Colleagues,

First of all...Why the giant 72pt typeface? 

Secondly.....In societies like ours where forces in the marketplace and government dictates take over control of the more private areas of people's lives, I believe we have a situation where we need more enlightenment about individual empowerment, not less.  We talk a lot about teaching people to take control of their lives and their careers, but what we are faced with is a capitalist marketplace that removes that control with no input from the people it affects. I am not against capitalism, but I reject the non-regulated marketplace that has removed democratic institutions from our polity.

Freire took the poorest of the poor in a country ruled by oligarchic families and taught them to read so they could question the injustice of their empoverishment. The military government shut the project down and jailed Freire for the very reason governments have to fear those who question their place in the scheme of things....maintaining power and the money, land, and education that guarantees that power. Read Fanon's Wretched of the Earth for an Algerian's take on this kind of colonialism. And today we have monied interests bulldozing the Amazon over the protests of the indigenous population because they can do so with impunity.

As for Thoreau, he lived on his own but he was not poor. I believe there is a great difference between people who preach the simple life, but are nowhere near the living reality of oppressed empoverishment under colonial rule whether internal or by external armies and government from afar. This is the invisible safety net white people and colonial governments keep for themselves, and in no way is near what the people (colonialized proletariat, etc) experience.

Here in the US we have a reproductive education that would keep the status quo because it benefits the middle class and above. Any real Freiren approach is anathema to this social order.  So we can either use Freire's work to help students think for themselves and understand why they can't get ahead, or why the educational goalposts keep moving; or we can educate for a revolution. I doubt that will happen here, because the real voices for change will not be able to overcome the lethargy of the self-satisfied who have found their niche in the social order. Once again...read Frantz Fanon and then apply the thought to the inner city minority students and under-educated here who see their lives in terms of being at the mercy of forces beyond their control. Once again: Katrina is a good example, but it is prevalent everywhere among the marginalized.

Wm. Peter MacMonagle, M.Ed. 
Central Piedmont Community College 
Community Development/Workplace Basic Skills 
West Campus 2219 
704-330-4668 

"I meant," said Ipslore bitterly, "what is there in this world 
that truly makes living worthwhile?"
Death thought about it.
"Cats," he said eventually. "Cats are nice." 
Terry Pratchett, Sourcery



-----Original Message-----
From: povertyracewomen-bounces at nifl.gov on behalf of Muro, Andres
Sent: Mon 1/8/2007 11:33 PM
To: The Poverty, Race,Women and Literacy Discussion List; The Poverty, Race,Women and Literacy Discussion List
Subject: [PovertyRaceWomen 223] Re: GED programswithapopulareducationa	pproach
 
Andrea: Ok, now you have a good question, how can we apply Freire's terminology to our daily work. Which terms would you like to explore specifically? Lets start with a few at the time and maybe different people can share examples of possible Freirian work.
 
I wonder if the people from New orleans are around. Margerie and Lou and others were doing these great anti- racist workshops grounded on a lot of Freirian stuff. 
 
Andres

________________________________

From: povertyracewomen-bounces at nifl.gov on behalf of Andrea Wilder
Sent: Mon 1/8/2007 7:35 PM
To: The Poverty, Race,Women and Literacy Discussion List
Subject: [PovertyRaceWomen 220] Re: GED programs withapopulareducationa pproach


Andres-- 

I do not dismiss Freire,. I dismiss the language. Bertha Mo expresses my feeling better than I have. 

I think anyone in adult literacy should know his work, use it as an analytic frame, see what it highlights, what it leaves out. Not to know Freire is to be low literate in the field. He is a gigantic figure. 

What I am really interested in, now that we have gotten this far, is how you and others might use his concepts every day, if indeed you do. 

Back to Thoreau--in Walden he talks about a woodchopper, French-Canadian I think, who boards at a house in the town. What would become of him when he got too old to cut wood, or injured himself with a knife or ax? Thoreau also describes an Irish family who trudge up the road with their goods on their backs, having just sold the boards in their home (shack) to Thoreau. (I think this is accurate.) I know this place, I know these people. Thoreau's idea, in the end, was to make a botanical inventory of Concord--he had started to read Darwin, had read Linnaeus. 

When I spoke about Richard Cash's views about effective medical intervention, I was thinking about this kind of situation--very local. Often people who talk about theory start from the top and apply it down--I'm not saying you do this, this is just an observation. I am suggesting that we look at the local, and star there to build up. So this is why I am interested, now, in learning how teachers mesh local conditions with their understanding of Freire--or if they don't, and why not. Cash's work has saved literally millions of children. 

Andrea 

On Jan 8, 2007, at 6:12 PM, Muro, Andres wrote: 


	The words that you cite are words to describe concepts and ideas. If you disagree with the concepts and ideas, then that is great. What I am trying to understand is what specifically you don't like about the idea of, say, conscientization or critical praxis, etc. If you disagree with these ideas and you can specify the reason, then we can have a discussion about pedagogy. If you simple disregard them because they get your goat, then you are silencing a conversation. Also, if you have difficulty understanding what Freire meant by these things, then you can always say: "I ain't sure of what he means by "critical praxis" and many will help define this. Then you can say that you don't like the idea of critical praxis because you don't think that people need to know what forces shape their experience before they engage in activity, or you can say that you like the idea and you agree with it. Again, dismissing terms because they get your goat, or they sound Marxist is silencing a conversation before it starts. The process of silencing by saying that something is Marxist, or Passé, without engaging it is undemocratic. I know that that wasn't your intention, but it is the result. Instead of engaging Freire's pedagogy we are arguing with you about process. 
	
	I appreciate that you feel more inclined to Thoreau because of his writing references to things that hit home. At the same time, Freire's work is part of the education field. I think that trying to understand Freire is important just like it would be to understand current anatomy and physiology or calculus if you want to be an engineer. 
	
	At the same time, if you don't feel like you need to know or understand Freire to be a good educator that is just fine too. However, as I said before, dismissing him on the grounds that he is a Marxist or his language gets your goat is not constructive or conducive to anything. 
	
	Andres 
	

	From: povertyracewomen-bounces at nifl.gov [mailto:povertyracewomen-bounces at nifl.gov] On Behalf Of Andrea Wilder 
	Sent: Monday, January 08, 2007 11:45 AM 
	To: The Poverty, Race,Women and Literacy Discussion List 
	Subject: [PovertyRaceWomen 207] Re: GED programs with apopulareducationa pproach 
	
	Andres-- 
	
	It's the language that is associated with Freire, and that Ditmar used, some of it is quotations, I am sincerely grateful for that. I am also grateful for Ditmar embedding definitions in his text. 
	
	But to your point, with or without quotations these word get my goat (obviously): class consciousness, class struggle, conscientisation, critical praxis, codification (which I actually usually do like), and pedagogical praxis. 
	
	At one point Freire did go around the bend, my opinion, over in Africa, and started to dictate how his workbooks were to be used. TSK. Someone besides me picked this up, I was just reading along and there it was. 
	
	By the way, I have I think a CD of Freire talking at Harvard's Ed School. That's ambiguous, I think it is a CD, I know it is at HGSE. 
	
	David Rosen's list of attributes in Freirian/popular education teaching was profoundly human and adapted to a pluralistic American zeitgeist, my opinion. 
	
	I understand Thoreau, I live near Walden Pond, I know the New England woods. Of course we have somewhat the same background, and MAYBE those who come from S.America feel more of a kinship with the writing style of Freire. Over to you, Andres. (AND WHERE IS THE SNOW?? I need snow to fully appreciate Thoreau.) 
	
	Andrea 





	On Jan 8, 2007, at 11:32 AM, Muro, Andres wrote: 

		
		What language are you referring to? 
		  
		
		From: povertyracewomen-bounces at nifl.gov [mailto:povertyracewomen-bounces at nifl.gov] On Behalf Of Andrea Wilder 
		Sent: Monday, January 08, 2007 6:47 AM 
		To: The Poverty, Race,Women and Literacy Discussion List 
		Subject: [PovertyRaceWomen 200] Re: GED programs with a populareducationa pproach 
		  
		Ditmar and others, 
		  
		I must put up my small flag here: I absolutely detest the language used in this educational movement. To me, it seems foreign and laid on with a trowel. Am I for social empowerment? Of course. Am I for social movements which try to being about even a modicum of social justice? Absolutely. 
		  
		Back to the trenches, 
		  
		Andrea 
		  
		On Jan 8, 2007, at 7:33 AM, Muro, Andres wrote: 

			  
			Hi Ujwalla, David, Andrea, Ditmar: 
			  
			We did a project with our students that has strong Freirian elements. This is an ongoing project with migrant students in which they write their own stories and we publish them. to see this project please visit: 
			  
			http://bordersenses.com/memorias 
			  
			While the stories are written in Spanish most of them have been translated. If you want to read the content, please click on each of the books. Also, to understand the theoretical foundation you can read my introduction to both books. They are in English. I kept the introductions very simple without making any references, However, the work is influenced by Freire,Dewey, Giroux, etal. You will see in the intrductions the elements of Freirianism that Ditmar points to. 
			  
			Andres 
			  
			From: povertyracewomen-bounces at nifl.gov on behalf of ditmar0906_inossian at netzero.net 
			Sent: Sat 1/6/2007 4:26 PM 
			To: povertyracewomen at nifl.gov 
			Subject: [PovertyRaceWomen 197] Re: GED programs with a popular educationa pproach 
			
			  
			Yes, Project Hope's Adult Learners Program uses (or did use) a popular education approach that is distinctly Freireian, and this program was the focus of Lorna's dissertation. For what it's worth, "conscientisation" was the focus of Freire's approach: a process by which a group (not at all about individual empowerment here [think "class struggle"]) becomes aware of their oppression and discovers that they have a popular culture that is both political and social--has a sociopolitical role in history (as Marx understood history). The group learners engage in "critical praxis" or dialogue toward the end of identifying common interests. It's rather like an effort to critique false consciousness through 1) an investigation of the thematic universe (identifying themes); 2) identifying those themes that are "generative"; 3) codification of those generative themes, and 4) dialogue within the cultural circle of learners to interpret those themes (i.e. create meaning). I know this sounds very abstract but one might think of it as a very Marxist-oriented version of the ideology critique that was advanced by the Frankfurt School and later by educational theorists who continue to work in this tradition (e.g. Giroux, Apple, etc.). 
			  
			Freire's goal was social change, not individual empowerment nor individual transformation. In fact, in my own reading of Freire, he didn't even think that individual transformation was possible. In other words, he never intended for his theory to be used as a means for helping learners function within the given social system. One might argue that if you change individuals, you will change society (one person at a time). However, this can be true only from an anthropological view of history (i.e., the driving force behind history is human experience/consciousness). From a structuralist (or Marxist) point of view, the consciousness of the individual makes no difference; it's class consciousness that matters because one's individual consciousness is a product of ideology; individuals become subjects only through their subjection to processes of production (i.e., the reproduction of production, or more commonly, the reproduction of inequality). So basically "popular education" becomes a mechanism for bringing about class struggle. Finally, Freire never specified the end results of pedagogical praxis because the "solution" or product was not known, in fact could not be known--it evolved among/through the people. Social change was then the process of peaceful intervention into the system by initiating dialogue with the "oppressors" to develop alternatives. 
			  
			The philosophical foundations are to be found in Catholic humanism (Catholic Action, Liberation Theology, etc.), orthodox Marxism, and German philosophy (particularly Hegel). Freire also integrated bits of critical theory into his approach, which evolved into his "Movement of Education from the Base" (a take-off on the "Popular Church from the Base" that evolved during the revolutionary period in Latin America). See his two major contributions to adult education theory and practice: Pedagogy of the Oppressed and Education as the Practice of Freedom (both late 1960s). Lorna's dissertation is a marvelous illustration of how one GED program puts these principles into practice. 
			  
			Thanks. --Ditmar 
			  
			C. Ditmar Coffield 
			
			  
			-- eleonelli at aol.com wrote: 
			David - I think that Project Hope in Dorchester, MA takes a popular  
			education approach in their program. 
			  
			Esther 
			__________________________________ 
			Esther D. Leonelli 
			
			  
			-----Original Message----- 
			From: djrosen at comcast.net 
			Sent: Sat, 6 Jan 2007 11:14 AM 
			Subject: [PovertyRaceWomen 194] Re: GED programs with a popular  
			education approach 
			  
			   Hi Andrea, 
			  
			Thanks.  I have emailed Lorna. 
			  
			All the best, 
			  
			David 
			  
			On Jan 5, 2007, at 1:37 PM, Andrea Wilder wrote: 
			  
			> David, 
			> 
			> Thank you for the list, it makes me feel very happy to have all these 
			> values in teaching spelled out. What a comprehensive list!  Lorna 
			> Rivera I believe used the term "popular education"  in her 
			> dissertation.  Perhaps you have already asked her about GED 
			> programs--she is at UMASS Boston. She is the best source I can 
			> think of 
			> right at the moment. 
			> 
			> Andrea 
			> 
			> On Jan 5, 2007, at 11:25 AM, David Rosen wrote: 
			> 
			>> Hi Andrea, 
			>> 
			>> Suppose we use the term "popular education" approach.  This suggests 
			>> to me: 
			>> 
			>> 1. a lack of hierarchy, that teachers treat students as their equals 
			>> in status and power although they have different roles, and the 
			>> program or school incorporates democratic decision-making practices. 
			>> Students and teachers, not just administrators and the board,  play a 
			>> central role in the decision-making process; 
			>> 2. a belief that the central purpose of education is to bring about 
			>> the conditions for social and economic justice and democracy; 
			>> 3. a commitment to raising the consciousness of students and 
			>> teachers, and helping them to become critically aware of how their 
			>> individual personal experiences are connected to larger social 
			>> problems; 
			>> 4. a commitment to social change, often at the community level; 
			>> 5. learning history and other social sciences from a variety of 
			>> perspectives, for example from the perspectives of: women, people of 
			>> color, immigrants, and workers; 
			>> 6. knowledge and skills learned in the context of issues which affect 
			>> students in their lives and in their communities; and 
			>> 7. an education process characterized by discussion and debate, not 
			>> just memorizing facts or learning skills. 
			>> 
			>> I doubt that this definition is complete, and some would say that 
			>> some elements are more important than others.  But when I use the 
			>> term, those are the ingredients I have in mind. 
			>> 
			>> I can think of a couple of community-based programs in Boston, an 
			>> ESOL program and an ABE/adult diploma program which -- currently or 
			>> in the past -- fit most of these criteria, but these are not GED 
			>> programs.  Anyone know of a GED program that has these ingredients? 
			>> 
			>> David J. Rosen 
			>> djrosen at comcast.net 
			>> 
			>> 
			>> On Jan 5, 2007, at 10:05 AM, Andrea Wilder wrote: 
			>> 
			>>> Hi David, 
			>>> 
			>>> I would be interested to know what a Freirian approach adult 
			>>> literacy 
			>>> program might look like.  In your opinion, what might be the 
			>>> ingredients? 
			>>> thanks. 
			>>> 
			>>> Andrea 
			>>> 
			>>> On Jan 5, 2007, at 3:13 AM, Ujwala Samant wrote: 
			>>> 
			>>>> Dear David, 
			>>>> 
			>>>> This is one question that I have been wondering about 
			>>>> for years. Aside from the 'glory days' in the 70s/80s 
			>>>> which colleagues of mine at NCSALL told me about and 
			>>>> one in NY, I could find no Freireian approaches to 
			>>>> adult literacy. I have studied the 70s-80s classics, 
			>>>> and I have been curious as to what happened since 
			>>>> then. 
			>>>> 
			>>>> Thanks for raising this question, 
			>>>> Warm regards, 
			>>>> Ujwala 
			>>>> 
			>>>> --- David Rosen <djrosen at comcast.net> wrote: 
			>>>> 
			>>>>> Colleagues, 
			>>>>> 
			>>>>> In a conversation yesterday I was asked if I know of 
			>>>>> good examples of 
			>>>>> GED preparation programs which use a popular 
			>>>>> education, or 
			>>>>> participatory (Freirean) approach.  I am only aware 
			>>>>> of one, a theme- 
			>>>>> based approach that the City University of New York 
			>>>>> adult literacy 
			>>>>> GED program has used for over a decade.  If you have 
			>>>>> others to 
			>>>>> suggest I would be pleased to hear about them. 
			>>>>> Thanks. 
			>>>>> 
			>>>>> David J. Rosen 
			>>>>> djrosen at comcast.net 
			>>>>> 
			>>>>> 
			>>>>> 
			>>>>> ---------------------------------------------------- 
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			>>> National Institute for Literacy 
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			>> 
			>> David J. Rosen 
			>> djrosen at comcast.net 
			>> 
			>> 
			>> 
			>> ---------------------------------------------------- 
			>> National Institute for Literacy 
			>> Poverty, Race, Women and Literacy mailing list 
			>> PovertyRaceWomen at nifl.gov 
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			> 
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			David J. Rosen 
			djrosen at comcast.net 



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