Learning Freedom: The Pedagogical Potential of Crisis

Abstract:

... climate crisis, environmental crisis, AIDS crisis, food crisis, humanitarian crises, refugee crisis, crisis of the subject, crisis of truth, crisis of representation, crisis of evidence, inner-city crisis, rural crisis, personal crisis, currency crisis, constitutional crisis, energy crisis, mid-life crisis, crisis of faith, civilization crisis, urban crisis, financial crisis, intelligibility crisis, housing crisis, education crisis...

"Ring the bells that still can ring / Forget your perfect offering / There is a crack in everything / That's how the Light gets in." ~ Leonard Cohen

A keyword search of the York University library catalogue for “crisis” returned 9,531 hits. A keyword search for “crisis AND education” returned 596 hits. Alternatively, a keyword search for “hope” returned 5,748 hits and “hope AND education” returned 460 hits. Records of crisis outnumber hope by nearly a 2:1 ratio (9,531: 5,748). However, when paired with education, the crisis: hope frequency ratio diminishes to 1.2:1. Paulo Freire (2008) claims that “hope is an ontological need” and that “we need critical hope the way a fish needs unpolluted water” (p. 2). Crisis and critical are both etymologically derived from the Greek word krinein which means “able to discern” (OED, 2010). In this paper, I ask if there is something that education provides learners in its structure and processes that mitigates crisis and supports “hope grounded in practice” (Freire, 2008, ibid.). I respond to the question, “given compelling evidence of an ecological, sustainability crisis, how might education(s) respond?” by asking, more generally, what opportunities and challenges crises, when recognized as pedagogical, offer education. I focus on crisis generally, instead of the “ecological crisis” specifically, because I believe that strategies for learning from and through the latter may be productively applied to former. Moreover, I contend that they are produced within similar power- structures. For this reason, I focus on public as opposed to private crises. The paper is divided into three sections. First, I define “crisis” and examine how it is pedagogical. Next, I consider the challenges and barriers to learning through crisis. Third, I develop the opportunities crises offer education and finally, I conclude with suggestions that might support the potential for transformative learning from and through crises and considerations of why such learning is desirable.

source: http://www.web.cemus.se/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/Learning-Freedom-The-Pedagogical-Potential-of-Crisis-1.pdf