Pedagogy of the Heart by Freire Paulo

Author:Freire, Paulo
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Bloomsbury UK

Seriousness and Happiness

There is much talk today, not only in Brazil, about education and citizenship. There is talk about fighting for democracy, about the active involvement of the popular classes in shaping the destiny of cities. I would like to make it clear that it is not possible to make Brazilian society more and more democratic without starting by attacking hunger, unemployment, the health crisis, and that of education. The solution to these problems implies redefining the role of the state, moving away from an economistic comprehension of development, and instituting an educational practice coherent with democratic values.

An educational practice must be instituted that proposes and takes advantages of situations where the learners may experience the power and the value of unity within diversity. It should do nothing to stimulate lack of solidarity and fellowship. It should do nothing that works against the development of serious discipline of body and mind, without which all efforts for knowledge fail. It must do everything to ensure an atmosphere in the classroom where teaching, learning, and studying are serious acts, but also ones that generate happiness. Only to an authoritarian mind can the act of educating be seen as a dull task. Democratic educators can only see the acts of teaching, of learning, of studying as serious, demanding tasks that not only generate satisfaction but are pleasurable in and of themselves.

The satisfaction with which they stand before the students, the confidence with which they speak, the openness with which they listen, and the justice with which they address the students’ problems make the democratic educator a model. Their authority is affirmed without disrespect of freedom. It is affirmed for this very reason. Because they respect freedom, they are respected. A democratic educator cannot allow his or her authority to become atrophied, for that would exacerbate the learners’ freedom. He or she cannot contradict himself or herself in favor of his or her authority, nor in favor of the learners’ freedom: neither authoritarianism nor permissiveness.

The power of a democratic educator lies in exemplary coherence; that is what sustains his or her authority. An educator who says one thing and does another is irresponsible, and not only ineffective but also harmful. He or she is more of a disservice than a coherent authoritarian.

An educator’s authoritarianism is not only manifested in the repressive use of authority, which restricts the movements of the learners. It is equally manifested in a number of opportunities, in his or her excessive vigilance over the learners, in his or her lack of respect for the learners’ creativity, and for his or her cultural identity. It is also manifested in his or her lack of acceptance of the popular-class learners’ way of being, the manner in which he or she warns the students and censures them. An educator’s authoritarianism is also manifested in his or her narrow understanding of the teach/learn equation, within which the learners are restricted to the mechanical memorization of what the educator deposits in them. That is the “banking educator,” as I termed him or her in Pedagogy of the Oppressed.

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