4/22 - Critical and Cultural Studies Pedagogy

"All educational practice implies a theoretical stance on the educator's part. This stance in turn implies--sometimes more, sometimes less explicitly--an interpretation of man and the world. It could not be otherwise." (Freire 616)

"Overall, this problematic study of "work" offers one means to engage students in an extraordinary reperception of something very ordinary. It not only develops literacy skills and consciousness relevant to the problem theme, but it also validates students psychologically, because the exercise is based on their experience and their language resources." (Shor 120)

"...we are ethically bound by students' own aims, even if those aims seem uncomfortably close to elite values. Our distrust of such values does not permit us to tell students what they "really" want, or should want. We are very limited, I think, in how far we can set ourselves up as ends-experts. The only thing we are certainly justified in imposing on students is our judgment of means: Here, in my expert opinion, is the best way to learn this thing that you and I have agreed should be taught." (Smith 317)

Freire, Paulo. “The Adult Literacy Process as Cultural Action for Freedom and Education and ConscientizaÇão.”

• Literacy as disease metaphor
• Critical consciousness

Berlin, James. “Rhetoric and Ideology in the Writing Class.”

• Ideology: what is real, what is good, what is possible
• What is the goal of a critical pedagogy?

Shor, Ira. “Monday Morning Fever: Critical Literacy and the Generative Theme of “Work.”

• literacy instruction vs. writing instruction
• What classroom techniques does Shor discuss?

Hairston, Maxine. “Diversity, Ideology, and Teaching Writing.”

• What are the causes of the "cultural left suddenly claiming writing courses as their territory"?
• What are the shortcomings of critical pedagogy?
• What alternatives does Hairston propose? 

Smith, Jeff. “Students' Goals, Gatekeeping, and Some Questions of Ethics.”

• Comp studies' "Standard Model": "means-ends equivalence," "ethic of direct enactment"
• Universities and professions as "intentional communities"
• Teachers' ethical obligations: to students, to society