Ann George presents an overview of some of the main aims and challenges of critical pedagogy in “Critical Pedagogy: Dreaming of Democracy” (A Guide To Composition Studies, 2014, pp. 77 – 93). After raising several questions regarding democratizing the classroom, student activism, and the contradictory aims and practice of critical pedagogy in the writing classroom, she ends the chapter with allying herself with Kenneth Burke, rather than Friere. She says,
“[Kenneth] Burke’s work is now the centerpiece of my critical pedagogy and I teach student writers that “[a] way of not seeing” (Permanence and Change 49), that we see the world through the lens of symbols so natural, so unremarkable (war on terror, illegal alien, No Child Left Behind) that we often don’t see how they persuade us to think and act in certain ways and not others. In my critical pedagogy, we write together about the invisible” (. 91)
I’m attracted to this idea about writing together about the invisible, however, I think it needs some disassembling and reassembling for the second language writing classroom. I see particularly the university second language writing classroom in the US as a challenging site to think about critical pedagogy. George is writing primarily for a US context, where there may be a shared set of political, historical, or human rights issues that frame critical engagement. How does critical pedagogy engage with the local/global. I agree that writing is both a way of seeing and a way of not seeing, but it still begs the question of how the unseen becomes seen, especially within a classroom of cultural and linguistic difference. We don’t want to be in a position where the teacher becomes the one who lifts the veil.
Hey Jack,
SO, there’s this concept in Post-Colonial, Critical Race theory about the veil between the Black and White experience in the US. I find it interesting that you brought in this concept (intentionally or not) in connection to the L2 learner. I definitely have to refresh on that theory (I have a feeling that it’s spoken of by Toni Morrison and such), but I think it might be a fresh interesting lens through which to view the teacher and L2 student role in addressing the power relationships within the L2 composition classrooms.
Jack — I’ve enjoyed reading your post, and I have to admit that it’s one I’m still thinking through and look forward to revisiting in the next few days to see how I’ve processed some of your comments. Allow me an immediate, if not particularly well fleshed out, response. I, too, was drawn to this idea of writing about the invisible. But as an instructor in a university second language writing classroom, I feel very acutely the fact that in stark contrast to many of my students, I grew up in an academic environment (place and time) that places value on critical engagement and questioning, albeit with varying levels of success. How do you balance your efforts to help students develop the critical skill set necessary for studying in the United States while respecting different traditions and understandings of how to engage the invisible?
A diverse classroom does pose specific problems for a coherent critical pedagogy considering the shift of educational, social, cultural politics across cultures. I had some first-hand experience with this last semester. This reading made me curious about the Burke article cited by George, “Linguistic Approach to Problems of Education.” She doesn’t say a whole lot about it – but what she does say is very intriguing.