To conclude
this short overview of critical theory – the topic of the preceding postings, –
this entry will describe how its advocates see the construct contributing to the
common good. This is the answer to the final
organizing question identified several postings ago. As the antithesis to the natural rights
construct, critical theory provides an alternative view of what education
should be about. By doing so, those who
support critical theory see themselves as advancing equality, its trump value.
Sociologically, they place great stock in the role education can potentially
play in enhancing the level of justice a society will exhibit in mostly capitalist
nations. The construct explains what is allegedly
happening in schools: the fulfillment of
the “reproduction” function; that is, to provide the necessary instruction so
that the existing social arrangements are maintained and carried into the
future.
Educational systems are established and maintained, according to
this view, to reproduce the social arrangements that benefit the elite
class(es). This role of schools can be
analyzed using either the Marxian concept of the superstructure (the
compilation of societal institutions that are in sync with the economic
institution) or the systems theory's concept of structural-functionalism (a la Talcott Parsons[1]).
In either approach, the schools take on a political role in that
they are doing the bidding of the elites and assist in projecting messages of
support of the exploitation that capitalism establishes. This function is accomplished by using
language.
That language subtly promotes messages that contain supportive
myths. The myths promote beliefs that describe,
hide, or obfuscate exploitation by portraying those practices as reflective of
a rational paradigm. For example,
capitalist theory, according to the construct, espouses false promises of a
just meritocracy. It casts a blind eye
as to whether the standards of meritocracy are either compromised or
ignored.
Not all students accepted into schools such as Harvard get in
because they are the best students. Not
all CEOs become CEOs because they can add the most value to their
corporations. Many workers and many
within the lower classes have been convinced by the elites that their
cooperation leads to efficiency and a potentially better life for themselves in
the future.
This is a function of the language used by schools and other
institutions. Critical analysts claim that capitalist policy fails to adequately
reward the productive efforts of the laboring class which make the capitalist
engine work. Instead, the language used
in schools diminishes this contribution and glorifies the contributions of the
business owning class. The schools,
therefore, have voluntarily participated in the exploitative arrangement due to
the false representations the elites have promulgated and reinforced in the classroom.
In their methodologies, critical scholars emphasize the study of
language and how it is manipulated to acquire the aims of those who control language. In addition, besides relying on rational
dialectic study, Marxian advocates have, almost from its beginning, argued for
not only studying exploitative relationships, but also promoting action; that
is, action that is aimed at rectifying the exploitive policies and arrangements
the elites have instituted through their surrogates.
This activism is called praxis.
Praxis refers to “man's [or woman’s] conscious reshaping of nature and
the creation of history via intellectual and manual labour”.[2] It is a proactive posture, through action, to
address the various forms of injustice.
An excellent work that not only describes this use of language,
but further explains how education can strive for equality, is Paulo Freire’s
book, Pedagogy of the Oppressed. In that book, he explains several aspects of
oppression and how schooling, as presently constituted, furthers it.
Praxis is described by Freire as those educational efforts that
disabuse students from seeking to emulate the lives of oppressors; that
encourages, instead, to work toward liberating not only the oppressed but the
oppressors as well, in order that they and students can see the common humanity
among all. The oppressed, using their
experiences, determine what the curriculum should be to make them and their
teachers both students and teachers together.
This includes viewing education as distinct from “banking” information toward
developing and implementing the strategies that will lead toward true
liberation.[3]
In more common language, here, the call is for action that leads
to an ideal society of justice. There
are those curricular professionals who have argued that a special focus needs
to be directed at the impact of race, gender, ethnicity, sexual preference as
well as socioeconomic class on education with its effect on one’s quality of
life, on one’s outlook on life, and on the ability of the individual to develop
a truly liberated life space.[4]
Actions spurred on by reflection and commitment to achieving these
just goals constitute praxis. More
recent writers have tamed the calls for praxis that include revolution or
violent overthrow of the existing order.
For example, praxis proposed by Jurgen Habermas relates to establishing
“ideal speech situations” in which what is communicated is done so in a
completely non-coerced environment.[5]
Such communication allows for the search of internal
contradictions and gaps so that a new interpretation of social reality can
emerge. Belief in an ideal society
provides a basis by which to criticize the dominant society over the following
political standard: power relations must
not oppress any groups within a society.
What should be noted is that emphasis on praxis leads to a more
contextual notion of what is true. That
is, beyond the use of dialectic analysis, critical scholars use praxis to
devise successful strategies by which to challenge and reform exploitive
relationships through the lessons that praxis reveals.
Not to be too philosophical, truth can be seen by what is observed
around us – a capability critical thinkers question vigorously – or it can be
seen from the truth held by different perspectives (an approach more in keeping
with critical theory). These varying
perspectives not only determine what aspects of reality are taken into our
consciousness, but also further determine what new “truths” are sought by the
questions one chooses to ask.
The central argument of the critical pedagogues is that education
should be about discovering the “true” exploitive relationships that exist in
capitalist societies and devising and implementing the strategies that rectify
those conditions. The main tools are
language and praxis.
[1] Raymond A. Morrow and Carlos A.
Torres, Social Theory and Education: A
Critique of Theories of Social and Cultural Reproduction (New York, NY:
State University of New York Press, 1995).
[2] Richard B. Bellamy, “Labriola, Antonio,”
The Blackwell Encyclopedia of Political
Thought, ed. David Miller (Cambridge, MA:
Blackwell Publisher, 1996), 272-273, 273.
[4] William H. Schubert, Curriculum: Perspective, Paradigm, and
Possibility (New York,NY: MacMillan Publishing Company, 1986).
[5] Michael Pusey, Jurgen Habermas (London: Routledge, 1993). Habermas' theoretical work is not limited to
speech. He presents a highly-sophisticated model which incorporates ideas from
Marx to Parsons.
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