Faculty of Education - Theses
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ItemAfter Freire: a study of the politics and pedagogy of Henry Giroux( 1991)The development of critical pedagogy after the publication of Paulo Freire's Pedagogy of the Oppressed has taken many interesting and controversial turns. One theorist who takes up and expands on Freire's insights in a western context is Henry Giroux. Broadly speaking, Giroux writes from a similar vantage point and expresses similar epistemological, political, sociological, and pedagogical viewpoints to Freire. Giroux at the same time addresses his work to an American audience and thus implicitly his works are relevant to us here in Australia. This thesis, whilst dealing with Freire and Giroux, concentrates on Giroux, and attempts to understand and critique the political, pedagogical, and theoretical arguments that sustain and support Giroux's notion of critical pedagogy. Certain key questions arise in any study of such a topic. How democratic is utopian radicalism? What is the relationship between pluralism and democracy? What does it mean to be educated? What are the political and epistemological bases for teaching practice and the function of schools? This thesis contends that, whilst pedagogy may be political, the real area of contestation is the type of politics that Freire and Giroux propose. The central thrust of this thesis combines liberal, pluralist and pragmatic insights in an effort to interrogate the utopianism that informs Giroux's and Freire's position. The arguments put in the thesis are drawn from several intellectual traditions. However, the ultimate vantage point from which Giroux and Freire are critiqued is a liberal one, and ultimately it is from a liberal perspective that Freire's and Giroux's positions are interrogated and understood. The liberal perspective, although not without its obvious flaws, does tie democracy to notions of plurality, difference, choice and tolerance. Issues of inequality and injustice are important in education, but they should be viewed within a paradigm that recognizes contingency and plurality, rather than asserting the possibility of radical utopias. Education should not foreclose on our choices, but rather should provide us with the knowledge with which to make and understand our choices and ourselves. Thus education in the service of utopian ideals may undercut the very goals it seeks to achieve. In short, whilst Giroux and Freire engage in an interesting and sometimes inspiring discourse, I believe the philosophy and politics that informs their positions to be ultimately misconceived.