Pedagogy Of The Oppressed By Paulo Freire

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Pedagogy of the Oppressed is a nonfiction book by Brazilian author Paulo Freire. The book is best known for its philosophical concepts on oppression as it pertains to education. Since the book 's first publication in 1978 it has become a worldwide staple for educators and activists alike, who strive to conquer the problem of oppression in its many facets of life. Pedagogy of the Oppressed is an eye-opening and life changing book that should be a requirement for all future educators in order to ensure success in creating a liberating and humanizing education system. Author:
Paulo Freire was born in a middle class community of Brazil November of 1921 where he was raised for his early childhood until the age of 12 when his family was uprooted …show more content…

The first chapter talks about the justification of the pedagogy, the contradiction between the oppressors and oppressed, which each house on another in each other psyche’s, and how the pedagogy is justified. Chapter two is about the “banking” concept of education as means of oppression which treats students as brainless ‘piggy banks’ to be filled with knowledge and teachers as all-knowing beings; “the more completely she fills the receptacles, the better a teacher she is. The more meekly the receptacles permit themselves to be filled, the better students they are” (Freire, 1998, p. 53). Chapter two also poses a solution to the “banking” method: problem posing, which through dialogue creates a co-creator relationship between the students and teacher. The third chapter builds more on dialogue as a practice of freedom in education and the final chapter is about dialogics and antidialogics as opposing theories of action.
Critical Analysis: Through Freire 's (1998) in depth philosophical analysis on oppression he strives to show people that that the world is not a reality to be accepted or changed but rather a problem to be worked out and solved by way of literacy, education, and dialogue which in turn inspires action:
“Education either functions as an instrument which is used to facilitate integration of the younger generation into the logic …show more content…

Because Freire had been put in a situation of oppression he argues against institutions and people that oppress. His dislike and knowledge of oppression as a physiological state and an institutional construct is strongly expressed in the book. The book stands to mainly inform people on what oppression is, how oppression affects people psychologically, how to help oppressed peoples, and how to educate in a non-oppressing way. All of Freire 's points draw on the fact that “Oppression not only resides in external social institutions and norms but lodges in the human psyche as well”, only to be changed by education, dialogue, and altering ways of thinking (Bell, 2013, 23). With the density of information packed into 192 pages the read can be quite hard, however his points are clear, concise, and many times restated to emphasize importance. With each chapter the book builds on itself using principles, ideas, and theories from previous chapters to go into further detail to explain itself. Chapter one speaks on oppression as a whole in relation to humans and the human experience, this builds in chapter two to how oppression is apparent in education which translates to the third chapter in Frieres explanation of dialogue as means of action and finally unites all chapters together by correlating how the problem of oppression can be solved through awareness,

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