Aug 18 (Sa), 2012 Reflection - one of my homeworks as a grad student at University of Minnesota at Twin Cities, 2008

                      Introduction
“Justice will not be served until those who are unaffected are as outraged as those who are."  -- Ben Franklin

            This paper is a reflection on what I have learned from the various types of critical theory and applications studied and discussed in our class.  Such a reflective process enhances my pedagogical  consciousness and conscience in my daily practice as an instructor/educator. In addition to my reflection, I also  used this writing opportunity to inspect my own dilemmas addressed in one of early one-page writings regarding Kliebard’s “The Struggle for the American curriculum, 1893-1958”.  The question was “How have you seen the four major forces Kliebard identified playing out in your personal and professional lives?”  My answers were “Thus far, my 10 years’ teaching experience in the U.S. has been a mental struggle between a die-hard social meliorist and social efficientist… Honestly speaking, having been teaching in a 2-year “technical” college for 5 years, my tons of dilemmas between being a culprit of capitalist instructor and conscientious facilitator for the typical low-income students challenges my mental soundness on daily basis.”  Thus, this paper presented two levels of investigations: at the individual level, it harvested what stimulated and inspired me to move on, and the other one looked into a contextual level to examine the “unknowability” (Kumashiro, 2002) or uncertainties of what students learn as well as the pedagogy under specific type of educational settings.

                                                   
                                                         Two Tales of This Paper

At the individual level – my reflection of what I have learned thus far
           Alluding to critical pedagogy as an enhancer, I brought together approaches discussed in our classroom to help decode the  pedagogical enigma- the juggling between a repressive capitalist-culprit instructor and an anti-oppressive educator. 

           Scholars, researchers or activists who have inclination toward critical pedagogy tend to seek more basic change in society.  Radicals penetrate into the basic flaws in society that are responsible for various types of oppression and malfunctions of society.  For example, for the Marxists, the basic flaw is the capitalist economic system that creates social classes and various types of artificial social hierarchies and oppression as addressed in Freire’s (1993) Pedagogy of the Oppressed; for the radical feminists as discussed in Davies’ the Shards of Glass (1993) - the conventionally oppressing “spoken-to-existence” of gendered dichotomy and repressive social institutions such as family/marriage “can be speaking and  ‘be slaughtered’ out of existence, played with, disrupted, or used to manufacture new revolutionary potentials (p.198); and Kumashiro’s (2002) tangible knowledge that examines multiple ways of reading activism and its pedagogical role to engage in social change.   To me, radical/critical ideals and practices, in their symbolism like revolution, transformation, challenging status quo, anti-oppression, and social change…etc. are energizing, stimulating, and inspiring that fill me with optimism to wade through the educational battlefields.
Having sociology as one of my academic disciplines, it is hard not to declare that the transformative ends of education need to be attained by the forcible overthrow of all existing safe / repetitive normalcy and oppressive practices. However, the rational approach also comes into play because social change does not come easily. For the solutions to transform society entails radical changes of our society’s everlasting institutions.  Having said that does not mean it will discredit the desirability of the transformative dynamics. Some insist that it begins with economy, and others, education, but which one comes first, or simultaneously?  I will detail this point in the later section.

           In the educational realm, the conscientious one desperately decries- let the educational oppressive classes tremble at Freire’s Pedagogy of the oppressed and launch toward the dialogical revolution!  On the other hand, we might be pondering a critical issue: do we really have nothing to lose but the institutionally repressive chains??  Do educators or knowledge workers unite, and there is a world to win or one has to work it out like the educational Rambo- Erin Gruwell’s hard-earned heroic victory?
           Dan Lortie (1975) maintains that the easy entry of recruitment in addition to the individualistic socialization process supports the conservative sentiments permeating in the K-12  (and 13-14 too. Detailed later) educational settings. He argues “…to see recruitment into teaching as leading to reaffirmation than as leading to challenge to the past…in teaching it tips toward continuity rather than change to sustain stability” (p.54).  Though such investigations observed by Lortie more than three decades ago, they still portrait current practices vividly.   In my episodic observations from the small group discussions, I heard off both the revelations from the tough and the enlightened:  “I never know all these radical theories and practices all my life as a teacher until now, but that doesn’t mean that I am not a good teacher”; “ After this class, I started feeling upset and hating those oppressive people and their practices…”;   “Those curriculum approaches (refer to Freire, Kumashiro, McCarthy and Dimitriadis in particular) are very unconventional, how can you practice them in your class?”  “Why everything is binary? There are much more important things (inferring the taking care of the majority of students than spending time on focusing on minority issues)  teach and discuss than that…The author’s writing style is really cursive /incomprehensible!” (refer to Browyn Davies’); “ O.K…. I am from the dominant group, I also feel oppressed too; and I am trying very hard to understand Other’s experiences, but there always is a gap hanging there!” and so on so forth. Yes, there are much more questions and skepticism than answers and doability.  

              Though the doors lead to change is narrow, critical activists, researchers, and practitioners devote great deals to such a cause that inspires me to keep on going.  In practicality, Davies (1993) proposes a workable definition of agency with a combination of the ability to recognize the constitutive power of discourse; the ability to catch discourse/structure/practice in the pact of shaping desire, perception, knowledge; and engagement  in a  collective possess of re-naming, re-writing, re-positioning oneself in relation to coercive structures (p.199).  Freire (1993) suggested the dialogical actions of cooperation, unity of liberation, organization, and cultural synthesis to generate positive conditions for freedom to resuscitate the awareness of human creative possibilities and scaffold people’s freedom of expression, effective participation in power.  He also reminded us of the confronting ideology of domination and alienation with class struggle to fight against the false consciousness. Kumashiro (2002) maintains that education is critical of privileging and othering.  He suggests that educators and students need to examine not only how some groups and identities are Othered in society, but also how some groups are privileging, as well as how this dual processes legitimized and maintained by social structure and competing ideologies (p.44).  With the above individual’s venturing perspectives in mind and in actions, change can be done as the saying goes, “The thousand miles’ journey starts right from every individual’s first foot step”.   In addition to the individual level’s endeavors, the next section will examine the overarching forces permeating in the educational system from my personal observations.

The Contextual Level of Investigation

            In Freedom Writers, the viewers could identify the extraordinary individual endeavors to overcome obstacles beyond ordinary people’s control. During the group discussion, I raised a question “In Erin Grewell’s case, why does a system impose the toughest tasks to a young student teacher under one of most formidable conditions (contrast to the senior teachers who have the privilege to teach the “good /honor or “easy” students)? Is it a testimonial to prove Social Darwinism- the strongest the fittest- like Rambo, Erin, or it goes with the cliché “for those who can, do; those who cannot, teach?” 

          With the understanding of the contextual issues that play significant role in teaching and learning, now I am returning to my predicaments mentioned in the introduction. The conundrum confounding the individuals’ efforts, in my case (and many instructors/educators having the similar conditions to mine) is situated in the specific educational conditions, which have to call upon system approach as well to confront such a challenge.

            Having been serving as a social science instructor/educator in the non-liberal art type of educational settings, my daily struggle between a die-hard social meliorist and social efficientist schizophrenically challenges my mental state. It takes a deeper look into a larger picture to see through. To understand part of my pedagogical quandaries, a brief educational context is delineated as follows.
           Very different from my first teaching experience as a TA in the Art Department of a 4-year liberal art school (Wayne State College), the last two educational settings, a 4-year college, University of Wisconsin-Stout, and the current one, a 2-year technical college in Chippewa Valley, Eau Claire, Wisconsin, challenge me constantly as a social science instructor/educator.  One of the challenges comes from the nature of both schools’ historical developments, which lead to the utilitarian mission imperative.  UW-Stout, founded in 1891 as a Manual Training School, was based on the pragmatism of “social utility”. Such philosophy[1] and strategy echoed the industrialization, new immigrants, structural expansion due to G. I. Bills, changing constituencies, diversity needs that evolved into today’s professional career-oriented mission as a priori. Thus, from its inception, the utilitarianism laid out the foundation of its educational practices.  Liberal art education, such as Social Science which I belonged to, does not have its own degree program, but functioning as a supporting learning to the main protagonists – the vocational (or career) degree programs. A couple of proposals to establish Social Science degree program were killed in the college wide contesting. Focusing on social utility functions as mission statement, yes, one could euphemize it by tying to Dewey’s “learning by doing” educational philosophy, if it is genuinely progressive in practicing experiential pedagogy.

             As to Chippewa Valley Technical College, it is one of the 16 tech schools in the Wisconsin Technical College System. Wisconsin was the first state to establish a system of state support for vocational, technical and adult education (Chapter 616, Laws of 1911).  In the past 2 decades, the system has increased its focus on lifelong learning; education for economic development; and services for groups that formerly had less access to education, including people in rural areas, women and minorities. Special emphasis has been given to assisting the unemployed, displaced homemakers and those with literacy problems.
             Serving the regional needs, in particular, training the desirable job skills, working ethics, good citizens to feed the workforce demands is the major mission statement of the both schools that I served/have been teaching.  Inside the system, the visible as invisible discord between hands-on (vocational programs) vs. minds-on (liberal art or general education programs) is a constant undercurrent that school seeks to reconcile by advocating the integration of the two.  But once in a while, you hear off that liberal art/general education is parasitical on the vocational programs, or the degree program creating working robots without critical thinking skills…etc.

            The demographics of students attending the technical college are quite different from those of the typical liberal art university.  Generally speaking, they are low-income, high school dropouts, first generation attending a 2-year college, displaced workers due to the corporate downsizing and outsourcing, learners from malfunctioning families or communities and so on.  This is the student populations that I am working for and with on daily basis. The climate is very different from that of National Taiwan University, UW-Madison, University of Minnesota, the Ivy League Schools, and the like.

            Due to space limit, I used a couple of small episodes from my sociology classes to examine the critical thinking capacity. The consciousness raising tends to be more successful in responding to the awareness of, such as, the endangered species or the polluted environments in the U.S. But in terms of global stratification/inequality regarding race/ethnicity, gender, social class, sexuality and other socially constructed categories were less successful. (I remembered in discussing racial issues in the U.S. in one of my classes, a student argued that we did not have racial problems here - Wisconsin. And her ancestors were not slave owners, thus affirmative action was truly against the White and privileged the minority – this episode was from UW-Stout when I taught there).  One of the reasons as Davies’ points out (1993)  that we are always vulnerable to the discourses through which is spoken and speaks itself into existence (p.21). The unexamined baggage students carry into classrooms reflecting the “the normalcy of individuality”- a tendency to blame the poor and the victims/failure instead of social stratification and corporate hegemony due to the mass bought  the spoken-into existence of the dominant ideologies.  Same as in debating and discussing “Homestead Strike” and “Roger and Me”, one striking comment from half of the students was that workers should have looked for other jobs- because this is a land of “Freedom” to “choose”; no one tied you up at Homestead or Flint!  Students can see the needle in the haystack (blaming individuals), but ignore the elephant in the room (ideologically constructed social structures)!!

           Thus it might be easier to call for a green action to save endangered species and conservation than foster critical reflection on individuals’ participating in their own oppressive processes. Having said that one still have to encounter other disciplines or degree programs’ mission statements, which support or are sponsored by capitalistic ideology.  For example the refrain consumption would against, say, the Marketing, International Business, or Business Management programs’ advocacy.  In an occasion, I picked up a handout of a business class in which the contents was pro-“globalization processes” and applauded the logics of growth.  And for the over-consumption as students interpreted it: a way to express patriotism. Nevertheless, the above anecdotes might reflect my selective attention, thus are subject to my personal bias.
            I have a little bit envy of Kumashiro’s endeavors that he seems able to arouse students’ sense of  “crisis”  (it did happen in our class too, but I am curious of the demographic characteristics of his students!) when they are confronting the discomfort ideas or practice that are not part of their learning experiences. In my classes, such  precious “crisis” moments do not surface very often.  Like many other instructors/educators, the classroom managements would overshadow the managing of generating critical ideas (Schulman, 1987) in the technical college settings.  Hopefully you won’t consider the following common scenes are excuses for not being an Erin type of educator: Absenteeism, illness (in particular, single parent student’s children), family affairs (lots of family problems in low-income households spilling over into other spheres of students’ lives), transpiration problems, finance stress, jail time and all kinds of adult problems come into play in the daily classroom dramas.

            When economic stress, such as being unemployed, being laid off, dealing with nickel-and-dimed temp job, or living on welfare is haunting majority of students, the notions of liberation of gender, emancipation of race/ethnicity, and restructuring the  social class, tolerating/accepting the different sexual identities and so on are not easy to get into students’ mindsets.

            This semester, I expanded a mini-carnivalesque approach in my Psychology of Human Relations class - all male, blue collar, “emotionally reserved” students mainly major in heavy duty hands-on vocational programs.  Lots of music, exotic foods, snacks, multimedia presentations (you tube, movies, documentary, ppt), story telling, students’ role-playing as my teachers…etc. is the only pedagogy that I can think of to engage with this type of class genre that I have never taught before.  Kumashiro mentions the notion of unknowability referring to teachers who are not sure what students really learn, or act.  Hopefully, such activities could lead to Britzman’s argument that learning involves in unlearning of what they believed as norms in their gender/family and community relationship, their notion of patriotism, the religiosity, and the invisible oppressive capitalism that they  (and I too, when I showed my iron fist to command the authoritarianism on their punctuality, obedience, politeness, learning to be employable workers and marriageable men/fathers, and good law-abiding citizens…etc.  See how much I contribute to the capitalist education! ) participate in and contribute to.

                                                                       Conclusion

            I am wondering how many educators/practitioners expect or feel satisfied to teach so-called “no-problem, good, honor students” in the K-14 setting?  For me, I got the chances to teach two high schools and two colleges in Taipei a while ago.  Three of them were academic successful schools with “good, obedient, polite” students. But so far, my best memory and my most self-aggrandized pride came not from the good schools but the one that people recommended me not to go.  It was that very “dreadful” high school privileged me how to be a good educator!

         At my current workplace, in a typical face to face Sociology class, usually 10 to 15 percent of students in an average class size of 25 can/will engage in the critically reflective processes:  discomfort, crisis/paralysis, upsetting, and then work through the crisis before being able to act.  This small group of students having and enjoying the  “luxury” as well as “privilege” to decode the enigma of “Justice will not be served until those who are unaffected are as outraged as those who are" tend to be from healthier family background or at a more mature mental state that make the critical pedagogy shine! School contexts matter, so as social class!  In a nut shell, my belief to work against both visible and invisible oppression takes dual levels of endeavors. One is focusing on system (such as Bronfonbrenner’s) approach to engage in organizational/institutional criticism on the structural and ideological hegemony.  The other one is relying on individuals’ endeavors to take on the role of change agents/activists as well as guard against one’s own contributions to the oppressive processes.

          Being a multiple-conscious instructor/educator, I realized that I am much more privileged than unprivileged.  So, this is my confession as a social science instructor (hopefully, someday, I can self-promote into an activist educator) who struggles between a die-hard social meliorist and social efficientist; a teacher and learner who is able to reflect the privileges she possesses in serving as a culprit of a capitalist educational system without losing the conscience of being an anti-oppressive “pedagogue” to engage with the less fortunate students one “class” at a time.

         Finally, and most importantly is that I truly appreciated the onsite pedagogical modeling, such as the design of the course readings, the energy, engagements, and the multiple dimensional encouragements, the diverse pedagogy (some examples such as, unknowabilities of pleasantly pressured surprises- e.g., tackling the impossible tasks, brainstorming the onsite spontaneous writing and sharing, debating, big/small discussing, mutual paper critiquing, and group project collaborating to name a few).  I experienced the pedagogy of humanist, social melorist (mostly), social efficiency, and some developmentalist approaches integrated well in such a short period of time!

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[1] Such philosophy contesting the traditional liberal art education could be traced back to the Yale report in the 19^th century. The disciplinary theory of liberal educations supported the following ideals:

(1)Keep away occupational studies from curriculum: occupations could best be learned through practice in the counting room, the workshop, and on the farm. To preserve room for literary and scientific studies as students might never have time or opportunity again to pursue in the course of a busy practical life; (2)The college might not offer training peculiar to specific occupations, it would provide the broad theoretical foundation logically prior for them all; (3) Liberal education emphasized to cultivate the whole man, the all-around man.-symmetrical and complete.

(4) Specialization would produce only a fraction of a man.  To avoid narrowness liberal was to attend to  round men out physically, morally and intellectually; (5) Finally, liberal arts cultivate imagination, length perspective, sober judgment, and refine taste at the  same time it gave life direction and purpose; while supporting the utilitarianism was much the themes of Stout’s development:

(1) The tradition of liberal education inherited from abroad was aristocratic; (2)  In the latter part of 19th century, undergraduates  reacted much more readily where they could see the  instrumental values of their studies; (3) Utilitarian studies could releases student energies more spontaneous; and 

(4) The Land Grant Morrill Act of 1862 played an important role in stimulate the growth of technological education (agricultural and mechanical  fields). E.g., Harvard, Yale, Cornell, and “Wisconsin idea” of being public- service institution 

(Notes from Dr. D. Lewis’ course readnigns).