Critical Pedagogy And Predatory Culture

This book is a principled, accessible and highly stimulating discussion of a politics of resistance for today. Ranging widely over issues of identity, representation, culture and schooling, it will be required reading for students of radical pedagogy, sociology and political science.

Schools have been traditionally defined as institutions of instruction, but the authors of this volume challenge that position in order to generate a new set of cultural categories and constructs through which the nature and process of schooling can be more appropriately understood. Giroux and McLaren develop a theory of schooling that takes into account not only the more traditional relationship between teaching and learning, but also the import of wider cultural dynamics such as language, mass culture, popular culture, the state, theories of readership, ethnographic research, and subcultural studies.

To understand contemporary times, we must appreciate the extent to which our lives are affected by the cultural and political struggle between "official" narratives and the counternarratives which emerge as oppositional responses. Counternarratives develops a concept of "postmodern counternarratives" as a frame for exploring the politics of media, technology and education within everyday struggles for human identities and loyalties. The authors identify two forms of counternarratives. One functions as a critique of the modernist propensity for grand narratives. The second concept, which is the focus of the book, builds on the first; the idea of "little stories" addressing cultural and political opposition to the "official" narratives used to manipulate public consciousness. Each marks an important point of contestation within contemporary education and culture: curriculum, pedagogy, literacy, media representations and applications of new technologies.

This book will address a number of urgent themes in education today that include multiculturalism, the politics of whiteness, the globalization of capital, neoliberalism, postmodernism, imperialism, and current debates in Marxist social theory. The above themes will be linked to critical educational praxis, particularly to teaching activities within urban schools. Finally, the book will develop the basis for a wider political project directed at resisting and transforming economic exploitation, cultural homogenization, political repression, and gender inequality. Recent and widespread scholarly attention has been given to the unabated mercilessness of global capitalism. Little opposition exists as capital runs amok, unhampered and undisturbed by the tectonic upheaval that is occurring in the geopolitical landscape that has recently witnessed the collapse of the Soviet Union and the regimes of the Eastern Bloc. As we examine education policies within the context of economic globalization, we attempt to address the extent to which the pedagogy and politics of everyday life has fallen under the sway of what we identify as cultural and economic imperialism. Finally, the book raises a number of urgent questions: What are the current limitations to educational reform efforts among the educational left? What are some of the problems associated with certain developments within postmodern education? How can a return to Marxist theory and revolutionary politics revitalize the educational left at a time when capitalism appears to be unstoppable? What actions need to be taken in both local and global arenas to overcome the exploitation that the globalization of capital has wreaked upon the world?

The diverse range of critical pedagogues presented in this book comes from a variety of backgrounds with respect to race, gender, and ethnicity, from various geographic places and eras, and from an array of complex political, historical, religious, theological, social, cultural, and educational circumstances which necessitated their leadership and resistance. How each pedagogue uniquely lives in that tension of dealing with pain and struggle, while concurrently fostering a pedagogy that is humanizing, is deeply influenced by their individual autobiographical lens of reality, the conceptual thought that enlightened them, the circumstances that surrounded them, and the conviction that drove them. To be sure, people of justice, people who resist, are framed by a vision that embraces an inclusive, tolerant, more loving community that passionately calls for a more democratic citizenship. That is just what the 34 critical pedagogues represented in this text heroically do. Through the highlighting of their lives and work, this book is not only an excellent resource to serve as a springboard to engage us in dialogue about pivotal issues and concerns related to justice, equality, and opportunity, but also to prompt us to further explore deeper into the lives and thought of some extraordinary people. A Critical Pedagogy of Resistance: 34 Pedagogues We Need to Know is an ambitious undertaking. Kirylo’s narrative enterprise, which seeks to chronicle the lives of transformative pedagogues, is a project whose time has come. This text is an excellent resource for all those interested in the aesthetic that, as Kierkegaard believed, exercised power for the common good. Luis Mirón

Critical pedagogy refers to the means and methods of testing and attempting to change the structures of schools that allow inequities. It is a cultural-political tool that takes seriously the notion of human differences, particularly those related to race, class, and gender. Critical pedagogy seeks to release the oppressed and unite people in a shared language of critique, struggle, and hope, to end various forms of human suffering. In this revised edition, Kanpol takes the pre- and in-service educators along some initial steps to becoming critical pedagogists. As before, university professors and public school teachers alike will learn how to address their own prophetic commitments to belief and faith in the fight against despair, institutional chaos, oppression, death of spirit, and exile.

Teaching about the media and popular culture has been a major concern for radical educators. Yet in recent years, the hyperbolic rhetoric of "critical pedagogy" has come under attack, not only from theoretical perspectives such as feminism, anti-racism and postmodernism, but also in The Light Of Actual Classroom Experience. The Notion That Teachers Might "liberate" students through rationalistic forms of ideological critique has been increasingly questioned, not only on the grounds of its political arrogance, but also because of its ineffectiveness in practice. This book seeks to move beyond the limitations of these debates, and to explore positive alternatives. It contains a broad international range of contributions, covering practice from primary schools right through to higher education. The authors draw on diverse perspectives, including poststructuralism, postmodernism, cultural studies, anti-racism and feminism; yet they share a willingness to challenge radical orthodoxies, and to offer positive practical alternatives.

This collection attempts to incorporate cultural studies into the understanding of schooling, not simply addressing how students read themselves as "members" of a distinct culture, but how they, along with teachers and administrators, read popular texts in general. The purpose of this book is to suggest some alternative directions critical pedagogy can take in its critique of popular culture by inviting multiple reading of popular texts into its analysis of schooling and seeing many forms of popular culture as critical pedagogical texts.