CRITICAL EDUCATION THEORY

PART 2: CONSTRUCTING A PEOPLE

©
2006
Tony Ward
No part of this document may be published or reproduced without the written
permission of the author
 CRITICAL EDUCATION
Critical Education Theory involves the application
of Critical Theory to educational theorizing. It
interrogates the composition of what is taught and the
way in which it is taught, viewing both as a medium
of social control. It includes:
Critical Pedagogy – the critical analysis and practice
of classroom practices, demonstrating how they are
shaped by, model and hence reproduce existing
structures of power (class, race, gender etc.).
Hidden Curriculum - the way in which informal
behaviours and structures in the classroom bring
about subliminal learning of patterns of social control
(passivity, fear of authority, competition, hierarchy,
control of body functions etc.)
Curriculum Studies (what is able to be taught and
who controls the process by which this particular
form of knowledge is chosen amongst all others
(legitimation), It views the imposition of a National
Curriculum, for instance, as a means of erasing
cultural difference and silencing minority voices. The
power to determine what is valid knowledge
corresponds closely with differences in cultural power
and class. The Universities play a major role in the
naming of legitimate forms of knowledge and are key
instruments in ensuring that the beliefs and ideology
of the elite in society hold sway.
 EDUCATION - THE HIDDEN
CURRICULUM
School is one of the main places where children are taught to conform to social meanings and values. The mythology about
school which we teachers all buy into, is that Education is about realising the potential of the individual and creating a life for
them of more social and economic freedom. Critical Theory suggests that this is a socially constructed mythology, and that one
of the main functions of education is to create the conditions for social control, cheap labour and passive populace that can be
easily exploited. Seen from this perspective, Education is about the opposite of freedom. The ability of schools to engender
conformity and passivity in their students stems not so much from the curriculum content, but from what is termed the hidden
curriculum - that is, the informal regimes of discipline, timetabling and systems of social order (sitting in rows facing the
(powerful) teacher, same age companions, timetabled toilet breaks, prohibitions on unauthorised speech etc) that establish an
acceptance of external authority rather than personal rangatiratanga or personal sovereignty. By such means is the meaning of
key concepts such as “Freedom” constructed.
 THE BANKING CONCEPT
A critical understanding of Education really begins
with the Brazilian educator Paulo Freire‘s notion of
the Banking Concept of education where the teacher
starts from the belief that the students have empty
heads that must be filled up, like bank accounts, with
knowledge. Freire maintains that this generally
accepted position does violence to the students‘ own
capacity for critical enquiry, their creativity and their
learning. It presumes, for instance, that there is only
one kind of “right” knowledge - thus denying the
experience of the learner. It presumes the right and
power of the teacher to “name the world”.

The banking system is based upon the establishment

and maintenance of power relationships in the
classroom. It‘s underlying purpose is the
maintenance of the power status quo and the
continues oppression and dominance of the poor,
disempowered and oppressed. Education requires
the free flow rather than the imposition of ideas.
This suggests dialogical model, Freire promoted
education as a dialogical relationship between
learners. Teaching, in his estimation was
oppression..
 NAMING/LEGITIMATING
All the concepts, theories and meanings
that shape our lives are socially
constructed. This is to say that ideas and
things don’t have meanings in and of
themselves but only those meanings that
are given or ascribed. The power to give
meaning - to name - is one of the most
powerful powers that exists because it
shapes all of our views and beliefs about
the nature of the world. This power, the
power to name is not evenly distributed
across society. Some individuals or
organisations have almost all of the power,
which they exercise through Education, the
Media, the Law, and so forth. Education is
a very powerful agency in the social
construction of meaning. A related power
to naming is the power to legitimate.

Of all the knowledge available in the world, only a small proportion is viewed as significantly valuable to society and culture to be
included in curricula, published, displayed in museums and galleries etc. A great deal of knowledge is excluded from this kind of
public recognition. Knowledge that is included is said to have been legitimated. Usually, Universities play a key role in the process
of knowledge legitimation, because they have been able to establish an erroneous reputation for being ideologically-free. But the
power of naming and legitimating is inherent in the entire educational system, and is most noticeable in the area of curriculum. The
power to determine what goes into an educational curriculum and what is left out is enormous. Those aspects of knowledge that are
left out or remain unspoken or unvoiced become invisible in society at large. It is as though they do not exist.
 SCHOOL, ORDER AND POWER
The Hidden Curriculum can be defined as those collective elements of school life
which are ordered and shaped to achieve and establish a hierarchical and competitive
social order in the learning environment. This is done by organising both time and
space to achieve the acceptance of an established and authoritative power. Classes are
divided into subjects, each with its own specific time slot. Rest breaks are imposed
upon natural bodily functions and in primary and secondary education permission is GRADE SCHOOL
required to ignore these. Spatially, classes are arranged on a same-age (and often same-
gender) basis, organised in rows, with the teacher in a position of focused authority and
with students having co compete to be heard. Undergraduate university education is
characterised by the Lecture - an extension of the grade-school system. It is only at
Graduate level, where the student has already demonstrated an acceptance of the
discipline, that a semblance of pedagogical equality is allowed, although the teacher
remains in a position of control.All of this contrasts dramatically with the pedagogical
space of many indigenous peoples, characterised primarily with the talking circle, in LECTURE THEATRE
which discussion takes place rotationally, each person speaking in turn, and with rules
against interruption. Here, learning is accretive - that is, everyone contributes to the
learning experience by building upon the group. experience

In the talking circle, there is no authority, no

hierarchy and no competition. Each person,
holding the “taking stick” may speak, in turn,
for as long as they with, uninterrupted. In
Lakota culture, it is customary for four circuits
of discussion to take place.
TALKING CIRCLE UNIVERSITY SEMINAR
 CRITICISM / HUMILIATION
One of the consequences of Alienation is that individuals feel Peggy says that four may be divided into the
increasingly isolated and less able to control the circumstances that numerator and the denominator... Boris’ failure
shape their lives. Critiques of this situation which might otherwise result made it possible for Peggy to succeed; his misery is
in systemic change then become reduced to criticisms of individuals or the occasion for her rejoicing. It is a standard
their actions - seldom delving beneath the surface appearances of condition of the contemporary American elementary
oppression to find the underlying socio-economic structure that is the school. To a Zuni, Hopi or D(L)Lakota Indian,
cause. In a sense, the reduction of identity to simple individualism Peggy’s performance would seem cruel beyond
brought about by what Marx has called the social relations of belief, for competition, the wringing out of success
production is inevitable. Individuals as individuals are only able to see from somebody's failure, is a form of torture foreign
the social problems in which they find themselves in terms of individual to those non-competitive cultures.”
actions. Similarly, their own responses are those shaped by their own
individualism. Criticism becomes personal, non-systemic and The role of public shaming plays a crucial role in the
deteriorates into blaming. All of which is inimical to truly creative Hidden Curriculum, ensuring that the power of the
activity. There may be no such thing as constructive criticism. teacher / authority (and by implication The State)
Education rather operates on the basis of instilled fear. remains dominant.

Sociologist Jules Henry tells the story of his experience in a primary

school for Lakota children. The teacher asked Boris, a small boy to
reduce 12/16 to its lowest terms. When he had difficulty, she shamed him
by asking him the “think”. “Much heaving up and down and waving of
hands by the other students, all frantic to correct him. Boris pretty
unhappy, probably mentally paralysed. The teacher quiet, patient, ignores
the others and concentrates with look and voice on Boris. After a minute
or two, she turns to the class and says, “Well, who can tell Boris what the
number is?” A forest of hands appears, and the teacher calls Peggy.
 CONSTRUCTING PASSIVITY
The child learns early not to question authority, and by
the time he or she has graduated, they have been
shaped into compliant citizens, willing to accept
whatever the State decides. As individuals it is very
difficult to resist authority or to make changes happen.
One of the reasons for the promotion of individualism
is to create a sense of hopelessness in the face of
(usually faceless) power. By creating the conditions for
passive acceptance of “the way things are” those who
wield power do not need to resort to force to achieve
their aims - the reproduction and augmentation of their
own power over others for their own economic gain. In
this sense, the State operates as the partner of business
in creating the conditions for profitable development.
Schools play a crucial role in engendering a sense of
passivity in the face of power. In school, resistance to
the authority of the teacher is useless, and the child
learns early that the faceless system cannot be easily
faced-down. For the schoolchild, there are no
appropriate avenues of complaint without the danger
of being labeled a “trouble-maker”, a “malcontent” or
a “problem child”. One learns early to keep one’s head
down and to stay quiet.
 CONSTRUCTING HIERARCHY
As we have seen, one of the chief functions of Education is to create
a fear and awe of and a respect for authority. It teaches us not to
question authority
•Where does it come from?
•Who possesses it?
•How did they acquire it?
•Can it be taken away?
•Who bestows it?
•How did they get that power?

Schools teach us to obey authority, never to question it, and always

to accept it. It is on the basis of this unquestioning acceptance of
authority that all hierarchical social structures in our everyday life
are shaped. One of the key elements of critical education theory is
the belief that this school-based acceptance of authority is designed
to produce compliant workers for the capitalist job market. Critical
Theory always asks the question who stands to benefit from such an
arrangement? Invariably, the answer is: those already with or in
authority.
Although it is true that “horizontal” management structures have
become recently more popular and accepted, the underlying power
structure of capitalism remains hierarchical. Knowing one’s place
and “not rocking the boat” are the key ingredients of maintaining the
power status quo
 CONSTRUCTING COMPETITION

Schools promote competition. We are told that the competitive spirit is good. We speak of the survival of the fittest as though it
were some natural law applying to all human relations. Competition is actually corrosive. The concept of healthy competition is
an oxymoron. Competition always results in someone feeling bad, in losing or diminishing their spirit and dignity. Most
indigenous peoples have very strict tapu around competition because it can be so dangerous to good social relations. Competition
under capitalism is intended to promote a strong sense of individualism. This in turn, separates the person from their social
environment and makes them easier to manipulate. The capitalist system of production relies upon workers behaving as
individuals rather than collectively. Note that while there are many systems in schools which promote a love of competition,
there are few that successfully promote a love of co-operation.
 CONSTRUCTING INDIVIDUALS
In Western philosophy, the individual has usually been
taken to be the irreducible element of identity. It has also
been taken in economic theorizing, as being the indivisible
element of ownership and of wage-labour. These two
understandings are not unrelated. In broader terms,
individualism refers to the ideology, prevalent in western
society, that achievement of and by the individual is the
paramount value in social relations. This ideology stands in
stark contrast to the beliefs in pre-colonial or indigenous
societies in which the well-being and success of the social
collective operates integrally with the well-being of the
individual, Such views call into question the western
concept of progress in a world that is experiencing global
warming, potential environmental, social and economic
catastrophe.
Furthermore, the irony, that is pointed out by Ralph
Steadman (top right) in which everyone becomes identical
in their competitive striving to be different should not be
overlooked.
EXAM TIME

It suggests that education functions to ensure that the meanings of identity, competition and success are socially controlled to
pervert the emergence of unique critical thought and of collective creativity. In school, copying is the worst offense, despite the
fact that imitation is the primary means by which children learn. Collective work is actively discouraged because it supposedly
inhibits the development of individualism, and because the results of collective creativity are difficult to measure in
individualistic terms. Despite all of this, collective creativity can point to startling successes - as, for instance in the highly
successful Americas Cup campaign of 1999-2000.
 CONSTRUCTING OWNERSHIP
One of the main purposes of the Law in Western
society is to establish, maintain and police
regimes of private property, and ownership. The
concept of private property is very recent,
developed in its present form only in the 16th
Century. In pre-capitalist societies the property
was conceived rather as collective guardianship.
For the ideology of capitalism to triumph it was
necessary to destroy this prior conception, and
this was one oc the main thrusts of colonisation.
One of the primary ways in which the dominant
culture maintains its hegemony is through the
control of space. It does this by linking together
concepts of individualism with concepts of
exclusive use and legalises the resulting interface
as ownership. Initially, the issue of space was not
taken seriously from a Marxist point of view.
Time, not space was the predominant variable in
Marxist analysis.

This was because Marx believed that the exchange value of workers’ time in the production process was the most important
significant factor in the creation of different classes. Increasingly, it has been recognised that the appropriation and creation
of space has been a powerful factor in colonisation and in the creation of surplus value. Traditionally, the Church and the
Legal profession have been its primary proponents.
 CONSTRUCTING HISTORY
We like to imagine that with the advent of Postcolonialism, the
kinds of abuses common through colonisation have ceased to
exist. Yet even in the 1950s, the Maori village at Orakei was
burned to the ground and its people displaced because it was
considered an “eyesore” on the route of the motorcade for the
newly crowned Queen Elizabeth II (right). It would be another 25
years, and after much protest and struggle that Ngati Whatua
would have their Claim heard by the Waitangi Tribunal and would
achieve some sort of redress and apology. Their occupation of
Bastian Point demonstrated the power of the State when it’s
hegemony fails. The police and Army were called in to quell the
occupation and to evict the occupiers (below). The hegemony of
the dominant culture always rests ultimately in the use of force
when all else fails.
This is why Civil Disobedience and direct action against the Law,
the State invariably succeeds, and why it is feared so much by the
dominant culture - it reveals that force rather than moral rectitude is
the basis of their power. One of the chief weapons used by the State
in its relentless quest for cultural control is the naming and shaping
of History. It has been said that “History is always written by the
victors”. It is used not only to give a particular version of past
events, but also to make sure that what really happened does not
impact upon the present and the future. As George Orwell noted:
““Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present
controls the past”. To name the present time as “Postcolonial” is to
mask the colonisation that continues and shapes the future.