Freirean notions of Critical Pedagogy provide the consequential validity that is often lacking from decontextualized discussions concerning asymmetries of power in dialectical conversations within a given social reality. In his book Pedagogy of the Oppressed, Paulo Freire utilizes concepts of Critical Theory to formulate a pedagogical methodology aimed at social reconstruction in which the subordinate culture reexamines and exerts its own power to interrupt the existing power asymmetry.
Freirean paradigms are concerned primarily with the narrative nature of education which he dubs the banking model and its proposed antithesis, the problem-posing paradigm. Freire characterizes the banking model as involving “a narrative Subject (the teacher) and patient, listening objects (students)” (p. 52). The teacher is considered a depositor, knowledge is considered to be that which is deposited, and the student is considered to be the receptacle into which knowledge is deposited by the aforementioned teacher. As Freire articulates the phenomenon, the teacher’s “task is to ‘fill’ the students with the contents of his narration—contents which are detached from reality, disconnected from the totality that engendered them and could give them significance” (p. 52). The student is therefore considered to be a good student if they adopt the passive role of a receptacle.
In opposition to the banking model, Freire believes that “[k]nowledge emerges only through invention and re-invention, through the restless, impatient, continuing, hopeful inquiry men pursue in the world, with the world, and with each other” (p. 52). In other words, Freire supports the experiential learning advocated by Dewey and the anti-positivistic epistemology supported by the Frankfurt School. As such, the form of pedagogy that Freire supports pays very close attention to dialectical relationships between both oppressed and oppressor as well as between human knowledge and social reality. In view of the above, Freire suggests that in the banking model, “knowledge is a gift bestowed by those who consider themselves knowledgeable upon those whom they consider to know nothing” (p. 52). In so being, the banking model is highly supportive of the status quo and often views students as malleable objects that become increasingly more willing to accept what is given to them. As Freire puts it, “[t]he capability of banking education to minimize or annul the students’ creative power and to stimulate their credulity serves the interests of the oppressors, who care neither to have the world revealed nor to see it transformed” (p. 53). As such, the relationship dynamics designate that the student/oppressed as an outsider or “welfare recipient” and the teacher/oppressor as the insider/patron.
Further, Freire considers the banking model to be necrophilic in that it considers humans to be objects and therefore precludes the idea that they have the capacity to grow in a self-regulated manner. As such, Freire believes that the banking model supports a kind of love for death (p. 55).
Freire supports a view of education that does away with the dichotomous relationship between student and teacher. Freire feels that this can be done by “adopting…a concept of men as conscious beings, and consciousness as consciousness intent upon the world” (p. 56). He further suggests that problem-posing education is an inherently emancipatory endeavor that requires a shift in the dialectical relationship between student and teacher in which there exists a greater share of reciprocity in the communication of learning.
References:
Freire, P. (2009). From pedagogy of the oppressed. In A. Darder, M.P. Baltodano, & R. D. Torres (Eds.), The Critical Pedagogy Reader (pp. 52-60) New York, NY: Routledge.
Social Justice in Education 