Abstract
In a higher education system driven by student satisfaction, there has been a recent push towards more student-centred methods of teaching such as collaborative learning and seminar discussions despite an increase in student numbers. In contrast, some academics defend the transformative and educative possibilities of the lecture by challenging its conception as ‘banking education’, asking us to reflect on the purpose of education in a way that calls into question our assumptions about the transmission of information through lecturing. While acknowledging the place of the lecture in higher education, I want to consider whether a lecture can be critical pedagogy by interrupting previous ways of thinking and being. As the teacher lectures he/she models what it means to know, to think and to act, but is this enough to make it critical pedagogy? Looking at conceptualisations of the transformative intellectual and the relationship between curriculum and pedagogy alongside data from case study research, this article will explore what critical pedagogical practice looks like in the university.
Interest in student-centred learning and pedagogy in the university continues to grow (Lea et al., 2003), especially with more recent changes in higher education (HE) policy that have positioned students as consumers of a product (O’Neill and McMahon, 2005). The white paper Students at the Heart of the System (Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, 2011: 33), for example, encourages universities to ‘create a learning community where engagement of students is encouraged, their feedback valued, and complaints resolved transparently’. Although I agree that student-centred approaches can offer an opportunity to empower students by putting student engagement and activity at the centre of learning, it seems that the term is being co-opted by policy makers and education development centres as a way to satisfy students. At the same time, however, university educators are being asked to deliver courses designed for 20 students to a class of 60 or more, without any apparent regard for the effect large class sizes have on pedagogy, student engagement and effective learning. Despite being encouraged to implement student-centred approaches to teaching, the lack of resources, including staff time dedicated to teaching rather than research, is seen as a barrier to actually implementing student-centred learning approaches in the university classroom (Lea et al., 2003; O’Neill and McMahon, 2005). Further, student-centred learning is often featured in university policy or guidelines, ‘but this has not necessarily transferred into practice’ (O’Neill and McMahon, 2005), meaning that students might have expectations about student-centred learning that are not being met. This is not a recent development. Barnett (1990: 153) argued 28 years ago that teachers in HE must pay attention to the expectations and perceptions of their students because the students could simply study elsewhere if they did not ‘value their learning experience’. This pressure to teach in a way that meets the expectations of students is compounded by the increasing importance placed on student satisfaction, as well as an increase in student numbers, both of which affect the kind of pedagogy that can be implemented. These constraints often lead to a more monological, didactic approach to teaching commonly known as the lecture.
The lecture has been criticized by many educators over the years, perhaps most notably by Paulo Freire (1970), commonly recognized as the founder of critical pedagogy, who described the process of ‘banking education’. This process is often associated with the traditional lecture, in which the ‘expert’ stands at the front of the class and delivers a monologue on a particular topic, often presenting the information as immutable facts, with little to no participation from students. In Freire’s depiction of the banking model of education, the teacher makes a deposit of knowledge into the accounts of students, without requiring any processing or changing of this information on their part. Freire considered education a ‘tool for social and cultural emancipation’, something that could be achieved through portraying and practising education as a political and pedagogical project in which dialogue, democratization of teacher–student relationships, co-construction of the curriculum and making learning relevant to the learner are valued (Schugurensky, 2014: 39).
Looking at HE from a Freirean perspective, it might be considered that the lecture does not fulfil any of the aims of critical pedagogy, or of a transformative HE more generally. However, in considering Webster’s (2015) article In Defence of the Lecture, in which the common understanding of Freire’s banking model is challenged, the idea that a lecture might serve a critical pedagogical approach can be examined. Reflecting on the data collected by observing and interviewing critical pedagogues in English universities, I also started to question whether perhaps the emphasis should be put on the content rather than the way it is transmitted. However, although this highlights the interconnected relationship between curriculum and pedagogy, ultimately, it points to two different ideas: critical pedagogy, with a focus on the method, and a critical curriculum, which focuses more on the content. Although it could be argued there is no critical pedagogy without a critical curriculum, it does seem that a critical curriculum without critical pedagogy is possible and might be prevalent in HE. Examples of the latter could be a lecture which presents content that is critical of power in society yet does not enact a critical approach to teaching by challenging power dynamics in the classroom. By exploring these distinctions, a more coherent understanding of critical pedagogy might be possible.
Throughout my research on critical pedagogy in the university, in which I observe and interview self-identifying critical pedagogues (SICPs), I have experienced a range of different teaching approaches that fall on a spectrum which ranges from completely democratic methods to more traditional, didactic ones. Yet, all of these SICPs claimed to be involved in critical pedagogy, which is itself hard to define or pin down. This range of pedagogical approaches is akin to what is discussed in Breunig’s (2009) article, in which she critically reflects on her own pedagogical practice and how it relates to her critical beliefs. In this study, Breunig (2009) interviews other SICPs to see how their practice corresponds with their pedagogical values. Her results indicate that there may be a disconnect between theory and practice, which occurs when pedagogical beliefs are not implemented. A similar idea is explored by Aronowitz and Giroux (1985) in their conceptualization of educators as intellectuals involved in a pedagogical project in which they can be critical or accommodating of hegemonic ideologies, as well as actively working for or against them. The practice of these ‘educator-intellectuals’, or SICPs, might be explained in a number of ways, which also apply to those who participated in my study: (a) self-identifying critical pedagogues do not really know what critical pedagogy is in practice; (b) I do not know what critical pedagogy looks like (or should look like); (c) putting critical pedagogy into practice is not possible in the current HE system; or (d) critical pedagogy is not about their practice, but more about what they are teaching (including the curriculum but also beyond it) and how they go about presenting it (e.g. how they present knowledge as fixed or changeable, context dependent, etc.). This fourth possibility is what I will be exploring in this article by bringing together Webster’s (2015) defence of the lecture, Aronowitz and Giroux’s (1985) article Radical Education and Transformative Intellectuals and my own research into SICPs in English HE.
Reconsidering the critical and transformative potential of the lecture is important because critical educators are increasingly being pushed to the margins and their academic freedom to teach as they want is being suppressed by large class sizes and fewer contact hours with students. Perhaps if we can change the way we approach the lecture, we can make it a more transformative experience for students even if it is a class of 150. Maybe, by looking at how SICPs are coping with the effects of marketization of HE so far, we can identify new ways forward that can still maintain a critical approach to teaching through critical curriculum choices and by questioning the knowledge that is presented in the lecture, whether it comes from lecturers or from other ‘experts’.
Research design
In this article I will be focusing on the first three people who took part in my PhD research, whom I observed and interviewed during the 2016–2017 academic year. These participants were the first three to be interviewed out of a larger sample of 11 and offer a starting point for the discussion in this article. Because an interpretivist approach is used in this study I do not think the small sample size is an issue, especially because I am not trying to make generalizations, and the data is used to explore two theories through concrete examples. Snowball sampling was used to find and approach SICPs in English universities for the larger sample, which consisted of 11 participants for the interviews and 8 for observation (some could not be observed for practical reasons). Two of the participants teach at a Russell Group university in London and one teaches at a red brick university in the north-east of England. I used participant observations to better understand the practice of each educator, participating in at least two of their classes, and then interviewed them after the second observation. This interview was a chance for both me and the SICP to reflect on our experiences in the class and discuss how they had put their critical beliefs into practice in the classroom. Both the participant observations and the interviews were semi-structured, in that there were no pre-identified practices that I was trying to find or questions that had to be answered aside from a broad research interest concerning the translation of critical pedagogical values and beliefs into pedagogical practice.
I began each interview by reflecting on my experience in the SICPs’ classes and the questions came out of this experience. In an effort to mediate the power dynamic present in the interview and observation, participants were asked in advance to identify any topics they wanted to discuss in the interview. This was done in an attempt to make the research method and process more ‘critical’, in that I constantly reflected on how I collected data, treated participants and the reasons for doing research in a certain way. The few ethical concerns with the design mainly focused on anonymity and confidentiality. Teachers and students were informed about the participant observations beforehand through information sheets, which outlined the purpose and process of the research, and were assured that the ethical concerns would be addressed. Lecturers were guaranteed anonymity and confidentiality so they would feel more comfortable openly reflecting on their experience of teaching within the university.
Scope and limitations of the study
The aim of my research more generally is to better understand the beliefs and practices of SICPs and the factors that influence their practice. The scope of this article is narrower: it aims to explore whether the lecture (or a transmission style of instruction) can be critical pedagogy by looking at data from my research through the lens of Webster’s (2015) ideas on lectures and Aronowitz and Giroux’s (1985) work on transformative and critical educators. Due to the limited space for the article, there are several ideas that must be taken for granted: (a) it is assumed that using critical pedagogy in HE is desirable despite the fact that it has its roots in a different context; (b) on some level, it is assumed that education should be a critical experience; and (c) it is also assumed that most lectures do not offer a critical educational experience for students, empowering them to challenge knowledge we take for granted as well as the power dynamics of the classroom and society more generally. Of course, there are some limitations to the study, which are mainly concerned with the sample size and the methodology. The small sample size is a limitation even though generalizations are not being made about all SICPs or all university lecturers. Having more examples to connect to the concepts presented by Webster, and Aronowitz and Giroux would be helpful for readers and would demonstrate more of either a consensus or variety of experiences. There might also be a limitation with regard to the way the sample was selected; snowball sampling is commonly used in situations in which the population is hard to access. Contact was first made at a critical pedagogies conference, resulting in a referral chain that I chased up via emails to recommended participants. However, of the 20 people contacted, several responded saying they were not critical pedagogues, meaning that the people who were doing the referring may have misidentified their peers. Following on from this, it is possible that some of the participants may not really identify as critical pedagogues, but they wanted to be helpful, or they were interested in learning more about critical pedagogical practice. However, due to the open nature of my research questions, I am not sure this is a major limitation of the sampling method, especially in the case of this article, which is more about exploring theory through a small set of examples.
In terms of the methodology, in an attempt to share power with participants, the interviews were left unstructured and participants were able to lead discussions in whatever way they thought was relevant to the observations and to the conversation. Again, this limits the ability to make generalizations and comparisons across participants but, as I was trying to explore their perceptions about critical pedagogy and practice more generally in order to thematically analyse these perceptions, I don’t think this is a serious concern. Of course, curriculum, pedagogy, educators and students vary from institution to institution, and even within institutions in different departments or disciplines. The picture, therefore, that I am painting of SICPs in English HE is based on my own experience and the perceptions of those whom I have interviewed and, thus, is not representative of all HE educators in England. Because I have chosen to focus on those that use a particular approach, I do not think this is a major limitation to the study and, in fact, coming from a critical approach I try to avoid attempts at making sweeping generalizations about all educators or even all SICPs. Each of these educators operates within an institution and a system that influences what they are able to do, and so context is very important, as well as the differences between the contexts. Therefore, I will begin by introducing the three different SICPs. I will first explore the data from the interviews thematically, and then through the lens of ideas presented by Webster (2015) and Aronowitz and Giroux (1985).
Observation data
Case 1: Arthur
Arthur teaches education and international development at a Russell Group university in London. I observed two of his classes in the autumn of 2016, one taught by himself and the other co-taught with an educator who specializes in post-colonialism. The class was so large that two classrooms had to be joined together to fit in all the students. There were so many students crammed into this space that some didn’t have desks, and the students at the back of the room were so far away a microphone had to be employed so that they could hear the teacher. A second roving microphone was passed around so that students who had questions could also be heard. In the first session I observed, Arthur began by reporting some of the suggestions that students had put forward using an online learning platform to address the large class size issue. From the choices presented, the students chose how the class would function in the future. The sessions I observed followed similar schedules: about an hour and a half of lecture with questions and some group discussions throughout, followed by a ‘breakout’ session, in which students were split into groups of about 10, each with a facilitator (lecturer or PhD student). The content covered in the class as well as some questions that were posed by the lecturer were addressed in this ‘breakout' session. The two classes I observed focused on post-colonialism, international development and education for social transformation. These topics were explored using real-life examples from the lecturers’ research and sometimes from the students, drawing on critical pedagogy and post-structural and post-colonial theories to explore alternative methods of education and their effects in various contexts.
Case 2: Louisa
Louisa teaches a course on radical education at a Russell Group university in London. I observed three sessions of her third-year bachelor’s module in the spring of 2017. This option module was quite small, with an average of 10–15 students attending each session, although 28 were enrolled. The class was a combination of lecture and discussion, with students expected to have read assigned texts beforehand. There was also a seminar that met at another time and was led by a PhD student of Louisa’s. Like Arthur’s class, the content of this module was relatively ‘critical’ in that it focused on alternatives to mainstream schooling. The three classes I attended were about historical social movements in education, critical pedagogy, and education and social change. The first class I attended was the introduction to the module and, in this session, Louisa began by telling the students how passionate she was about radical education and social change. She also said she didn’t want to lecture all the time and instead wanted there to be discussion in relation to what radical education is, the main question to be explored throughout the course. The class began by unpicking the word ‘radical’, with questions concerning how the word is used and what it implies. Through several group exercises, we developed a discussion around the various meanings of ‘radical’, as well as some other related terms such as ‘fundamental’, ‘indoctrination’ and ‘hegemony’. Louisa went on to explore social movements that seemed quite radical at the time (e.g. women’s rights, or the abolition of slavery), movements we take for granted now as being perfectly just and normal. Louisa tried to get students engaged by asking questions, but was for the most part met with silence. The second class was about Paulo Freire and other educational movements from South America. We started with a discussion of Chapter Two of Pedagogy of the Oppressed in groups; however, due to lack of engagement, the class gradually turned into a lecture. The third class was about historical social movements, such as the Chartists, and more current movements such as Black Lives Matter. Through questions and group discussions Louisa encouraged us to think about how social action itself can be educative.
Case 3: Chris
Chris teaches several different classes relating to education at a red brick university in the north-east of England. I attended two different classes in the spring of 2017, one master's level, the other bachelor’s level. Typically, I attend more than one session of the same class because then I can get a better feel for the typical structure of the class, but Chris mentioned that due to class sizes and the different levels of the courses, she often uses different approaches in the classes. The first class I attended was a bachelor’s module on democratic decision making that had 38 students in attendance. This class was extremely active because, rather than simply teaching the class about democratic decision making, Chris allowed students to undertake the democratic process in practice. The class started with a warm-up discussion that got students thinking about self-governance and democratic decision making. We then explored how they were related to democratic schools and how we could get young people more involved in decision making in schools. Following this, we participated in three activities to explore three different methods of democratic decision making: representative, direct democracy and sociocratic. Finally, we discussed how we thought these decision-making methods could be used in mainstream schools
The second class I observed was a master’s level class on inclusive and special education that had 17 students. The module was co-taught with another lecturer from a different discipline, which Chris felt brought an interesting dynamic to the class. We had been asked to read an article written by Chris before the class that she then told us more about through a presentation. Her plan was to tell us about her research and then talk about how the students could apply it to other settings. Because this is a master’s level class, many of the students are already teaching or have taught at some point, so there is an attempt to connect the theories discussed in the class to their professional practice. Because the class would be slightly different from normal in that it was a lecture, she gave us Post-it notes on which to write questions about anything that occurred to us during the lecture. In her lecture, she talked about her research comparing democratic schools in Europe and the UK, and the connection between pedagogy and space. After the lecture we had 15 minutes of questions, which mainly focused on the context-specific nature of making changes in schools and how we can learn from cases in different contexts. We then broke into groups and had a 30-minute discussion about how we could apply these ideas to a particular context (different levels of education) and what would and wouldn’t work. After reporting back to the group and discussing the different challenges, we took the final five minutes of the class to reflect on how what we learned today could also affect inclusion.
Interview data
In this section I will draw on interview data from my research to further explore the cases outlined above by looking at pedagogical decisions and what influences them.
Designing courses
Arthur, Louisa and Chris all talked about the design of their modules at some point in the interview. For Arthur, this centred around the improvisation that took place in his class due to the unexpected large number of students who had enrolled that term. Unsurprisingly, Arthur pointed out that the pedagogical approach used with 20–30 students had to be different from that used with a class of over 100 students. Ordinarily, there would be no need for a seminar or breakout session because this would be part of the main session, and the lecture would be broken up by discussions and activities to get the students more involved in the class. In an effort to address these issues, the students were consulted so that they could come up with ideas for making the class more participatory and more functional for such a large number of people. A lot of thought seemed to go into creating a space in which students felt comfortable sharing ideas and asking questions. Such a space was also a result of the subject content and the kind of people interested in international development, as well as the diversity of the cohort. According to Arthur, all of these factors contributed to a more social atmosphere. The way the course is set up encourages the students to make connections between the theories they are learning about and their own context.
When speaking of the design of her bachelor’s module, Louisa highlighted the differences between bachelor’s and master's classes. In her experience, teaching masters classes was much easier because students were more mature, came prepared to discuss ideas, had more experience to draw on and, typically, had more interest in the course. Whereas, on the bachelor’s modules she has taught on thus far, she felt more of an obligation to teach content. I really feel like my job is to kind of, make them aware of things that they’re not aware of. And break down material for them that might be difficult, in a way that is accessible and makes sense to them. And that’s a very difficult kind of thing. So I’m not sure if I can do that in a way that also leaves room for actually hearing their voices. (Louisa, interview)
Chris talked about the design of her bachelor’s module, which had changed and developed over time. The module was originally written for her by the director, so the learning outcomes and the shell of the module were already decided. However, as she taught the class over the years it changed and became much more experiential, whereas it had been designed to be more theoretical (and possibly more suited to a lecture). Constantly reflecting on what works best for the class has motivated most of the changes: content that could be merged with another session or the removal of a group presentation that wasn’t supporting learning. Although Chris tries to let students get involved in making decisions about the course, such as what to do with extra time and support sessions, or choosing their essay titles, many students do not respond well to having the freedom to make these decisions. In contrast, on the master's module she feels the course is typically more led by student discussions and questions, and engagement with theory and, thus, more praxis oriented.
Assessment in university
Despite Arthur and his students doing what they can to make the large class more interactive, Arthur pointed out that they are still limited by the structural and systemic constraints of the university, particularly in relation to assessment. A student of his pointed out that the idea of assessment in university narrows what is seen as an acceptable answer. This clashes with the ‘ecology of knowledges’ view that is promoted during the course, in which different epistemologies from different cultural groups are equally valued. It also highlights how assessment can affect the content of the course, especially in cases in which educators are working on modules that they have not designed or have little control over curriculum and assessment. In many senses, Arthur feels that it is sometimes a challenge to ‘practice what you preach’ when you work within a system with a very strict set of criteria or parameters. Louisa also voiced her concerns with assessment and how it affects her ability to be a real critical pedagogue. I mean that is a problem, right? When you’re trying to do something critical and radical but you’re in this framework that is very, very standard and traditional, and you’re awarding grades … And of course, that undermines my ability to be a real critical pedagogue. Because I’m in the role of someone with huge authority in the sense that I’m the one who decides what grade they get, and that could be the difference between, you know, a first-class degree and a second class or failing the course. So … it’s a bit artificial to think we can create this little space of critical pedagogy. (Louisa, interview)
Class sizes
The issue of increasing class sizes was something that came up frequently in Arthur’s and Chris’ interviews. Some of the problems that Arthur encountered have already been addressed, but there were other issues in relation to participation that seemed to go beyond pedagogical approaches. The larger the class size, the less likely students seem to be willing to participate, especially in cases in which a microphone is involved. First of all, because students had to use a microphone to speak, part of the group remained silent, but this also puts pressure on those using the microphone, meaning others may not contribute. In addition, in Arthur’s opinion, the larger the group the fewer the students who are actively engaged. As a result, the students on Arthur’s course have been quite critical of the class size and have complained to the university. And I’m afraid the university treats students very badly, for the most part and, because there is a kind of income maximization strategy and you know, if you can get away with having large numbers as an institution … But the model of course we have here is for a very low number of contact hours and taught classes … So for those few hours that they’re in class they need to have a really intense pedagogical experience and you can’t have that with those huge groups. (Arthur, interview) I really can’t stress this enough; the size of the group massively affects the learning. And, um, this year it’s been really difficult. Some of what you saw in that group … you know, I was quite pleased with the session that you saw actually, but engaging some students when there are so many in a group is difficult, and me being able to even have a sense of them all as individuals, I mean I struggle with their names, and that’s the most basic thing around having an individual connection with people. (Chris, interview)
Autonomous, critical learners
Another theme that emerged from the interviews was the challenge of empowering students to be more critical and autonomous as learners, something that was affected by all three areas that have been mentioned so far: pedagogy, assessment and class size. Louisa mentioned the struggle to get students engaged in critical thought and debates about ideas when they had not been previously exposed to this kind of learning. She felt that students seem to come to university wanting someone to tell them what to think rather than expressing their own views or being critical of what the lecturer tells them. This was echoed by Chris, who felt that students were coming to university expecting a certain kind of experience, one that was very prescribed and traditional. Although she wanted to do things differently in her classes, sometimes she felt like students might actually be at a disadvantage if they were exposed to a democratic and critical setting, and then had to go back to a more traditional class. Arthur, on the other hand, was more optimistic about students’ ability to change as a result of the classes in his programme. He felt that students often came from backgrounds that did not encourage critique of ideas in education, and yet they were leaving the course with a more critical perspective. All three SICPs used group discussions, challenging questions and examples from different contexts to expose students to different ways of thinking about education. Again, this highlights the dynamic between critical pedagogy and a critical curriculum – teaching critical content seems to be easier than teaching in a critical way in the current context, an idea that was echoed by Louisa. But in terms of the actual pedagogical approaches and methods, I think there are problems with trying to make [critical pedagogy] work in a context like this, where you’re so constrained by the structures. By, you know, the expectations of the students, of the other teachers. I mean, but I do … I do think that criticality has to be at the heart of what we do. (Louisa, interview)
Is there space for critical pedagogy in the university?
Despite a general push towards more student-centred pedagogy, it seems that educators who identify as critical pedagogues seem to struggle to put their beliefs into practice within the current system, as Breunig (2009) suggested. This is especially the case in increasingly larger classes, in which they are asked to teach subject matter meant for 20 students to a class of 60 or more. All three participants voiced their concerns about not practising what they preached, with Chris going so far as to say she doesn’t think she can call herself a critical pedagogue. I’m not sure that I am a self-identifying critical pedagogue, in that way. Because I might self-identify as, you know, aligning myself with those values and aspiring to work in that way, but actually I think that within a university, if I was to say that I am a critical pedagogue within my university, I’m setting myself up to fail because I actually think that is quite impossible. (Chris, interview) I think it’s really important that things happen at a small scale. And that we talk about those things. So, some of my research is about looking at really interesting, alternative educational spaces that are really tiny and sort of forgotten or on the fringes of things, but nevertheless give us a fascinating account of what might be possible. (Arthur, interview)
In defence of the lecture
Looking at the data from the three cases described above, as well as other data not discussed here, it appears that the majority of SICPs are using lecturing as their main method of instruction. Of course, not every lecture is created equal, and some have content that is more critical, or involve questions and discussions that offer opportunities for the students to be more active and engaged. However, does that make it critical pedagogy? Can a lecture ever be critical pedagogy? Webster’s (2015) In Defence of the Lecture offers a challenge to those who consider the lecture to be an obsolete way of teaching in HE. By arguing that a lecture is not always a monologue, and that it is not always a passive experience for students, he claims that, in fact, there are opportunities for disruption and transformation using the lecture format. Taking a deeper look at Freire’s critique of the banking model of education, Webster suggests that perhaps Freire is referring to a certain kind of lecturing or teaching that presents a certain kind of information. Freire refers to a narration sickness that occurs when ‘the teacher talks about reality as if it were motionless, static, compartmentalized, and predictable. Or else he expounds on a topic completely alien to the existential experience of the students’ (Freire, 1970: 52). In this excerpt from Pedagogy of the Oppressed, it is important to note that Freire focuses on the kind of information or knowledge that is being shared with the students, the way it portrays the nature of knowledge as unchanging and, therefore, is not up for debate and is separate from human experience, rather than the pedagogy used to present it. To continue with the banking metaphor, Barnett (1994: 42) points out that what is missing from this ‘transaction’ is a change in the student, or even the knowledge being transformed in the mind of the student. In this sense, information is learned or memorized but not understood. However, this can happen in any method of teaching, not just in the lecture, suggesting that perhaps how knowledge is portrayed or thought of is more important than the method used to deliver it (Webster, 2015). For example, when reading an article for a seminar, students can read and accept it as truth or fact without engaging with and critiquing it (or even understanding it). The same can be said of engaging in collaborative learning with your peers. In all of these cases, students are thinking, just maybe not very well or actively (Webster, 2015).
Another aspect of all methods of instruction that Webster highlights in association with the banking model is the tendency for research and ideas being presented to students as finished products, without all the thinking, work and mistakes that go into them. At least the lecture, according to Webster (2015), gives the opportunity for educators to display their thought processes, and can be an opportunity for students to learn how to approach problems and topics that are open to challenge. Displaying thought processes also reiterates to students that knowledge is not wholly objective but, instead, something with a human element that can change and be challenged by others (Barnett, 1990). The description and justification that can come along with explaining a thought process also shows students that all knowledge is influenced by ideology and, therefore, is not neutral – it is being communicated by someone with either an implicit or explicit agenda in mind. Helping students grasp this is a good way to teach them to always have their critical awareness ‘turned on’ (Webster, 2015). This would put students in a position to listen to a lecture that does not involve receiving the ‘knowledge deposit’ passively without challenging and critiquing what the teacher is saying and, thus, potentially avoiding Freire’s concerns about the banking model of education. However, although this way of presenting the content of the course might show students that knowledge can be challenged, it avoids challenging the power dynamics in the classroom or lecture hall, a key aspect of critical pedagogy and a Freirean approach to education. Standing at the front of the class lecturing not only tells the students that the teacher is an expert and someone to be listened to, it also ignores the knowledge and experiences that the students bring with them to the class. This further separates the teacher and student, reinforcing a hierarchical relationship between the two.
Webster (2015) attempts to get around these limitations of the lecture by calling for it to be seen as a pedagogy of interruption. Looking at the unique features of the lecture that Webster has outlined through the lens of Biesta’s (2010: 90) pedagogy of interruption helps us see how lecturing could be a transformative experience for students, as it could provide an ‘encounter that might interrupt “normal” ways of being and might provoke a responsive and responsible response’. Biesta (2010: 80) sees the purpose of education as helping students to ‘come into presence’ through developing subjectivity in order to become more human, but without a predefined idea of what this means. Subjectivity or ‘subjectification’ is developed through encountering the Other and interrupting normal ways of being and seeing the world; this is a process that is ongoing and sporadic and naturally involves risk (Biesta, 2010). A pedagogy of interruption has to leave things open for interruption to occur, and is ‘a pedagogy committed to the possibility of interruption and perhaps also a pedagogy that itself will interrupt’ (Biesta, 2010: 91). However, Biesta’s (2010) pedagogy of interruption could go further by interrupting ways of learning and ways of being in the classroom through critical pedagogy. This could be done through various methods, such as asking the students to give a presentation or lecture to other students, negotiating the curriculum or acknowledging the expertise of students.
What makes critical pedagogy critical?
Even after reading Webster’s (2015) defence of the lecture, I am still hesitant to think that a lecture could ever be critical pedagogy. However, it offers us some interesting ideas about how to get to the root of what critical pedagogy might look like in the university; by eliminating what isn’t critical pedagogy perhaps we can better understand what is. To help explore this question further, I turned to Aronowitz and Giroux’s (1985) article Radical Educators and Transformative Intellectuals.
In their article, Aronowitz and Giroux (1985) identified four kinds of intellectuals: transformative, critical, accommodating and hegemonic. At the heart of their project was envisaging educators as intellectuals in order to highlight the idea that all human action involves thinking and reflection, and that all education is political and ideological. Although Aronowitz and Giroux (1985) admit that these are oversimplified and idealized characterizations of educators and are theoretical constructs, their categories are helpful because they highlight the relationship between ideology, social practice and education. They also draw attention to one of the key aims of critical pedagogy, which is to put theory into action for the purposes of social justice. Transformative intellectuals, therefore, strive to make the ‘pedagogical more political and the political more pedagogic’ (Aronowitz and Giroux, 1985: 56), which they accomplish by problematizing knowledge and modelling reflection and self-critique for students. Transformative intellectuals also make learning relevant to students so that they can ‘see themselves as social actors with … opportunities to engage in reflexive understanding of their own situation within the system of social relations’ (Aronowitz and Giroux, 1985: 56). Critical intellectuals, on the other hand, are critical of the social situation and the inequality of the status quo, yet remain apolitical or removed from social action in part to maintain distance from that which they study. According to Aronowitz and Giroux (1985), accommodating intellectuals generally perpetuate the status quo, but often without realizing that they are doing so. Hegemonic intellectuals, on the other hand, willingly and consciously perpetuate the status quo that typically benefits them and the dominant ‘ruling’ class they associate with.
The purpose of using Aronowitz and Giroux’s framework is not to pass judgement or categorize people, rather to use their conceptualizations of educators as intellectuals to better understand the practice of SICPs. Would the three SICPs involved in my study, according to Aronowitz and Giroux, be transformative or critical intellectuals? Furthermore, perhaps more importantly, would Aronowitz and Giroux consider both transformative and critical intellectuals to be engaged in critical pedagogy? According to Aronowitz and Giroux (1985: 56), transformative intellectuals make the political more pedagogical by ‘utilizing forms of pedagogy which treat students as agents, problematizes knowledge, and makes knowledge meaningful so as to make it critical in order to make it emancipatory’. Although they do not explicitly discuss the pedagogy of critical intellectuals in their article, Aronowitz and Giroux (1985: 57) do claim that critical intellectuals ‘do not see themselves as connected either to a specific social formation or as performing a general social function that is expressively political in nature’. Therefore, it seems that a critical intellectual would most likely not be engaged in critical pedagogical practice if they do not aim to be involved in making the ‘pedagogical more political’ (Aronowitz and Giroux, 1985: 56).
The participants in my study all identified as critical pedagogues and, yet, despite their critical beliefs, their method of instruction in the classroom was mostly in line with traditional methods of teaching (i.e. lecturing). However, Aronowitz and Giroux’s reasons for the incongruity between values and practice were that educators distanced themselves from their object of study or resisted the political and ideological nature of education. In the case of my participants, and as you can see from the data presented, this does not appear to be the reason for their inability to implement what might generally be thought of as critical pedagogy. In their case, it seems that the system they work within makes it difficult for them to put their critical beliefs about pedagogy into practice in the way they would like. Large class sizes, restrictive assessment practices and students accustomed to the banking model of education make it almost impossible to create spaces in which critical pedagogy can work. However, there still spaces to be found, and just because it is hard to locate them does not mean we should stop looking. As Arthur said, small-scale projects can offer hopeful examples to others who might want to use these approaches. Chris believes that by pushing at the boundaries of what universities find acceptable we can make more room for critical pedagogy, and we can spread the news to colleagues about how they too can push the boundaries.
Discussion and suggestion
The four intellectual classifications presented by Aronowitz and Giroux (1985) highlight the ideological and political nature of education, as all of them either fight against or perpetuate the status quo, whether this is apparent or not. This ties in with Webster’s (2015) assertion that it is essential for students to understand that knowledge is not unchangeable, and that ideology is always present in what they are learning. According to Webster, the human element of lecturing makes this clearer than reading from an article or viewing PowerPoint slides online. A seminar could do this even more by encouraging discussion between students from different countries or backgrounds, or by engaging in problem-based learning or research, moving towards a pedagogy of interruption (Biesta, 2010). In looking at the observations of and interviews with critical pedagogues, it can be seen how their lectures made the ‘pedagogical more political and the political more pedagogic’ (Aronowitz and Giroux, 1985: 56) by challenging ways of thinking about education, raising awareness about social and political change through activism, explaining ways of thinking and doing research, challenging the hierarchy in the classroom and allowing room for disagreement and interruption. All of these practices may help mediate the constraints of large class sizes and assessment regulations but, if they could, most of the SICPs would likely have taught their classes in a different way. Perhaps there is a better way to lecture, if this is unavoidable, which can make it more critical, by challenging ideas, presenting conflicting perspectives, portraying knowledge as changeable and context specific, and by encouraging students to engage in critical dialogues with their peers, but it still isn’t critical pedagogy. Instead, we should turn to more active learning approaches, such as Freire’s problem-posing education or staff–student partnership, which help to challenge the power imbalance between staff and students, putting critical ideas about power and knowledge into practice in the classroom. Perhaps by challenging the dynamic in the university classroom or lecture hall, we can leave space for ‘students to invest something of themselves in what it is they say or do’ (Barnett, 1990: 154). By moving from a lecture to a co-constructivist or critical pedagogy, we can transform students from passive, docile learners into ‘critical co-investigators in dialogue with the teacher’ (Freire, 1970: 62), which might help students challenge power dynamics elsewhere.
In order for SICPs and HE educators generally to teach the way they want, they need more control over what and how they teach, something that seems to be slipping out of reach with the increasing reliance on student satisfaction and the Teaching Excellence and Student Outcomes Framework. For example, in research on educators’ perceptions of effective teaching in HE, Carnell (2007) found that although most participants indicated a preference for co-constructivist pedagogies that relied on dialogue and a more equal power dynamic between teachers and students, performativity affected educators’ ability to teach effectively, and that this was, specifically, a disconnect between the expectations of students and those of teachers and how this played out in the classroom. This suggests that student expectations, and whether or not they are met, are becoming increasingly influential in dictating the practice of educators in HE, meaning that involving students in shaping their learning experience may be more important than ever before. By engaging students in critical dialogue about what they are learning, how it connects with their lived experience and how they can challenge taken-for-granted assumptions about knowledge and society, we position students as ‘critical’ consumers in HE who can use their voice to challenge and shape the way HE itself is approached.
Footnotes
Declaration of conflicting interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship and/or publication of this article.