PAULO FREIRE: FROM CRITICAL CONSCIOUSNESS TO THE PEDAGOGY OF THE OPPRESSED

Abstract

Throughout history, the way education has been organized has changed as has its content and character.
As an expression of collective needs, education has served as a vehicle for accomplishing societal tasks and goals.
Often – amid discrepancies between societal goals and existing school practices – reforms have been planned and
implemented, meeting with rigorous criticism. The traditional approach to education faced its sharpest criticism at
the end of the 19th and in the first half of the 20th century. Europe was at that time the epicenter of new pedagogic
trends founded on the critique of tradition and a struggle for a contemporary classroom. A significant approach was
critical pedagogy, put forward by Paulo Reglus Neves Freire (1921-1997). Freire developed this creative thesis in
the field of adult education by linking the language of criticism to that of possibility. His revolutionary ideas in
literacy and educational practice became the trademark of pedagogy all over the world and the great Pierre Furter
described him as “the myth of his own time”. The goal of this paper is to present – through an analysis of Freire’s
major works – his philosophy and radical approach to education and the pedagogy of the oppressed. The authors ask
the following questions: Is the democratization and revolution of the classroom possible? How can education
transform the individual and society? Which lessons have we learned from Freire?
The first part of the paper presents an overview of the material, functional, and educational tasks of the school, the
traditional approach, and the concept of the active school. The paper includes an illustrative analysis of the didactic
triangle, the general model of teaching by Daniel Pratt, and a model developed by Freire – including his banking
concept of education, what Freire describes as the oppressive culture of silence, and his centering of dialogue as a
key aspect of learning inseparable from practice.
Freire’s pedagogy of literacy entails, above all, the development of critical consciousness, the formation of which
enables the questioning of historical and social circumstances to create a democratic society. Critical consciousness
enables the teacher to understand social reality and develop a list of words and topics that can stimulate discussion.
On the other hand, it enables students to learn to understand and then transform reality. Dialogue between the
student and the teacher furthers social change, as Freire states, because “human beings are not built in silence, but in
word, in work, in action-reflection”.
Although he ranks amongst the most famous representatives of radical education reform, Freire is unfairly neglected
in the Balkans. This paper is an attempt to incentivize a more studious investigation into his work and contribution
to the social sciences, action research, reform processes, and the educational system in general. With this paper, the
authors also wish to mark 25 years since the death of this Brazilian educator, activist, philosopher, and one of the
most influential theoreticians of education in the 20th century.