticism deemed worthy of mention was pulled from actual first year composition classroom students? Either that or the article is name-calling legitimate critics sarcastically and mockingly referred to as "first year composition students?" Not sure which is MORE inappropriate for Wikipedia, where NPOV is a crucial element to communicating credibility to readers, on what I would imagine the author considers a rather important page.

But it does seem fitting in a way, after all. While the author responsible for the language in this article I bet considers himself or herself a critical pedagogue, their attitude betrays one who suffers from the oft co-morbid trait of being an uncritical ideologue.

-Laced 96.41.85.137 (talk) 08:15, 14 August 2019 (UTC)

Social Reconstructionism

I was looking for information on "Social Reconstructionism" and was redirected to this entry on "Critical Pedagogy". The entry does not deal with Social Reconstructionism. If readers are to be redirected then the entry should treat the topic. Although inasmuch as the two fields are distinct there should probably be two separate entries. Critical pedagogy is of the 1960s through the present and Social Reconstructionism of the 1920s through the 1950s. LAWinans (talk) 09:01, 12 March 2017 (UTC)

The entry clearly states that "Critical Pedagogy" finds its origin in the work of Paulo Freiro in the 1960s. "Social Reconstructionism" is much older and although there are discernible beginnings in the 1920s, the educational movement can be said to have originated with the work of George Counts whose book "Dare the School Build a New Social Order" was published in 1932. Theodore Brameld and Harold Rugg also contributed to the development of Social Reconstructionism which is generally understood to be one of the four basic philosophies of education today (along with Perennialism, Progressivism and Essentialism)LAWinans (talk) 21:48, 1 November 2017 (UTC)

I am a retired English teacher, so I was looking for concrete examples of how a teacher, using critical pedagogy, might teach a thematic unit, integrating reading, writing, speaking and listening in the co-construction of knowledge, reflection on that knowledge, as well as action based on the reflection and evaluation of the action ("praxis"). Perhaps the section on the implementation of critical pedagogy in the classroom, replete with examples from multiple subjects, has been removed. The article begs for concrete examples; otherwise it's not as informative as it could be to those interested in wading into the waters of critical theory, either to apply it in schools or evaluate its efficacy.Marcywinograd (talk) 15:02, 4 June 2020 (UTC)