Paulo Freire and Multilingual Education Theoretical Approaches, Methodologies, and Empirical Analyses in Language and (Taylor Francis Group)

Prévia do material em texto

PAULO FREIRE AND 
MULTILINGUAL EDUCATION
This collection celebrates the work of Paulo Freire by assembling transnational 
perspectives on Freirean-based educational models that reconsider and reimagine 
language and literacy instruction, especially for multilingual learners. Offering 
an international and comparative overview of Freire’s theories and critical peda-
gogies in relation to multilingualism, this volume presents innovative analyses 
and applications of theories and methods and features case studies in public 
schools, after-school and community literacy programs, and grassroots activism. 
Part I features chapters that expand on Freire’s concepts and ideas, including 
critical literacies, critical consciousness, and liberatory teaching principles. Part 
II features chapters that discuss empirical analyses from applied research studies 
that draw from these philosophical concepts, making important connections to 
key topics on supporting students, curriculum development, and teaching.
Ideal for students and scholars in language education, bilingual/multilingual 
methods, and sociology of education, the volume informs teacher knowledge 
and practice. In offering alternative paradigms to our dominant, homogenized 
monolingual status quo, the chapters present a shared vision of what multilin-
gual literacy can offer students and how it can transform educational spaces into 
sites of imagination, creativity, and hope.
Sandro R. Barros is Assistant Professor in the Department of Teacher Education 
at Michigan State University, USA.
Luciana C. de Oliveira is Associate Dean for Academic Affairs and Graduate 
Studies and a Professor in the School of Education at Virginia Commonwealth 
University, USA.
http://taylorandfrancis.com
Edited by Sandro R. Barros and 
Luciana C. de Oliveira
PAULO FREIRE AND 
MULTILINGUAL 
EDUCATION
Theoretical Approaches, 
Methodologies, and Empirical 
Analyses in Language and Literacy
Cover image: © Liliana Duque Piñeiro, “Freirean Circles.”
First published 2022
by Routledge
605 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10158
and by Routledge
4 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon, OX14 4RN
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
© 2022 selection and editorial matter, Sandro R. Barros and Luciana C. de 
Oliveira; individual chapters, the contributors
The right of Sandro R. Barros and Luciana C. de Oliveira to be identified 
as the authors of the editorial material, and of the authors for their 
individual chapters, has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 
78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or 
utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now 
known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in 
any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing 
from the publishers.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or 
registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation 
without intent to infringe.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
A catalog record for this title has been requested
ISBN: 978-1-032-00791-5 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-0-367-77355-7 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-1-003-17572-8 (ebk)
DOI: 10.4324/9781003175728
Typeset in Bembo
by KnowledgeWorks Global Ltd.
https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003175728
CONTENTS
List of Figures viii
Editors’ Biographies ix
Contributors’ Biographies x
Foreword: “The People” Lost in Translation xvii
Samuel D. Rocha
 1 From Angicos to the World: Paulo Freire and the Task 
of Emancipatory Multilingual Education 1
Sandro R. Barros and Luciana C. de Oliveira
PART I
Theoretical and Methodological Approaches 25
 2 Critical Biliteracies: The Mutually Reinforcing Endeavors 
of Freirean Criticality and Bilingualism 27
Chris K. Chang-Bacon and Soria E. Colomer
 3 The Critical Space Between: Weaving Freirean and 
Sociocultural Pedagogies 42
Brandon J. Sherman and Annela Teemant
 4 Transforming Privilege: The Four R’s of Pedagogical 
Possibilities 59
Adam Howard, Patrick Dickert, Wallace Tucker, and Sam Jefferson
 5 Reading the World and Conscientização: Teaching About 
Multilingualism for Social Justice for Multilingual Learners 75
Heather Linville
vi Contents
PART II
Empirical Analyses 89
 6 Involvement and Authenticity: Transforming Literacy 
Curricula for Marshallese Students through 
Community-Based Writing Projects 91
Anny Fritzen Case, Marcy Ray Dodd, and Gina Mikel Petrie
 7 Learning English as an Additional Language from 
Children’s Points of View in a Public School in Brazil: 
A Freirean Perspective 110
Andrea da Silva Marques Ribeiro and Jessica F. Cruz
 8 Critical Educulturalism in the Borderlands: Exploring Social 
Positionality and the Dialogic Processes of Culture Circles 127
Kelly Metz-Matthews and Michele McConnell
 9 Kindergarteners as Co-Constructors of an Equitable Learning 
Community in a Dual-Language Class: A Freirean Analysis 143
Tatiana M. Cevallos and Rosa M. Floyd
 10 (Re)Turning to Freirean-Philosophy in Preparing 
Content Teachers to Work with Multilingual Students 158
Kara Mitchell Viesca, Peiwen Wang, Brandon Heinz, 
and Alexa Yunes-Koch
 11 Digital Storytelling as a Freirean-Based Pedagogy 
with Refugee-Background Youth 176
Carrie Symons and Kasun Gajasinghe
 12 Ignoramuses and Sages: Using Freirean Concepts to 
Co-construct Socially Just Initial Teacher Education Practices 196
Gabriel Díaz Maggioli
 13 Planting Seeds: Pre-Service Teachers Explore the 
Legacies of Projeto Axé and Projeto Semear 211
Amanda Montes and Miguel Fernández Álvarez
Contents vii
 14 Rereading Learning, Schooling, and Race: Reflecting 
on Dialogical Language Teacher Preparation Through 
Participatory Action Research 229
Amanda J. Swearingen, Catherine McCarthy, 
Autumn E. Sanders, and Taylor M. Drinkman
 15 Problematização and Poesis: Making Problems with 
Freire and Someone Else’s Syllabus 246
Cori McKenzie
 16 Bridging Multimodality and Criticality to Language 
Education with a Twist from the Global South: Multimodal 
Critical Consciousness as Multimodal Conscientização 261
Raúl Alberto Mora, Andrés Tobón-Gallego, 
Maria Camila Mejía-Vélez, and Elizabeth (Effy) Agudelo
Afterword 280
Valdir Borges
Index 284
 3.1 Enduring principles of learning as critical sociocultural 
theory in practice 44
 6.1 Artwork created by students including the caption “Ocean 
Dreamers” in Marshallese and Cebuano 101
 7.1 First conversation circle 121
 11.1 The picture drawn by Desire describing his hero 184
 11.2 The brainstormed list of ideas for a shared story 187
 11.3 The storyboard images for the youth’s shared story: trying to speak 188
 12.1 The E.N.A.B.L.E. model (Diaz Maggioli, 2021) 208
 16.1 A student’s depiction of environmental degradation 269
 16.2 MCZ as a form of compromise: Students’ composition of 
human impact on the environment 270
 16.3 Example of a multimodal composition on a controversial topic 272
 16.4 Example of sociopolitical memes as spaces for MCZ 273
FIGURES
Sandro Barros, PhD, is an Assistant Professor at Michigan State University’s 
Department of Teacher Education. He teaches and conducts research on 
multilingualism, curriculum, and intercultural experiences of language across 
schools, grassroots activism, community organizations, and other sites of 
cultural production. Dr. Barros has authored dozens of articles and chapters that 
foreground the centrality of the Humanities to the development of compassionate 
practices in educational policy, curriculum, instruction, and emancipatory 
movements of social justice vis-à-vis education as a broadly defined endeavor. 
He is the author of Competing Truths: Narrating Otherness and Marginality in Latin 
America (Floricanto Press) and The Dissidence of Reinaldo Arenas Queering Literature, 
Politics, and the Activist Curriculum (University of Florida Press).
Luciana C. de Oliveira,to the rev-
olutionary cause. As Mario Cabral wonders reflecting on the post-independence 
efforts to promote literacy in his nation:
suppose the criterion is to choose literacy in the mother tongue. In that 
case, to recognize that every child has the right to be literate in his or her 
own language, what to do then with the children belonging to linguistic 
12 Sandro R. Barros and Luciana C. de Oliveira
minorities? The very choice of some of the national languages and the 
nonchoice of others, probably based on statistics, would create a serious 
problem from the point of view of the child’s rights, since the principle of 
non-discrimination would be at stake.
(quoted in Freire and Guimarães, 2014, p. 177, our translation)
In the end, even if Guinea-Bissau’s Freirean-inspired literacy campaigns repre-
sented a failure by many accounts, in Freire’s case, at least, the experience was 
an inherently pedagogical failure. His emancipatory model of critical literacy 
showed a greater refinement and attunement to some deciding factors to con-
sider when planning large-scale interventions modeled after grassroots literacy 
movements. If on the one hand Paulo Freire’s early experiences in Brazil and 
Chile had focused intentionally on literacy as a process of conscientização—critical 
consciousness achieved through action, reflection, and analysis—on the other 
hand, after the African experience and upon his return to Brazil in 1980, Freire 
began to stress the importance of accounting for communities’ economies within 
literacy programs’ curriculum and instruction (Gadotti and Romão, 2012). In 
this respect, Africa provided Freire with an opportunity to further develop his 
theorization of the limitations organic intellectuals confront when organizing 
social movements through education (see Mayo, 1999).
The association of the means of production and literacy curriculum was an 
idea Freire developed in the didactics and training materials during his con-
sultancy work with Mozambique in 1976, where one realizes how much his 
treatment of language mobilizes a semiotic repertoire that extends beyond what 
one understands conventionally by language. Freire’s experiments in multilin-
gual Africa, blending a myriad of multimodal resources, anticipates the later 
work of educational linguistics’ socio-semiotic turn (e.g., The Douglas Fir 
Group, 2016). Through this line of inquiry, Freire crafted a discourse in which 
he drew attention to the significance of space in literacy processes. Consider, for 
instance, his remarks in Pedagogy in Process (2021) when reminiscing his encoun-
ter with the African soil:
My first encounter with Africa was not, however, with Guinea-Bissau 
but with Tanzania, to which, for a variety of reasons, I feel very closely 
related. I make this reference to underline how important it was for me 
to step for the first time on African soil, and to feel myself to be one who 
was returning and not one who was arriving. In truth, five years ago, as 
I left the airport of Dar es Salaam, going toward the university campus, 
the city opened before me as something I was seeing again and in which 
I reencountered myself. From that moment on, even the smallest things, 
like old acquaintances, began to speak to me of myself. The color of the 
skies; the blue-green of the sea; the coconut, the mango and the cashew 
From Angicos to the World 13
trees; the perfume of the flowers; the smell of the earth; the bananas and, 
among them, my very favorite, the banana; the fish cooked in coconut 
oil; the locusts hopping in the dry grass; the sinuous body movements of 
the people as they walked in the streets, their smiles so ready for life; the 
drums sounding in the depths of night; bodies dancing and, as they did 
so, “designing the world”; the presence among the people of expressions 
of their culture that the colonialists, no matter how hard they tried, could 
not stamp out—all of this took possession of me and made me realize that 
I was more African than I had thought.
(p. 1)
A few elements are worth remarking from the passage above, which gives us clues 
about Freire’s treatment of language within intercommunicative and transcul-
tural educational processes concerning their needed sensitivity toward place. In 
the excerpt, Freire hints at what it means to recognize oneself in the presence 
of an Other, to search for familiarity in difference, and partake in experiential 
practices conducive to the types of literacy the Other has to offer. But more 
importantly, perhaps, he also describes nature as a semiotic resource that shapes 
individuals’ literacy practices, underscoring how communicative practices are 
embedded in the social milieu that characterizes communities’ understandings 
and worldly practices.
Extrapolating from Freire’s observations, we might realize that the choices 
we make to communicate across spaces invariably carry the residues of other 
locations, our nomadic memories of histories, experienced directly or not, and 
the ways we bear witness to the world as we labor to build places within it. 
Pennycook (2010) states that language use represents a multifaceted expression 
of the interplay between humans and the world. He notes while highlighting the 
primacy of space in shaping communication that:
What we do with language in a particular place is a result of our inter-
pretation of that place; and the language practices we engage in reinforce 
that reading of place. What we do with language within different institu-
tions—churches, schools, hospitals, for example—depends on our reading 
of these physical, institutional, social and cultural spaces. We may kneel 
and pray, stand and sing, direct classroom activity, write on the margins 
of a textbook, translate between patient and doctor, ask when a cut hand 
might get seen to, or spray-paint the back wall; and as we do so, we remake 
the language, and the space in which this happens.
(p. 2)
Reflecting on Pennycook’s statement, it becomes clear how Freire’s experiences 
in Africa reaffirmed the prominence of reading the social space as part and parcel 
14 Sandro R. Barros and Luciana C. de Oliveira
of the emancipatory project he developed. It also underscores how such a reading 
is necessary to the attainment of a more critical cognizance of what literacy can 
mean to colonized peoples invested in recovering a collective sense of selfhood 
after centuries of exploitative occupation. The use of the term “recovery” is not 
meant as a search for an idealized lost paradise led by well-meaning intellectuals. 
It is analogous to a collective effort toward developing activities enabling com-
munities to regain their consciousness of a particular way of relating to the land 
outside the exploitative labor conditions imposed by colonial logics. This process 
of recovery requires, according to Freire, a profound acknowledgement of what 
language does in relation to the land (see Freire, 1985). As he states “no social 
group or class or even an entire nation or people can undertake the struggle for 
liberation without the use of a language. At no time can there be a struggle for 
liberation and self-affirmation without the formation of an identity, and identity 
of the individual, the group, the social class, or whatever” (Freire, 1985, p. 186). 
However, the kind of politics that ensues from disenfranchised groups’ organi-
zation around identity causes of minoritized others is an issue that intellectuals 
cannot resolve. Freire explains this idea thusly:
I am in total sympathy with women’s fantastic struggle, even though I 
cannot fight their battle. Although I am a man, I can feel like a woman, 
and I am not afraid to say this. But women’s liberation is their struggle. 
They need to elaborate their own female language. They have to celebrate 
the feminine characteristics of their language, which they were socialized 
to despise and view as weak and indecisive. In the process of their strug-
gle, they have to usetheir own language, not man’s language. I believe 
these language variations (female language, ethnic language, dialects) are 
intimately interconnected with, coincide with, and express identity. They 
help defend one’s sense of identity and they are absolutely necessary in the 
process of struggling for liberation.
(Freire, 1985, p. 186, our emphasis)
If anything, Freire’s experiences in African soil brought to the forefront of 
his awareness the problem of language and identity as something that should 
evade dichotomist frameworks reinforcing solipsism as a byproduct of liberation 
movements through education. Indeed, it was the dichotomization of language 
and identity performed as politics as usual that Freire believed led many well- 
meaning social causes to meet their demise. In his view, the centrality of iden-
tity questions within emancipatory literacy programs should not follow suit to 
essentialist strategies found in many de-colonial strands of 1980s postcolonial 
scholarship, which called for the deployment of identity as a means to build 
intergroup solidarity within political movements (Kothari, 1998). Because non-
dichotomization was a part and parcel of Freire’s political praxis, it served him 
From Angicos to the World 15
methodologically in examining the dangers of identity discourses that ultimately 
deem certain forms more appropriate than others, as in the dichotomizing advo-
cacy of standard vs. nonstandard linguistic forms. From the passage cited above, 
we may still surmise that Freire understood linguistic identity as a product of 
the types of relationships human beings establish with one another and the land 
they occupy. Thus, changing the ways individuals relate to one another and to 
the land they inhabit inevitably changes how we view ourselves and others as 
subjects (Freire, 1996).
What Freire learned in African soil is particularly useful to multilingual 
education theorizing and praxis because it opens avenues for educators and 
researchers to think about pedagogies sensitive to the relationship between the 
location of culture, the power of languages used to represent it, and how, within 
institutional settings, one might approach the study of language as a transcultural 
communicative phenomenon—as opposed to introducing language practices 
within “preferred language” discourses. As such, these discourses risk reifying 
the authority of standard language in pernicious ways, in ways that isolate people 
from their ancestral histories, the practices they’ve established in their modes 
of relating to the land, in what they produce in their environment, materi-
ally or linguistically, through their creativity fueled by curiosity. Curiosity, as 
Freire theorized, was the driving force of education, a phenomenon he believed 
manifested spontaneously when teachers and students desired to approach any 
educational task with child-like inquisitiveness open to what words mean in 
their present but also to what they might mean.
Why This Collection Now? The Challenges of 
Disinventing and Reconstituting Freire
Throughout the chapters of this book, the authors consider the many ways 
Freire’s ideas work within and against public schools’ culture of framing lan-
guage instruction in monolingual terms or as a discrete diglossia. The ongoing 
structural inequalities that are a deterrence to minoritized language learners 
merits grave consideration, as millions of newcomers continued to be denied 
equal voice and opportunities because their linguistic repertoires are system-
atically marked as inefficient or inappropriate for participation in the civic life 
of classrooms. To date, many of the pioneering theories originated within the 
domains of educational linguistics have aimed at improving the opportunities of 
historically disenfranchised populations. In some ways, these theories hold great 
promise. Nevertheless, when introduced to enthusiastic pre-service teachers who 
go on to work in mainstream public systems, these theories struggle to become 
an integral part of multilingual classrooms, a situation that needs to change.
To a certain extent, the resistance encountered in multilingual class-
rooms is expected. Schools are complex ecosystems that reflect the ideological 
16 Sandro R. Barros and Luciana C. de Oliveira
heterogeneity and political interests of the community in which they are inserted. 
In this respect, we would do well not to lose sight of how neoliberalism’s affective 
overreach as an economic discourse influences educators in treating languages 
and theories as properties, thereby attaching value to what we claim as beneficial 
to others without necessarily respecting what others expect from our activist 
work. Following Freire’s emancipatory thinking can assist us in anticipating 
those instances when our well-meaning collective efforts to understand mul-
tilingualism’s life can become limited by how we dichotomize and essentialize 
linguistic phenomena.
Overview of the Book
The collection of chapters that follows is divided into two parts. Part I, Theoretical 
and Methodological Approaches, expands Freire’s concepts and ideas in rela-
tion to multilingualism and multilingual education issues. Chapter 2, Critical 
Biliteracies: The Mutually Reinforcing Endeavors of Freirean Criticality and 
Bilingualism, by Chris K. Chang-Bacon and Soria E. Colomer, traces Freire’s 
theory of language through pedagogical concepts such as critical literacies, 
critical consciousness, and political clarity to signal toward the possible contri-
butions of Freire’s cannon to bi/multilingual education. The chapter introduces 
a framework that underscores the mutually reinforcing potential of critical bi/
multiliteracies, illustrating how the framework might be read through a criti-
cal analysis of the increasingly popular “Seal of Biliteracy” policies presently 
enacted across 36 US states.
Chapter 3, The Critical Space Between: Weaving Freirean and Sociocultural 
Pedagogies, by Brandon J. Sherman and Annela Teemant, discusses how criti-
cal pedagogy and sociocultural theories of learning, considered in tandem, 
have implications for the practice and pedagogy of language and literacy 
instruction for emergent bilinguals. In this chapter, the authors articulate ped-
agogical principles through Freire’s critical lenses, using illustrations drawn 
from how teachers translate Freirean perspectives into their living educational 
practices.
In Chapter 4, Transforming Privilege: The Four R’s of Pedagogical 
Possibilities, Adam Howard, Patrick Dickert, Wallace Tucker, and Sam Jefferson 
report on how students at Takau English School (TES; pseudonym), an elite 
secondary school in Taiwan, engage in an international educational experi-
ence aimed at transforming their understandings of self, others, and the world 
around them as they participate in a weeklong service trip. Specifically, the 
authors explore the four tenets of this educational process to transform partici-
pants’ understandings of privilege and develop critical consciousness. The tenets 
are relevance, responsibility, relationships, and reflection. The authors connect 
their findings to Freire’s theories on critical consciousness development and the 
From Angicos to the World 17
power of multilingual literacy to better understand how pedagogical interven-
tions might facilitate a greater conscientização about privilege.
Chapter 5, Reading the World and Conscientização: Teaching about 
Multilingualism for Social Justice for Multilingual Learners, by Heather Linville, 
suggests how teacher educators can incorporate Freire’s ideas to encourage a 
pro-linguistic diversity stance in courses that prepare pre-service teachers to 
work with multilingual learners (MLs). Using examples from an undergraduate 
course, Linville mobilizes Freire’s theories on conscientização to illustrate how 
pre-service teachers and teacher educators can go about fomenting multilingual 
dispositions as an educational valuewhile reflecting upon their role as commu-
nity members and educators.
The next part of the book, Part II: Empirical Analyses, reports on applied 
research studies drawing on Freirean philosophy. The studies reported in this 
section have multilingualism at the core, focusing on students, curriculum devel-
opment, and teaching. In Chapter 6, Involvement and Authenticity: Transforming 
Literacy Curricula for Marshallese Students Through Community-Based 
Writing Projects, Anny Fritzen Case, Marcy Dodd, and Gina Mikel Petrie sur-
vey two competing literacy programs that unfolded in a middle school English 
as a Second Language (ESL) classroom with a large contingency of Marshallese 
students. They compare these programs as each had a very different orientation: 
one focused on formulaic academic writing to scaffold multilingual students’ 
literacy development, embodying Freire’s notion of narrative as a potentially 
oppressive device. The other program reimagined writing as a dialogical tool 
deployed to connect with the community at large.
Chapter 7, Learning English as an Additional Language from Children’s 
Points of View in a Public School in Brazil: A Freirean Perspective, by Andrea 
da Silva Marques Ribeiro and Jessica F. Cruz, problematizes the widespread 
belief that Brazilian public schools are illegitimate places to learn English. 
The authors describe how culture circles were mobilized to gauge elementary 
students’ uptake of and reactions to English lessons. As the authors discuss, edu-
cational legislation in Brazil requires additional language learning starting in the 
6th grade. Thus, this chapter focuses on how English education can become a 
resource more equally distributed across the public education system, beginning 
with the ignored elementary grades.
In Chapter 8, Critical Educulturalism in the Borderlands: Exploring Social 
positionality and the Dialogic Process of Culture Circles, Kelly Metz-Matthews 
and Michele McConnell report on work done with K-12 teachers and school 
leaders in California to support multilingual students. Their chapter evaluates the 
results of a mixed-method study of the effects of a course focused on identifying 
and problematizing internalized linguicism, linguistic imperialism, or linguistic 
privileging, with particular attention paid to the role of social positionality and 
critical educulturalism in teacher preparation. The authors depart from the four 
18 Sandro R. Barros and Luciana C. de Oliveira
queries set out in Zaytoun’s framework around theorizing what border-thinking 
means to connect to Freire’s phenomenological model of critical literacy. The 
authors illustrate how the intersection of guided critical self-study coupled with 
critical educulturalism might facilitate the development of critical consciousness 
through specific forms of social and cultural exposure enhancing novice teach-
ers’ critical skills.
Chapter 9, Kindergarteners as Co-constructors of an Equitable Learning 
Community in a Dual Language Class: A Freirean Analysis, by Tatiana M. 
Cevallos and Rosa M. Floyd, describes and analyzes how a Spanish-English dual 
language teacher incorporates Freire’s principles of a liberatory education in her 
practice. Through descriptive vignettes, the teacher reflects on the steps she 
took to implement strategies geared toward assisting native-Spanish and native-
English speakers in a kindergarten class to challenge and transform English’s 
hegemony prevalent across US schools. The chapter focuses on the teacher’s 
deliberate attention to the planning of learning moments that enabled five-year-
olds to use their lived experiences as a starting point to learn English and Spanish 
within a dynamic continuum of bi-literacy.
In Chapter 10, (Re)turning to Freirean-Philosophy in Preparing Content 
Teachers to work with Multilingual Students, Kara Mitchell Viesca, Peiwen 
Wang, Brandon Heinz, and Alexa Yunes discuss a course in which 29 under-
graduate pre-service secondary content teachers, grounded by Freire’s 
philosophies, reflected in depth on the work they did alongside multilingual 
students. Centered on self-actualization, reciprocity, and accountability as 
guiding objectives, the course assisted students in making sense of their lin-
guistic orientations within the global and historical context of multilingual 
teaching. The authors investigate whether the teaching and learning practices co- 
constructed with pre-service teachers during the course generated the desired 
outcomes, thereby illustrating the possibilities of (re)turning to Freire’s work to 
support the development of strong anti-oppressive pedagogies in multilingual 
classrooms.
Chapter 11, Digital Storytelling as a Freirean-Based Pedagogy with Refugee-
Background Youth, by Carrie Symons and Kasun Gajasinghe, reports on a 
year-long afterschool digital storytelling project that provided opportunities 
for a group of multilingual, refugee-background youth to develop multimodal 
literacy skills and expand their linguistic repertoires through a Freirean-
inspired model of dialogic learning. Drawing from ethnographic field notes, 
interviews with the youth and fellow facilitators, as well as artifacts created by 
the participants, the authors narrate the dialogic unfolding of the curriculum’s 
underwriting and the final product of the course, a short film created by the stu-
dents accompanied by an original soundtrack. The film’s composition addressed 
the lived experiences of emergent bilingual students in the United States who 
navigate competing discourses about English as an additional language while 
From Angicos to the World 19
dealing with being misunderstood on multiple levels: by peers, teachers, and 
administrators.
Chapter 12, Ignoramuses and Sages: Using Freirean Concepts to Co-construct 
Socially Just Initial Teacher Education Practices, by Gabriel Díaz Maggioli, 
showcases an application of Freire’s pedagogical principles in pre-service 
education of English as a Foreign Language (EFL) professionals during their 
teaching internship in Uruguayan public schools. The chapter depicts a case 
study in which Freire’s theories were discussed to assist aspiring teachers in co-
constructing socially just teaching practices while responding to and negotiating 
with the goals set by the Uruguayan national curriculum.
Chapter 13, Planting Seeds: Pre-service Teachers Explore the Legacies of 
Projeto Axé and Projeto Semear, by Amanda Montes and Miguel Fernandez, 
documents pre-service teachers’ trajectories as they began to critically examine 
Freire’s banking education concept through their experiences as students and 
educators. The authors discuss the participants’ uptake of conscientização and liber-
tação within two particular pedagogical settings: the Projeto Semear and Projeto 
Axé, both Brazilian programs designed with Freirean philosophies in mind. 
The authors report on how pre-service teachers’ impressions of the oppressive 
realities of traditional educational systems assisted them in imagining suitable 
pedagogies to address the needs of culturally and linguistically diverse students.
In Chapter 14, Rereading Learning, Schooling, and Race: Reflecting 
on Dialogical Language Teacher Preparation through Participatory Action 
Research, Amanda J. Swearingen, Catherine McCarthy, Autumn E. Sanders, 
and Taylor M. Drinkman report on a qualitative study in which pre-service 
teachers and their teacher educator designed a Participatory Action Research 
(PAR) project about the school-to-prison pipeline, initiated previously in a 
required critical intercultural communication and English language teaching 
course. Through vignettes and analysis of course reflections, the authors discuss 
how their PAR initiative placed in evidence the intercultural relationships the 
participants formed (Migliorini and Rania, 2017) and how their awareness of 
these relationships reframed their critical intercultural consciousness through 
local systems of meaning,knowledge, and action. As the authors argue, the PAR 
design facilitated the dissolution of the language-culture divide, foregrounding 
cultural hybridity and identity in ways that opened up spaces to explore par-
ticipants’ positions in the world as teachers of a lingua franca and the symbolic 
weight it carries.
Chapter 15, Problematização and Poesis: Making Problems with Freire and 
Someone Else’s Syllabus, by Cori McKenzie, narrates her attempts to engage 
in problematização while adopting a colleague’s syllabus to teach a semester-long 
course. Autobiographically, the author surveys the relationship between English 
and the social and political contexts in which it is spoken, heard, read, and writ-
ten, considering competing theories of language acquisition.
20 Sandro R. Barros and Luciana C. de Oliveira
Chapter 16, Bridging Multimodality and Criticality to Language Education 
with a Twist from the Global South: Multimodal Critical Consciousness as 
Multimodal Conscientização, by Raúl Alberto Mora, Andrés Tobón-Gallego, 
Maria Camila Mejía-Vélez, and Elizabeth (Effy) Agudelo, concludes this edited 
collection by sharing how a research team in Colombia rethought the linkage 
between multimodality and critical literacy. Taking a closer look at Freire’s ideas 
of conscientização and praxis, the authors advance Multimodal Conscientização 
(MCZ) as a way to rethink text design and meaning making practices from a 
critical stance. The chapter introduces the conceptual underpinnings of MCZ to 
later describe how it might operate in language classrooms.
In many ways, the aforementioned chapters add to the extant research docu-
menting the various expressions of resistance to normative language ideologies 
materialized across grassroots literacy programs through activist work inside and 
outside classrooms (Sandlin et al., 2011). Yet, it is important to bear in mind 
that what is often perceived as academically valuable may end up reflecting the 
cultural interests, ideologies, and practices of the hommos academicus’ appreciation 
of what minoritized groups’ practices have to offer (Baker-Bell, 2020; Bourdieu, 
1988). In the present educational scenario, the tensions in our responses to ques-
tions related to providing appropriate conditions for literacy programs to thrive 
in just and humane ways will likely remain. Multilingualism, as May (2013) 
correctly remarks, is no panacea. Still, the present challenges to develop more 
socially just and humane models of language education rests on our disposition 
to resituate the repertoires of learners more centrally in language curriculum, 
pedagogy, and assessment practices (May, 2013). This re-situation could benefit 
a great deal from attuning to Freire’s anti-dichotomist stance as an organizing 
principle of educational inquiry (Borges, 2021). The analysis of his grassroots 
efforts, for better or for worse, introduces generative spaces for a scholarly appre-
ciation of what movements of popular education can do for literacy, without 
necessarily reifying monolingualism, standard languages, parallel monolingual-
isms, linguistic hybridity, or translingualism as concepts ready to be turned into 
normative discourses, thereby risking authoritarianism and clashing against 
individuals’ needs and circumstances that lead them to pursue an education (see 
Charalambous et al., 2016; Jaspers, 2019).
In our many entrances and exits from the universe of Freire’s theoretical cor-
pus, applied to the universe of multilingual education, we will likely continue to 
discover many Freires, versions of the same idea that assist us in improving upon 
and expanding what language education and multilingual literacy can mean in 
the 21st century. The chapters that comprise this collection represent an attempt 
at rediscovering Freire’s theories’ relevance to multilingualism and multilin-
gual education in a moment when languages and indigenous ways of life are 
threatened by our indifference to social injustices normalized within the educa-
tional system. Critical hope is still paramount if we are to labor toward building 
From Angicos to the World 21
possible worlds through educational movements making it more viable for stu-
dents to become themselves as they learn how to read, write, and utter their 
word and be heard in the process. Education as the practice of freedom, at least 
how Freire envisioned it, must have as its goal the unrestrained imagination. 
All critical knowledge that ensues from this goal facilitates the acquisition of a 
genuine spirit of discovery nested in the objective of forging a more socially just 
and humane society.
References
Alim, H. S., Ibrahim, A., & Pennycook, A. (Eds.). (2009). Global linguistic flows: Hip hop 
cultures, youth identities, and the politics of language. Routledge.
Baker-Bell, A. (2020). Linguistic justice: Black language, literacy, identity, and pedagogy. 
Routledge.
Barros, S. (2020). Paulo Freire in a hall of mirrors. Educational Theory, 70(2), 151–169.
Barros, S., Domke, L. M., Symons, C., & Ponzio, C. (2021). Challenging monolingual 
ways of looking at multilingualism: Insights for curriculum development in teacher 
preparation. Journal of Language, Identity & Education, 20(4), 239–254.
Bauman, R., Briggs, C. L., & Briggs, C. S. (2003). Voices of modernity: Language ideologies 
and the politics of inequality. Cambridge University Press.
Blommaert, J. (2010). The sociolinguistics of globalization. Cambridge University Press.
Borges, V. (2021). A reconstrução de uma ética pedagógica libertadora à luz de Paulo Freire. 
Editora CRV.
Bourdieu, P. (1988). Homo academicus. Stanford University Press.
Bourdieu, P. (1991). Language and symbolic power. Harvard University Press.
Cabral, A. (1974a). Guiné-Bissau: Nação africana forjada na luta. Nova Aurora.
Cabral, A. (1974b). P.A.I.G.C.: Unidade e luta. Nova Aurora.
Caldas, B. (2019). To switch or not to switch: Bilingual preservice teachers and translan-
guaging in teaching and learning. TESOL Journal, 10(4), e485.
Canagarajah, A. S. (Ed.). (2013). Literacy as translingual practice: Between communities and 
classrooms. Routledge.
Canagarajah, S. (2012). Translingual practice: Global Englishes and cosmopolitan relations. 
Routledge.
Charalambous, P., Charalambous, C., & Zembylas, M. (2016). Troubling translanguag-
ing: Language ideologies, superdiversity and interethnic conflict. Applied Linguistics 
Review, 7(3), 327–352.
Cummins, J. (1981). Empirical and theoretical underpinnings of bilingual education. 
Journal of Education 163(1), 16–29.
Davidson, B. (1975). A libertação de Guiné: Aspectos de uma revolução africana. Sá da Costa.
de Korne, H. (2016). Imagining convivial multilingualism: Practices, ideologies and strate-
gies in Diidxazá/Isthmus Zapotec indigenous language education. Doctoral dissertation. 
University of Pennsylvania.
de Oliveira, L. C., Jones, L., & Smith, S. L. (2020). Interactional scaffolding in a first-
grade classroom through the teaching–learning cycle. International Journal of Bilingual 
Education and Bilingualism, 1–19. Online First.
22 Sandro R. Barros and Luciana C. de Oliveira
Facundo, B. (1984). Issues for an Evaluation of Freire-Inspired Programs in the United States 
and Puerto Rico. Available at: https://www.bmartin.cc/dissent/documents/Facundo/
Facundo.html. Accessed on 19 Aug 2021.
Faltis, C. J. (1989). Code-switching and bilingual schooling: An examination of 
Jacobson’s new concurrent approach. Journal of Multilingual & Multicultural Development, 
10(2), 117–127.
Faundez, A., & Freire, P. (1985/2014). Por uma pedagogia da pergunta. Paz e Terra.
Foucault, M. (2012). The archaeology of knowledge. Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group.
Fishman, J. A. (1989). Language and ethnicity in minority sociolinguistic perspective. Multilingual 
Matters.
Freire, P. (1976). Education, the practice of freedom. Writers and Readers Publishing 
Cooperative.
Freire, P. (1985). The politics of education: Culture, power, and liberation.Bergin & Garvey.
Freire, P. (1996). Pedagogy of the oppressed. Continuum.
Freire, P. (1997). La educación en la ciudad. Siglo XXI.
Freire, P. (2014a). Ação cultural: Para a liberdade e outros escritos. Editora Paz e Terra.
Freire, P. (2014b). Pedagogy of hope: Reliving pedagogy of the oppressed. Bloomsbury 
Publishing.
Freire, P. (2015). Pedagogy of indignation. Routledge.
Freire, P. (2021). Pedagogy in process: The letters to Guinea-Bissau. Bloomsbury Publishing.
Freire, P., & Guimarães, S. (2014). A África ensinando a gente: Angola, Guiné-Bissau, São 
Tomé e Príncipe. Paz e Terra.
Freire, P., & Macedo, D. (2005). Literacy: Reading the word and the world. Routledge.
Gadotti, M. (1989). Convite à leitura de Paulo Freire. Scipione.
Gadotti, M. (1994). Reading Paulo Freire: His life and work. SUNY Press.
Gadotti, M. (Ed.). (1996). Paulo Freire: Uma biobibliografia. Cortez.
Gadotti, M., & Romão, J. E. (2012). Paulo Freire e Amílcar Cabral: a descolonização das 
mentes. Instituto Paulo Freire.
García, O., & Lin, A. M. Y. (2016). Translanguaging in bilingual education. In O. García 
& A. M. Y. Lin (Eds.), Bilingual and multilingual education (pp. 117–131). Springer.
Gerhard, H.-P. (1993). Prospects: The quarterly review of comparative education XXIII (V.3-4). 
UNESCO: International Bureau of Education: 439–458.
Gogolin, I. (1997). The “monolingual habitus” as the common feature in teaching in the 
language of the majority in different countries. Per Linguam, 13(2), 38–48.
Goodman, B. G. (2014) Implementing English as a medium of instruction in a Ukrainian 
University: Challenges, adjustments, and opportunities. International Journal of 
Pedagogies and Learning, 9(2), 130–141. https://doi.org/10.1080/18334105.2014.1108
2026
Gramling, D. (2021). The invention of multilingualism. Cambridge University Press.
Grosjean, F. (2010). Bilingual. Harvard University Press.
Guilherme, M. (2021). Freire’s Pedagogy of communication, action and transformation: 
an interview with José Eustáquio Romão. Language and Intercultural Communication, 
1–13. Online First.
Harasim, L. M. (1985). Literacy and national reconstruction in Guinea Bissau: A critique of the 
Freirean literacy campaign. Doctoral thesis. University of Toronto.
Jaspers, J. (2019). Authority and morality in advocating heteroglossia. Language, Culture 
and Society, 1(1), 83–105.
https://www.bmartin.cc
https://www.bmartin.cc
https://doi.org/10.1080/18334105.2014.11082026
https://doi.org/10.1080/18334105.2014.11082026
From Angicos to the World 23
Kirkendall, A. J. (2010). Paulo Freire and the cold war politics of literacy. University of North 
Carolina Press.
Kohan, W. O. (2021). Paulo Freire: A philosophical biography. Bloomsbury Publishing.
Kothari, R. (1998). Postcolonialism and the language of power. Interventions: International 
Journal of Postcolonial Studies, 1(1), 35–38.
Kubota, R. (2016). The multi/plural turn, postcolonial theory, and neoliberal multi-
culturalism: Complicities and implications for applied linguistics. Applied Linguistics, 
37(4), 474–494.
Labov, W. (1972). Language in the inner city: Studies in the Black English vernacular. University 
of Pennsylvania Press.
MacSwan, J. (2000). The threshold hypothesis, semilingualism, and other contributions 
to a deficit view of linguistic minorities. Hispanic Journal of Behavioral Sciences, 22(1), 
3–45.
Martin-Jones, M. (1995). Code-switching in the classroom: Two decades of research. In 
L. Milroy & P. Muysken (Eds.), One speaker, two languages: Cross-disciplinary perspectives 
on code-switching (pp. 90–112). Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/
CBO9780511620867.005
May, S. (Ed.). (2013). The multilingual turn: Implications for SLA, TESOL, and bilingual 
education. Routledge.
Mayo, P. (1999). Gramsci, Freire and adult education: Possibilities for transformative action. Zed 
Study Editions.
Mignolo, W. D. (2011). The darker side of Western modernity. Duke University Press.
Migliorini, L., & Rania, N. (2017). A qualitative method to “make visible” the world of 
intercultural relationships: the photovoice in social psychology. Qualitative research in 
Psychology, 14(2), 131–145.
Ortega, L. (2019). SLA and the study of equitable multilingualism. The Modern Language 
Journal, 103, 23–38.
Pennycook, A. (2010). Language as a local practice. Routledge.
Pennycook, A. (2017). Translanguaging and semiotic assemblages. International Journal of 
Multilingualism, 14(3), 269–282.
Rajagopalan, K. (2001). The politics of language and the concept of linguistic identity. 
CAUCE, Revista de Filología y su Didáctica, 24, 17–28.
Rancière, J. (1991). The ignorant schoolmaster. Stanford University Press.
Rosa, J., & Flores, N. (2017). Unsettling race and language: Toward a raciolinguistic 
perspective. Language in Society, 46(5), 621–647.
Sandlin, J. A., O’Malley, M. P., & Burdick, J. (2011). Mapping the complexity of public 
pedagogy scholarship: 1894–2010. Review of Educational Research, 81(3), 338–375.
Shor, I. (1987). Freire for the classroom: A sourcebook for liberatory teaching. Heinemann 
Educational Books.
Spolsky, B. (1981). Educational linguistics. Bunka Hyoron Publishing Company.
Spolsky, B. (2008). Introduction: What is educational linguistics?. In B. Spolsky & 
F. Hult (Eds.), The handbook of educational linguistics. Wiley. https://doi.org/10.1002/ 
9780470694138.ch1
The Douglas Fir Group (2016). A transdisciplinary framework for SLA in a multi-
lingual world. The Modern Language Journal, 100, 19–47. https://doi.org/10.1111/
modl.12301.
https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511620867.005
https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511620867.005
https://doi.org/10.1002/9780470694138.ch1
https://doi.org/10.1002/9780470694138.ch1
https://doi.org/10.1111/modl.12301
https://doi.org/10.1111/modl.12301
24 Sandro R. Barros and Luciana C. de Oliveira
Torres, C. A. (1998). Da Pedagogia do oprimido à luta continua: a pedagogia política 
de Paulo Freire. In P. McLaren, P. Leonard, & M. Gadotti (Eds.), Paulo Freire: Poder, 
desejo e memórias da libertação (pp. 77–102). Armed.
Torres, R. (1998). The million Paulo Freires. Convergence, 31, 107–117.
Vertovec, S. (2007). Super-diversity and its implications. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 30(6), 
1024–1054.
PART I
Theoretical and 
Methodological 
Approaches
https://taylorandfrancis.com
DOI: 10.4324/9781003175728-3
2
CRITICAL BILITERACIES
The Mutually Reinforcing Endeavors of 
Freirean Criticality and Bilingualism
Chris K. Chang-Bacon and Soria E. Colomer
Introduction
As we mark the 50th anniversary of Freire’s Pedagogia do Oprimido’s publication 
in English, the importance of Freire’s work to language education is becom-
ing ever clearer. As the authors of this piece, we write from the contexts of 
the United States, where migration and multilingualism increasingly character-
ize our schools. At the same time, regressive global movements such as science 
denial and the embodiment of White nationalism have reaffirmed the impor-
tance of critical perspectives. Our chapter demonstrates the productive synergies 
between Freirean approaches and bilingual education to address these dynamics, 
exploring both the affordances and limitations of Freirean criticality to advance 
social, educational, and linguistic justice in language education.
This chapter is primarily focused on Freirean notions of criticality as employed 
by teachers and researchers in language education. A variety of approaches use 
the term “critical” in language education, including critical literacies, critical lan-
guage teaching, critical consciousness, and critical language awareness. In this chapter, 
we explore these varied approaches and Freire’s particular influence on these 
bodies of work. Yet, rather than viewing this as a one-way “banking model” 
in which Freirean criticality influences language education, we also explore the 
contributions language education has made, and can continue to make, to criti-
cal approaches. Thus, we offer a frameworkof critical biliteracies to highlight the 
mutually reinforcing endeavors of Freirean criticality and language education.
The two of us write as US-based scholars who primarily study bilingual 
and English language education. Within this perspective, we focus our respec-
tive research on language education for racially and linguistically minoritized 
https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003175728-3
28 Chris K. Chang-Bacon and Soria E. Colomer
students. Thus, this chapter will primarily spotlight bilingual, dual language, 
and English as a Second Language (ESL) education in US contexts. For the 
purposes of this edited volume, we encapsulate these varied educational models 
under the moniker language education. While we, of course, acknowledge the 
major pedagogical differences between ESL, bilingual, and dual-language pro-
gramming (see Wright, 2019), we focus this chapter not on specific pedagogy 
or program structures but on the use of criticality and interrogations of power 
dynamics across these varied forms of language education. Importantly, we do 
not intend this chapter to be an exhaustive review of all scholarship that has used 
the “critical” label in language education research. Instead, our goal is to provide 
an overview of key critically oriented approaches in language education, and 
for the purposes of this edited volume, prioritizing work that explicitly engages 
Freirean perspectives.
First, we provide an overview of critical biliteracies as a theoretical frame-
work. Next, we explore the use of and the continued need for multilingual 
approaches within the critical paradigm. In this section, we draw attention to 
the monolingual orientations that have historically characterized critical work in 
language education. Subsequently, we flip this dynamic to demonstrate the use 
of and the further necessity for critical approaches within language education. 
The last section of this chapter explores further possibilities that exist between a 
(re)prioritization of Freirean critical literacy and a foregrounding of multilingual 
perspectives, further explicated through the framework of critical biliteracies. 
We conclude by describing the implications of a critical biliteracies approach for 
language education.
Critical Biliteracies
Our critical biliteracies framework (Colomer & Chang-Bacon, 2020) inter-
twines the field of bilingual education with the field of critical literacies. Since 
its inception, the field of critical literacies has drawn attention to the power 
dynamics inherent to the consumption and production of texts (Luke, 2012). 
Critical literacies extend beyond the mechanics of decoding and comprehension 
to encompass political and sociohistorical power dynamics (Freire, 1970). These 
power dynamics become even more pronounced in multilingual education. Yet, 
much of the scholarship that has applied critical literacies to language learn-
ing contexts upholds a monolingual perspective, primarily observing critical 
engagement through the target language (i.e. English) rather than bilingually 
(Bacon, 2017). Our framework offers a response to the call for more critical 
consciousness and critical language awareness in biliteracy and dual-language 
programming (see Palmer et al., 2019), as critical biliteracies necessitates explic-
itly addressing the intersections of languages and literacies, with culture, race, 
and power.
Critical Biliteracies 29
Critical literacies have long been upheld as a way for students to navigate the 
complexities of identity (Duncan-Andrade & Morrell, 2008). Through critical 
literacies, students acquire the tools to recognize, and at times resist, socially 
constructed notions of identity that are inherently involved in reading the word 
and the world (Freire & Macedo, 1987) while concurrently having their own 
racial, linguistic, and sociocultural expression read by the world. In this way, 
critical literacies inform how emergent bilinguals are socialized to (un)mask 
their multiple identities and cultures to cope with racialization (Colomer, 2019). 
The framework of critical biliteracies, then, calls for an awareness of the racial-
ized dynamics of language use, which often idealize the language practices of 
the white, English-monolingual middle class against the language practices of 
multilingual communities of color (Chang-Bacon, 2021).
We use the term critical biliteracies to also encompass the shift toward acknowl-
edging multi- and transliteracies under the broader field of bilingualism. 
Although there are important distinctions to be made between bi-, multi-, and 
translingual perspectives (see García et al., 2017; MacSwan, 2017; Makoni & 
Pennycook, 2012; Williams, 1996), we decided to avoid using the terms mul-
tiliteracies and transliteracies as these terms are widely used in the field of literacy 
research with non-multilingual connotations. Multiliteracies, for example, is 
often used to refer to multimodality (see Cope & Kalantzis, 2000) and trans-
literacies to intertextual forms of meaning-making across social and material 
relationships (see Stornaiuolo et al., 2017). Since these terms are not generally 
understood to indicate the use of multiple languages, we find biliteracies a clearer 
signifier of our focus in this piece.
As we argue in this chapter, without a critical perspective, the promotion of 
bilingual, multilingual, and translingual educational approaches simply repro-
duce social inequities rather than disrupt them. We, therefore, assert the need for 
a framework of critical biliteracies with the dual purpose of broadening concep-
tions of and access to multilingual forms of education, while, at the same time, 
engaging students in critical conversations around the power dynamics embed-
ded in the field and within changing views of language more broadly.
The Need for Multilingual Perspectives in Critical Paradigms
As we suggest through our framework above, critical approaches are deeply rel-
evant to language education. However, in this first section, we flip this dynamic 
to argue that language education also has much to provide to critical approaches. 
This is especially true in regard to multilingualism, the potential of which is 
often overlooked by existing critical paradigms, even within language education.
Critical approaches to textual analysis are likely as old as literacy itself. Yet, 
there remains an ahistorical and Euro-centric tendency to view critical per-
spectives of literacy as having originated only in the modern era. While past 
30 Chris K. Chang-Bacon and Soria E. Colomer
approaches did not necessarily use the term “critical” as we understand it today, 
various forms of power-conscious analysis have occurred in scholarship and 
among individuals across a vast range of cultures and time periods. Abednia and 
Crookes (2019), for example, remind us that critically oriented dialogues were 
well documented in texts on the ancient Greek philosophers, and that vigorous 
debates among different schools of religious thought characterized the early texts 
of many religious traditions, including Confucian, Buddhist, Jewish, and Islamic 
scholarship. Similarly, Pratt (1991) highlights the work of indigenous Andean 
historian, Felipe Guaman Poma de Ayala (1615/2009), who wrote a 1,200 page 
treatise that was sent to the King Philip of Spain in 1615. Writing bilingually 
in both Quechua and Spanish, da Ayala’s text offers a re-interpretation of world 
history from an Andean-centric perspective “to construct a new picture of the 
world, a picture of a Christian world with Andean rather than European peoples 
at the center of it” (Pratt, 1991, p. 34). De Ayala’s work provides a clear example 
of a writer critically re-appropriating a power-laden genre to challenge exist-
ing historical narratives, textual representations, and linguistic boundaries. Such 
examples do much to interrupt the view of critical approaches to literacy as 
having originated only in recent decades and stemming solely fromEuropean 
intellectual traditions.
In this vein, much can still be said of the relatively recent pedagogical line-
age of Paulo Freire in regard to critical approaches to language education. This 
volume celebrates the English publication of Freire’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed 
50 years ago. A key review by Luke and Dooley (2011) documents the uptake 
of Freire’s work and other critical scholarship by scholars and practitioners in 
the fields of TESOL and second language education in the 1980s. The authors 
situate this uptake in part of a larger shift from approaches to language educa-
tion that were historically grounded in cognitive and psycholinguistic theories 
of language toward a more sociocultural framing of language and its use. This 
shift brought particular focus to the power dynamics of language and language 
education. Still, as we argue throughout this chapter, much of this work has 
been taken up by and placed within a monolingual paradigm (i.e. pedagogies 
geared toward monolingual students sequentially learning a second or “foreign” 
language) rather than a multilingual perspective.
Early Critical Language Approaches
Some of the pioneering critical work in language education in English-medium 
scholarship was described as critical reading (Wallace, 1986), critical language teaching 
( Janks, 1991), and critical language awareness (Fairclough, 1992)—all approaches 
that applied Freirean critical approaches and interrogations of power dynamics 
to language education in various ways. Janks (1991), for example, outlined what 
she described as critical language teaching as follows.
Critical Biliteracies 31
A critical approach to language teaching aims to make students aware of 
the interface between language and power. It aims to help them under-
stand the ways in which different linguistic features can serve to articulate 
power relations in discourse. Language education that seeks to empower 
students should enable them to de-construct discourse so that they are able 
to resist attempts to subject them through language.
( Janks, 1991, p. 191)
Fairclough (1992) and others articulated a similar need for critical language aware-
ness, positing that institutional power in the modern era had begun to be imposed 
less by direct force than through language. “If power relations are indeed increas-
ingly coming to be exercised implicitly in language,” proposed Fairclough, “a 
language education focused upon training in language skills, without a critical 
component, would seem to be failing in its responsibility to learners” (p. 6). In 
regard to language pedagogy, Fairclough (1992) further critiqued “mainstream 
language study for taking [linguistic] conventions and practices at face value, as 
objects to be described, in a way which obscures their political and ideological 
investment” (p. 7).
The growing utility of these varied critical approaches was increasingly 
recognized in language education, prompting scholars to identify the late 
1990s and early 2000s as the period of a “critical turn” for language education 
(Kumaravadivelu, 2006). This period brought to the fore a broad range of schol-
arship grappling with lineages of colonization and racism in language education 
(e.g. Kubota & Lin, 2006; Motha, 2006).
Critical, Yet Monolingual
A decade following the critical turn, the multilingual turn “challenged bounded, 
unitary, and reified conceptions of languages” (May, 2013, p. 2) by centering 
multilingualism in language education. Research using a multilingual lens 
revealed the nuances of multilingual repertoires to describe “the ways in which 
people of different and mixed backgrounds use, play and negotiate identities 
through language” (Makoni & Pennycook, 2012, p. 449). To that end, languag-
ing acknowledged language as action and challenged static notions of language 
(Flores & García, 2013). We echo scholars who argue that sustaining the linguis-
tic repertoires of language users is fundamental to effective language teaching 
and learning (May, 2013).
Still, even in the midst of this multilingual turn, much of the critically ori-
ented work in language education remained pervasively monolingual in its 
orientation. Bacon (2017) documented how much of the critical literacies schol-
arship in English language education has historically focused on criticality in 
the target language rather than bilingual engagement. In other words, much of 
32 Chris K. Chang-Bacon and Soria E. Colomer
this critically oriented scholarship focuses exclusively on whether students can 
approach texts in English through critical engagement in English while they are 
still in the process of learning the language. Absent from such framing are ques-
tions around how students engage critically in texts bilingually, utilizing the 
full range of their linguistic repertoires. Notable in much of the scholarship in 
Bacon’s (2017) review was the near-absence of critical questions on why students 
are learning English in the first place, whose English they are learning, and what 
is language in the first place (i.e. disrupting the binary distinctions between named 
languages; see Makoni & Pennycook, 2012).
To some degree, the relative rarity of more multilingual approaches to critical 
work in language education can be traced back the ways Freire’s work has been 
taken up in the field. In all their utility for critical approaches to education writ 
large, Freirean approaches have been critiqued for lacking a specific theory of 
language or a recommended approach for linguistic analysis (Luke, 2012). This is 
not necessarily a fault of the work itself (Freire did not identify himself as a lin-
guist, after all). Accordingly, it is common for educational scholarship to position 
Freire’s work as primarily geared toward so-called first language literacy (i.e. 
learning to read, write, and analyze text in a language you are already familiar 
with speaking). This perspective spotlights Freirean literacy campaigns that were 
geared toward promoting political participation by marginalized communities 
with little access to literacy education. In a very literal sense, the communities 
Freire worked with could not vote if they could not write (Abednia & Crookes, 
2019); therefore, the focus of his work was to empower individuals through 
learning to read the dominant social language (often a language they already 
spoke). Approaches that rely solely on this specific aspect of Freire’s work run the 
risk of reproducing monolingual interpretations of critical pedagogies that pre-
sume oppression can be disrupted solely through understanding, analyzing, and 
reproducing the socially dominant forms of discourse. Such approaches focus 
primarily on dismantling power hierarchies through awareness and use of the 
dominant linguistic and political tools. While this is one strategy for change 
for reading the word and the world (Freire & Macedo, 1987), critical approaches to 
bilingual education may offer a range of further possibilities for reading the word 
and the world multilingually.
The beginnings of such an engagement with multilingualism are indeed pre-
sent, though often overlooked, in Freire’s work (e.g. Freire, 1978/2016, 2003). 
In what is perhaps the most specific example, Freire cautioned against using a 
colonial language as the primary means of instruction for post-colonial educa-
tion systems in Letters to Guinea-Bissau (1978/2016). In one of his exchanges with 
educational policymakers in Guinea-Bissau, Freire wrote,
In truth, the process of liberation of a people does not take place in pro-
found and authentic terms unless this people reconquers its own Word, the 
right to speak it, to “pronounce” it, and to “name” the word: to speak the 
Critical Biliteracies 33
word as a means of liberating their own language through that act from 
the supremacy of the dominant language of the colonizer. The imposi-
tion of the language of the colonizer on the colonized is a fundamental 
condition ofcolonial domination which also is extended to neocolonial 
domination. It is not by chance that the colonizers speak of their own 
language as “language” and the language of the colonized as “dialect”; the 
superiority and richness of the former is placed over against the poverty 
and inferiority of the latter.
(p. 126)
Still, even in such moments of direct engagement with the power dynamics 
of language, Freire’s work leaves many questions on the specific pedagogical 
dynamics of multilingualism unanswered. Do Freire’s cautionary notes above, 
for example, foreclose the possibility of bilingual education as a liberatory project 
if a colonial language is involved? Does learning a globally dominant language 
inherently promote the notion of “inferiority” for an individual’s existing lan-
guage practices? Is it possible to achieve true multilingualism or a translingual 
orientation that refutes the colonialist boundaries between named languages? 
Again, these open questions should not be seen as a fault of Freire’s work itself 
(the majority of which was not focused on multilingualism) but instead should 
alert those of us in the field of language education to address these sorts of 
questions that Freire’s work provokes. This drives the need to engage both with 
and beyond Freire by drawing in additional perspectives from scholarship on 
bilingualism to extend existing critical frameworks, as we explore in our next 
section.
The Need for Criticality in Multilingual Paradigms
In the history of US educational policy, bilingual education has been so effec-
tively marginalized that, at times, bilingual education in and of itself can seem 
to represent a critical and somewhat subversive act. While we support the 
spirit of this position, we caution against taking its implications too literally 
to assert that all bilingual education is inherently critical, or even necessarily 
geared toward educational equity. Recent research around inequity in access 
to bilingual education programming—particularly the increasing popularity of 
dual-language educational programming—exemplifies the need for such cau-
tion. Cervantes-Soon et al. (2017), for example, demonstrate how the growing 
demand for dual-language educational programming often disproportionately 
benefits students from white, English-dominant middle and upper class com-
munities in comparison to the bilingual populations of color for whom such 
programming is often presumed to have been designed. This phenomenon has 
also been described by Valdez et al. (2016) as “the gentrification of dual language 
education” (p. 601).
34 Chris K. Chang-Bacon and Soria E. Colomer
As such, scholars have increasingly drawn on critical perspectives to articulate 
the need for critical consciousness as applied to dual language and broader bilingual 
education programming. Palmer et al. (2019) proposed critical consciousness as 
a key “fourth pillar” of dual-language education (adding to the more traditional 
pillars of academic achievement, bilingualism and biliteracy, and sociocultural 
competence). The authors articulated critical consciousness as a way to inculcate 
“awareness of the structural oppression that surrounds us and a readiness to take 
action to correct it,” and offer suggestions for facilitating such awareness through 
“interrogating power, critical listening, historicizing schools, and embracing 
discomfort” (Palmer et al., 2019, p. 121). Alfaro (2019) described the need for 
such interrogation within the preparation of dual-language teachers, emphasiz-
ing the importance of teachers’ developing ideological clarity around language, 
pedagogy, and the power dynamics therein.
These dynamics of critical consciousness reflect what Freire described as con-
scientização. While Freire’s conscientização is often translated into English as critical 
consciousness, it is also important to remember that, from its inception, this idea 
went beyond consciousness (i.e. awareness) to also promote critical action. Freire 
envisioned conscientização as a cycle in which individuals engaged in critical analy-
sis of existing power structures, developed a sense of agency to disrupt inequity, 
and specifically promoted critical action to disrupt oppression (El-Amin et al., 
2017; Seider & Graves, 2020). For critical consciousness to reach its full potential 
in language education, therefore, students and educators must engage specifi-
cally with the ways in which languages themselves both represent and function 
to uphold structural inequities. One area of language educational research that 
has been especially productive has been language variation and racism through 
a critical lens, as explored in the following section.
Language, Race, and Dialect
Here, we draw attention to work described as critical language awareness (Alim, 
2005) and critical language pedagogy (Godley et al., 2015). Such research applies 
Freirean principles to the power relations that exist not only between named 
languages (e.g. English and Spanish) but also in regard to dialectal variations 
that exist within languages. Much of this work has focused on dialect diversity 
within English, particularly in regard to African American Language (AAL) or 
Black English (Baker-Bell, 2013; Smitherman, 1998). Though dialectal vari-
ation is not always traditionally considered a form of bilingualism, we argue 
that this is a problematic oversight, particularly considering the applicability of 
critical work on dialect variation in the field of language education. It is easy 
to forget that dialectal variation exists across all languages and is thus impor-
tant to consider in language education spaces (e.g. Whose dialect of Spanish are 
we privileging? Is Black English legitimized in dual-language spaces? Who is 
Critical Biliteracies 35
positioned as speaking “real” French?). Such work also brings important focus 
to the racialized dynamics of these dialect biases, which are often upheld in 
bilingual education as well.
Consider Alim’s (2005) description of critical language awareness, in which 
he describes existing educational institutions “as designed to teach citizens about 
the current sociolinguistic order of things, without challenging that order, 
which is based largely on the ideology of the dominating group and their desire 
to maintain social control” (p. 28). This conceptualization of critical language 
awareness not only draws on but also extends Freirean criticality to ask “How 
can language be used to maintain, reinforce, and perpetuate existing power 
relations,” while also being used to “resist, redefine and possibly reverse these 
relations” (p. 28). Such an approach takes a broad view of language to encapsu-
late both linguistic and dialectal variation, as both can be leveraged to justify (or 
conversely, to disrupt) broader forms of oppression.
In classroom contexts, awareness of these dynamics must be productively 
linked to pedagogy. Baker-Bell (2013) offers a way forward in this regard through 
critical language pedagogy, which she describes as “an instructional approach that 
encourages students to interrogate dominant notions of language while provid-
ing them space to value, sustain, and learn about the historical importance of 
their own language” (p. 356). This dual notion of interrogating as well as sustaining 
diverse language practices is key, as it is often missing from the more mono-
lingually oriented language education work, even those derived from Freirean 
perspectives.
Importantly, critical language pedagogies go beyond uncritical “code switch-
ing” in which students are simply taught to change their language practices to 
accommodate existing power hierarchies (see broader critiques of appropriacy-
based language ideologies in the work of Flores & Rosa, 2015). Instead, critical 
language pedagogy asks students to critique the very existence of a system that 
compels some to adapt their language practices, but not others—particularly 
regarding theunderlying racialized and classed dynamics of these imbalances. 
This, again, represents an extension of Freire’s most popularized work in first 
language literacy, which was mainly geared toward reading the word and the world 
through the dominant language systems of a given society.
In this regard, the work on critical language awareness and pedagogy in 
regard to dialectal varieties draws more explicit connections to how race and 
racism manifest through language (Alim et al., 2016)—an area that Freire’s work 
generally did not specifically engage. Thus, the work on dialectal variation pro-
vides an excellent example of a recontextualization and reimagination of critical 
language approaches to focus more explicitly on specific axes of oppression, such 
as racism and white supremacy, and how these forms of oppression manifest 
within language education. We believe that such specificity will be of benefit 
to broader critical approaches to language education, as we discuss in Part III.
36 Chris K. Chang-Bacon and Soria E. Colomer
Moving Toward Critical Biliteracies
The previous sections have demonstrated the mutually reinforcing affordances 
of critical approaches and language education. In this section, we describe how 
these connections can be synthesized and furthered through a framework of 
critical biliteracies.
To reiterate, we offer critical biliteracies as a framework to consider the 
overlapping dynamics of race, culture, and power in relation to languages and 
literacies. This framework first unapologetically underscores the need for bi-, 
multi-, and translingual approaches to critical engagement. There is an irony to 
pedagogies that purport to take up an overtly emancipatory critical approach, 
while placing barriers around the language or modality in which students can 
express that criticality. Second, our framework reemphasizes literacies in regard 
to the various forms of critical approaches to language education. Although 
there are certainly literacy implications described in many of the critical lan-
guage education approaches we have cited throughout this chapter, most of these 
approaches tend to prioritize criticality in regard to spoken forms. Through 
critical biliteracies, we seek to reimagine how the power of this work might be 
extended through more explicit engagement with Freirean principles of reading 
(and writing) the word and the world. Here, the notion of “reading” need not be 
restricted to traditional textual emphasis but also extends to multimodal engage-
ment with a broader range of texts in all their modalities (see Cope & Kalantzis, 
2000; Pandya, 2018; Smith et al., 2020).
Furthermore, approaches in both bilingual education and critical literacy 
often focus on language/literacy as both problem and solution. Theories of 
change across both fields tend to position social inequities as rooted in language 
hierarchies. In other words, this work often functions under the premise that, if 
students are provided access to literacy and multilingual forms of education, and 
engage critically with language, that broader forms of inequity will disappear as 
a result. A critical biliteracies approach acknowledges the existence of language 
hierarchies, and the clear need to redress them. At the same time, however, 
we caution against approaches that would seem to posit that disrupting language 
hierarchies will inevitably disrupt racism, anti-immigrant sentiment, or white 
supremacy more broadly. Language oppression is indeed a problematic symptom 
but is not necessarily the root cause of inequity itself.
While a focus on language oppression remains appropriate for critical 
approaches to language education, we believe it will be even more effective for 
the field to contextualize these language dynamics within other axes of oppres-
sion. Thus, a critical biliteracies approach draws attention to both languages and 
literacies (in all of their textual and multimodal expressions), as well as explic-
itly naming the power dynamics operating therein. We suggest this naming go 
beyond critical generalities around power or oppression—terms that can be used 
Critical Biliteracies 37
in such broad strokes so as to obscure the specific axes of oppression taking place 
at a given moment in a given context. We admit that a lack of such specific-
ity remains an appropriate critique of much of the work that has taken up the 
Freirean tradition in language education.
As such, while a critical biliteracies approach is very much in dialogue with 
Freire, it is also important to recognize that bilingual education has a critical 
lineage in its own right. Here, we recognize the work of Richard Ruiz, who 
proposed a heuristic of three orientations to language planning, particularly 
policies that impacted speakers of minoritized languages in the United States: 
language-as-problem, language-as-right, and language-as-resource (Ruiz, 
1984). Ruiz noted shortcomings in the first two orientations, as they stemmed 
from deficit perspectives. Language-as-problem focused on assimilation and 
transition to a dominant majority language, where language-as-right sought 
to address linguistically based inequities through compensatory policies (Hult 
& Hornberger, 2016). Language-as-resource, however, offered a counternarra-
tive (Ruiz, 2010) to enhance the status of minoritized languages, ease tensions 
across linguistic communities, recast the role of marginalized languages, and 
highlight the importance of cooperative language planning (Wright & Boun, 
2016). As such, language-as-resource could be used to identify schools and pro-
grams engaged in multilingual education and to craft policies and practices that 
promote societal multilingualism (see Bauer et al., 2017; Hult & Hornberger, 
2016). Furthermore, the orientation of language-as-resource shifted the focus 
from what the linguistically minoritized community could do for society as a 
whole, toward building greater understanding and compassion for the lives and 
experiences of said communities (Ruiz, 2010).
Although Ruiz was largely informed by the US policy context, he took 
the international scope of language rights into account when formulating the 
orientations. Toward that end, Ruiz supported a number of international ini-
tiatives, in one case, he helped draft and evaluate adult literacy programs in 
indigenous languages in Guatemala (Wright & Boun, 2016). Ruiz countered 
popular beliefs that indigenous languages were partially at fault for the low 
socioeconomic status of indigenous communities; furthermore, he worked 
with educators to understand the value of vernaculars, as they were an inte-
gral part of community cultural wealth (Reyes, 2008). Ruiz’s approaches 
deftly brought Freire to the table. Just as Freire critiqued traditional education 
(i.e. the “banking model”) as something that was done to the student by the 
teacher, Ruiz critiqued the notion that empowerment was something done to 
those who lacked power. Instead, Ruiz worked with both student and teacher 
to reframe the use of indigenous languages and cultures to foster learning and 
sustain community. Through these collaborative acts, liberatory knowledge 
emerged, which, in turn, contributed to the empowerment of marginalized 
communities.
38 Chris K. Chang-Bacon and Soria E. Colomer
Stemming from this tradition, Freirean approaches have much to gain from 
existing work in language education, particularly those that foreground the per-
spectives of linguistically and racially minoritized youth (see España & Herrera, 
2020). A perennial challenge of critical education is moving away from a bank-
ing model of education in which the teacher “deposits” knowledge into children 
seen as empty vessels (Freire, 1970). Counteracting such pedagogy remains 
challenging for even the most ardent of critical educators to execute (Duncan-
Andrade & Morrell, 2008). However, from a critical biliteracies perspective, 
multilingual classrooms have the potentialto jump-start such pedagogy. When 
the teacher cannot, in fact, speak or understand all of the language varieties 
their students bring to the classroom, yet encourages students to use their full 
linguistic repertoires, power dynamics inevitably begin to be disrupted and the 
possibilities for Freirean problem-posing education grow immensely. A teacher 
or student might pose a problem or question for the class to pursue; then stu-
dents can conduct research drawing from their full range of linguistic resources 
to bring knowledge back to the class. Importantly, these approaches resonate 
with models proposed by scholars of translanguaging (e.g. García et al., 2017; 
Williams, 1996) and provide actionable ways to prioritize students’ existing 
language dynamics in multilingual classrooms and societies. Such pedagogies 
offer avenues to de-center the teacher as the source of dominant knowledge—
a key goal of Freirean approaches to education. We, therefore, view a critical 
biliteracies approach as a key step toward not only disrupting linguistic hier-
archies but also realizing more democratic, equitable forms of education 
writ large.
Conclusion and Implications for Language Education
The wide appeal of critical pedagogies demonstrates the continued relevance of 
Freire and his work to bilingual education. However, the field of bilingual edu-
cation also has much to contribute to Freirean approaches. As we demonstrate 
in this chapter, even ostensibly “critical” approaches may reinforce monolin-
gual paradigms. Herein, we consider how a critical biliteracies framework offers 
both theoretical and methodological promise for multilingual education and 
critical agency. In celebrating Freire’s Pedagogia do Oprimido, our chapter bridges 
Freirean approaches with multilingual education to create a paradigm that fos-
ters social, educational, and linguistic justice in language education. As many 
of our schooling communities become more linguistically diverse, the call to 
work together in coalition to critique and resist systems of oppression intensifies. 
Language education offers an opportunity for linguistic and cultural sustain-
ment across communities. Still, this can only be possible if students, teachers, 
and researchers alike engage in critical praxis to disrupt the oppression present 
in their words and worlds.
Critical Biliteracies 39
References
Abednia, A., & Crookes, G. V. (2019). Critical literacy as a pedagogical goal in English 
language teaching. In X. A. Gao (Ed.) Second handbook of English language teaching 
(pp. 255–275). Springer.
Alfaro, C. (2019). Preparing critically conscious dual-language teachers: Recognizing 
and interrupting dominant ideologies. Theory into Practice, 58(2), 194–203.
Alim, H. S. (2005). Critical language awareness in the United States: Revisiting issues 
and revising pedagogies in a resegregated society. Educational Researcher, 34(7), 24–31.
Alim, H. S., Rickford, J. R., & Ball, A. F. (2016). Raciolinguistics: How language shapes our 
ideas about race. Oxford University Press.
Bacon, C. K. (2017). “Multi-language, multi-purpose”: A literature review, synthesis, 
and framework for critical literacies in English language teaching. Journal of Literacy 
Research, 49(3), 424–453. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/1086296X17718324
Baker-Bell, A. (2013). “I never really knew the history behind African American lan-
guage”: Critical language pedagogy in an advanced placement English language arts 
class. Equity & Excellence in Education, 46(3), 355–370.
Bauer, E. B., Presiado, V., & Colomer, S. (2017). Writing through partnership: Fostering 
translanguaging in children who are emergent bilinguals. Journal of Literacy Research, 
49(1), 10–37. DOI: doi.org/10.1177/1086296X16683417
Cervantes-Soon, C. G., Dorner, L., Palmer, D., Heiman, D., Schwerdtfeger, R., & Choi, 
J. (2017). Combating inequalities in two-way language immersion programs: Toward 
critical consciousness in bilingual education spaces. Review of Research in Education, 
41(1), 403–427.
Chang-Bacon, C. K. (2021). Idealized language ideologies: The “new bilingualism” 
meets the “old” educational inequities. Teachers College Record, 123(1). https://www.
tcrecord.org/Content.asp?ContentId=23558
Colomer, S. E. (2019). Understanding racial literacy through acts of (un) masking: 
Latinx teachers in a new Latinx diaspora community. Race Ethnicity and Education, 
22(2), 194–210.
Colomer, S. E., & Chang-Bacon, C. K. (2020). Seal of biliteracy graduates get critical: 
Incorporating critical biliteracies in dual language programs and beyond. Journal of 
Adolescent and Adult Literacy, 63(4), 379–389. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/jaal.1017
Cope, B., & Kalantzis, M. (2000). Multiliteracies: Literacy learning and the design of social 
futures. Taylor and Francis.
De Ayala, F. G. P. (1615/2009). The first new chronicle and good government: On the history 
of the world and the Incas up to 1615. (R. Hamilton, Trans). University of Texas Press. 
(Original work published in 1615).
Duncan-Andrade, J. M. R., & Morrell, E. (2008). The art of critical pedagogy: Possibilities for 
moving from theory to practice in urban schools (Vol. 285). Peter Lang.
El-Amin, A., Seider, S., Graves, D., Tamerat, J., Clark, S., Soutter, M., Johannsen, J., & 
Malhotra, S. (2017). Critical consciousness: A key to student achievement. Phi Delta 
Kappan, 98(5), 18–23.
España, C., & Herrera, L. Y. (2020). En comunidad: Lessons for centering the voices and experi-
ences of bilingual Latinx students. Heinemann.
Fairclough, N., (Ed.). (1992). Critical language awareness. Addison Wesley Longman 
Limited.
https://doi.org/10.1177/1086296X17718324
https://doi.org/10.1177/1086296X16683417
https://www.tcrecord.org
https://www.tcrecord.org
https://doi.org/10.1002/jaal.1017
40 Chris K. Chang-Bacon and Soria E. Colomer
Flores, N., & García, O. (2013). Linguistic third spaces in education: Teachers’ translan-
guaging across the bilingual continuum. In D. Little, C. Leung, & P. Van Avermaet 
(Eds.), Managing diversity in education (pp. 243–256). Multilingual Matters.
Flores, N., & Rosa, J. (2015). Undoing appropriateness: Raciolinguistic ideologies and 
language diversity in education. Harvard Educational Review, 85(2), 149–171.
Freire, P. (1970). Pedagogy of the oppressed (M. B. Ramos, Trans.). Continuum.
Freire, P. (1978/2016). Pedagogy in process: The letters to Guinea-Bissau. Bloomsbury 
Publishing.
Freire, P. (2003). A África ensinando a gente: angola, Guiné-Bissau, São tomé e Príncipe. Paz 
e Terra.
Freire, P., & Macedo, D. (1987). Reading the word and the world. Bergin & Garvey.
García, O., Johnson, S. I., & Seltzer, K. (2017). The translanguaging classroom: Leveraging 
student bilingualism for learning. Caslon.
Godley, A. J., Reaser, J., & Moore, K. G. (2015). Pre-service English language arts 
teachers’ development of critical language awareness for teaching. Linguistics and 
Education, 32, 41–54.
Hult, F. M., & Hornberger, N. H. (2016). Revisiting orientations in language planning: 
Problem, right, and resources an analytical heuristic. The Bilingual Review/La Revista 
Bilingúe, 33(3), 30–49.
Janks, H. (1991). A critical approach to the teaching of language, Educational Review, 
43(2), 191–199. DOI: 10.1080/0013191910430207
Kubota, R., & Lin, A. (2006). Race and TESOL: Introduction to concepts and theories. 
TESOL Quarterly, 40(3), 471–493.
Kumaravadivelu, B. (2006). TESOL methods: Changing tracks, challenging trends. 
TESOL Quarterly, 40(1), 59–81.
Luke, A. (2012). Critical literacy: Foundational notes. Theory into Practice, 51(1), 4–11.
Luke, A., & Dooley, K. T. (2011). Critical literacy and second language learning. In 
E. Hinkel (Ed.), Handbook of research on second language teaching and learning (Vol. 2, 
pp. 859–867). Routledge.
Makoni, S., & Pennycook, A. (2012). Disinventing multilingualism: From monologi-
cal multilingualism to multilingua francas. In M. Martin-Jones, A. Blackledge, & 
A. Creese (Eds.), ThePhD, is an Associate Dean for Academic Affairs 
and Graduate Studies in the School of Education and a Professor in the 
Department of Teaching and Learning at Virginia Commonwealth University. 
Her research focuses on issues related to teaching multilingual learners at the 
K-12 level, including the role of language in learning the content areas and 
teacher education. Currently, Dr. de Oliveira’s research examines scaffolding in 
elementary classrooms. She has authored or edited 24 books and has several and 
has over 200 publications in various outlets. Her books include the Handbook of 
TESOL in K-12 (Wiley, 2019), the first handbook focused exclusively in the area 
of teaching multilingual learners in elementary and secondary classrooms. She 
served in the Presidential line (2017–2020) of TESOL International Association 
and was a member of the Board of Directors (2013–2016). She was the first 
Latina to ever serve as President (2018–2019) of TESOL.
EDITORS’ BIOGRAPHIES
Elizabeth (Effy) Agudelo holds a BA (Honors) in English and Spanish 
Education from Universidad Pontificia Bolivariana in Medellín, Colombia and 
is currently an MA Candidate in Learning and Teaching Processes in Second 
Languages at the same university. She is currently an elementary English teacher 
at UPB School and belongs to the Literacies in Second Languages Project (LSLP) 
research lab at U.P.B. Her research interests include the exploration of fandom 
and membership in fan communities as catalysts for second-language learning 
and how to implement lessons from fandom into the language classroom. She 
is also interested in the intersection of multimodality and critical literacies with 
the fandom culture.
Miguel Fernández Álvarez is an Associate Professor in the Department of 
Linguistics Applied to Science and Technology at the Universidad Politécnica de 
Madrid (Spain), where he teaches technical English for specific purposes within 
the field of construction. His research areas include bilingual education, second-
language acquisition, and language assessment. He is currently working on 
aspects related to linguistic mediation and their implications for both teaching 
and assessment in the classroom.
Anny Fritzen Case is an Associate Professor in the Department of Teacher 
Education at Gonzaga University. A former middle and high school ESL 
teacher, she enjoys spending much of her professional time and energy working 
alongside her students in local schools. She received her PhD in Curriculum, 
Teaching, and Educational Policy from Michigan State University in 2010 and 
her MA in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages from Brigham 
Young University in 2001. Her scholarship focuses on secondary multilingual 
learners, particularly ways teachers and schools can provide access to equitable 
and intellectually rich instruction.
CONTRIBUTORS’ BIOGRAPHIES
Contributors’ Biographies xi
Dr. Tatiana M. Cevallos is the Director of ESOL and Dual Language Programs 
at George Fox University. A former elementary bilingual teacher and bilingual 
coordinator in Oregon, she has also taught internationally at the university level 
in Ecuador and in China. Her research interests include bilingual education, 
biliteracy, and internationalization of teacher education. She is passionate about 
preparing teachers who embrace diversity as an asset and create respectful, 
equitable, and engaging learning environments.
Chris Chang-Bacon is an Assistant Professor at the University of Virginia at 
the Curry School of Education. His research emphasizes critical literacies in 
bilingual education and English language teaching. He has published extensively 
on Freirean critical pedagogies in language learning, including a framework for 
critical English language teaching in the Journal of Literacy Research, and a chapter 
in the upcoming Routledge Critical Literacies Handbook. Chang-Bacon received 
the AERA Language and Social Processes SIG’s 2019 Emerging Scholar Award 
and the second place 2020 Bilingual Education Research SIG’s Outstanding 
Dissertation Award. He is also a member of the AERA Paulo Freire Research 
SIG and received their 2016 Travel Award.
Soria E. Colomer is an Associate Professor of bilingual education in the 
College of Education at Oregon State University. Her work is committed to 
transforming the educational landscape for marginalized youth and exploring 
the negotiation of language and identity in growing immigrant communities. 
Her research explores how language teachers’ ethnic identities and linguistic 
skills impact their roles and practices in schools with growing emergent 
bilingual student populations. Her work can be found in the Journal of Literacy 
Research, TESOL Quarterly, Bilingual Research Journal, Foreign Language Annals, 
and Qualitative Research, among others.
Jessica Fernandes Natarelli da Cruz is a primary school and English teacher 
at Fundação Municipal de Educação de Niterói, Rio Janeiro state, Brazil. She 
has a Master’s degree in English teaching at Postgraduate Program in Basic 
Education Teaching at the Institution of Application (CAp) at State University of 
Rio de Janeiro (UERJ) and graduate studies in the same area at Colégio Pedro II. 
At the moment, she is completing a doctorate degree in Applied Linguistics at 
the Interdisciplinary Graduate Program in Applied Linguistics (PIPGLA) at the 
Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ).
Patrick Dickert was a research assistant in the Education Department at Colby 
College where he earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in economics and educational 
studies. Following graduation, he served as a basketball skills trainer for the 
xii Contributors’ Biographies
Shenzhen Aviators in China. He is now a professional player for the Landstede 
Hammers in the Netherlands.
Marcy Dodd is a middle school English Language Development teacher 
focusing on writing instruction through community-based project learning. She 
received an M.I.T. from Gonzaga University in 2016 and an M.F.A. in Creative 
Writing from Colorado State University in 2010.
Taylor M. Drinkman is a senior research assistant in the Social Interaction 
Lab in the Department of Psychology at the University of Minnesota where 
she earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in psychology with minors in Spanish and 
teaching English as a second language (TESL). She is passionate about language 
and identity development, as well as exploring how humans interact and learn 
to take a critical perspective of looking at the world and understanding their 
mental health.
Rosa M. Floyd originally from Guadalajara, Mexico, has worked in dual 
immersion programs for nearly 30 years. She holds an MA from the Universidad 
de Guadalajara, an MAT in bilingual education from Portland State University. 
She currently works in the Woodburn school district where she has been an 
instructional coach, teacher mentor, and dual immersion teacher. She combines 
her knowledge of Mexican culture and Folkloric dance to involve students, staff, 
and community in cultural events and celebrations, district and statewide. She 
uses dance as a rich linguistic opportunity to unify families and communities in 
a purpose that equalizes and integrates people from different groups.
Kasun Gajasinghe is a doctoral student in the Curriculum, Instruction, and 
Teacher Education program at Michigan State University. He is a Lecturer in the 
Department of English Language Teaching at the University of Peradeniya, Sri 
Lanka. Also, he is a Fulbright alumnus. His research interests include curriculum 
theory, language policy, community-engaged teacher research, education in 
times of crisis.
Adam Howard is Charles A. Dana Professor of Education and Chair of the 
Education Department at Colby College. His research and writing focus on 
social class issues in education with a particular focus on privilege and elite 
education. His books include Learning Privilege: Lessons of Power and Identity in 
Affluent Schooling, EducatingRoutledge handbook of multilingualism (pp. 451–465). Routledge.
May, S., (Ed.). (2013). The multilingual turn: Implications for SLA, TESOL, and bilingual 
education. Routledge.
MacSwan, J. (2017). A multilingual perspective on translanguaging. American Educational 
Research Journal, 54(1), 167–201.
Motha, S. (2006). Decolonizing ESOL: Negotiating linguistic power in US public school 
classrooms. Critical Inquiry in Language Studies, 3(2–3), 75–100.
Palmer, D. K., Cervantes-Soon, C., Dorner, L., & Heiman, D. (2019). Bilingualism, 
biliteracy, biculturalism, and critical consciousness for all: Proposing a fourth funda-
mental goal for two-way dual language education. Theory into Practice, 58(2), 121–133.
Pandya, J. Z. (2018). Exploring critical digital literacy practices: Everyday video in a dual language 
context. Routledge.
Pratt, M. L. (1991). Arts of the contact zone. Profession, 91, 33–40.
Reyes, I. (2008). Ruiz, Richard (1948-). In J. M. Gonalez (Ed.), Encyclopedia of bilingual 
education (pp. 724–726). Sage Publications, Inc.
Ruiz, R. (1984). Orientations in language planning. NABE Journal, 8, 15–34.
https://doi.org/10.1080/0013191910430207
Critical Biliteracies 41
Ruiz, R. (2010). Reorienting language-as-resource. In J. E. Petrovic (Ed.), International 
perspectives on bilingual education: Policy practice, and controversy (pp. 155–172). Information 
Age.
Seider, S., & Graves, D. (2020). Schooling for critical consciousness: Engaging Black and Latinx 
youth in analyzing, navigating, and challenging racial injustice. Harvard Education Press.
Smith, B. E., Pacheco, M. B., & Khorosheva, M. (2020). Emergent bilingual students 
and digital multimodal composition: A systematic review of research in secondary 
classrooms. Reading Research Quarterly. (Advance Online Publication). https://doi.
org/10.1002/rrq.298
Smitherman, G. (1998). Ebonics, King, and Oakland: Some folk don’t believe fat meat is 
greasy. Journal of English Linguistics, 26(2), 97–107.
Stornaiuolo, A., Smith, A., & Phillips, N. C. (2017). Developing a transliteracies frame-
work for a connected world. Journal of Literacy Research, 49(1), 68–91.
Valdez, V. E., Freire, J. A., & Delavan, M. G. (2016). The gentrification of dual language 
education. Urban Review, 48, 601–627. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11256-016-0370-0
Wallace, C. (1986). Learning to read in a multicultural society: The social context of second lan-
guage literacy. Pergamon Press.
Williams, C. (1996). Secondary education: Teaching in the bilingual situation. In C. 
Williams, G. Lewis, & C. Baker (Eds.), The language policy: Taking stock (pp. 39–78). 
CAI.
Wright, W. E. (2019). Foundations for teaching English language learners: Research, theory, 
policy, and practice. Caslon.
Wright, W. E., & Boun, S. (2016). The development and expansion of multilingual 
education in Cambodia: An application of Ruiz’s orientations in language planning. 
Bilingual Review, 33(3). 1–17.
https://doi.org/10.1002/rrq.298
https://doi.org/10.1002/rrq.298
https://doi.org/10.1007/s11256-016-0370-0
DOI: 10.4324/9781003175728-4
3
THE CRITICAL SPACE BETWEEN
Weaving Freirean and 
Sociocultural Pedagogies1
Brandon J. Sherman and Annela Teemant
Introduction
Internationally, multilingualism and multilingual literacy as practiced in pub-
lic schools have been deeply influenced by the ascendant market logics and 
ideologies of neoliberalism, focusing on skill acquisition, competency develop-
ment, and high stakes accountability measures (Lipman, 2006; Mockler, 2013). 
However, neoliberal reforms have failed to mitigate inequalities in learning out-
comes for historically marginalized and minoritized student populations with 
linguistic, cultural, economic, and learning differences. In many instances, 
public schools continue to reproduce inequities dehumanizing students (Salazar, 
2013). Simultaneously, the imposition of neoliberal governance models in 
schools has de-professionalized the teaching profession with a one-size-fits-all 
mentality demanding fidelity to scripted programs and textbooks over teacher 
agency and responsiveness to learners (Morrell, 2017).
As currently enacted, language and literacy instruction require reframing for 
the 21st century, with new ways of thinking, interacting, and behaving being 
explored. With changing student demographics, the theory and practice enacted 
by teachers must account proactively and responsively for the full range of stu-
dents’ cultural, linguistic, and academic experiences, assets, and needs (Alim & 
Paris, 2017).
This chapter explores the interplay between theory and practice from Freire’s 
(1994) critical and Vygotsky’s (1978) sociocultural perspectives. Vossoughi and 
Gutiérrez (2016) have identified three points of resonance between these per-
spectives: viewing humans as social and historical beings, valuing the role and 
mediation of teachers, and connecting academic and everyday knowledge to 
https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003175728-4
The Critical Space Between 43
support learning. Both theories are arranged “for sustained well-being in the 
present ‘for the future,’” and therefore are about “hope and possibilities” (p. 140).
Teemant (2018) has argued that these theories, considered in tandem, have 
important implications for improved language and literacy instruction, especially 
beneficial for multilingual students. Drawing from her pedagogical coaching 
research, we illustrate how sociocultural practices are made more impactful 
when read through a Freirean lens. This chapter draws implications a new gen-
eration of teachers and learners.
Theory and Practice
Critical reflection on practice is a requirement of the relationship between 
theory and practice.
(Freire, 2000, p. 30)
This section introduces a set of sociocultural principles of learning articulated 
as the Five Standards of Effective Pedagogy (Tharp et al., 2000). To these, we 
add a sixth principle informed by Freirean critical theory called Critical Stance 
(Teemant et al., 2014). Using these six Enduring Principles of Learning (EPL, 
see Figure 3.1), we seek to read sociocultural practices through the lens of a 
Freirean informed principle of Critical Stance.
Sociocultural Theory as Practice
Originating with the learning and development work of Lev Vygotsky (1978), 
sociocultural theory has grown into a broad and varied body of thought united 
by common assumptions of learning as a mediated, dynamic, and culturally 
embedded process. Teemant (2018) summarized sociocultural theory with three 
tenets: Development is social, teaching is assisting and situated performance, 
and knowledge is cultural and competent participation. To define development 
as social recognizes how learning occurs in negotiation and through the sup-
port of others. As an extension, understanding teaching as assisting emphasizes 
the role of more knowledgeable others (MKO) in mediating development and 
supporting student performance in varied social and cultural contexts. Finally, 
knowledge itself is seen as a reflection of culture and context. At the heart of a 
sociocultural view of learning is to make the space between a teacher, learner, 
and the cultural environment active and vibrant with assistance (Teemant, 2020; 
Vygotsky, 1997).
Drawing on professional consensus, extant educational research, and soci-
ocultural theory, Tharp et al. (2000) articulated a set of five standards for 
supporting effective pedagogy, each defined by underlying principles of learn-
ing: collaboration, language use and literacy development, complex thinking, 
44 Brandon J. Sherman and Annela Teemant
contextualized and connected learning, and dialogic interactions. Figure 3.1 
lists and defines these first five standards (now listed as Enduring Principles of 
Learning or EPL) as one rendering of sociocultural pedagogical practices. 
Using various designs, researchers have found combinations of these princi-
ples to impact positively multilingual learners’ content and language learning(e.g., Doherty & Hilberg, 2007; Estrada, 2005; Saunders & Goldenberg, 1999). 
Tharp et al. (2000) did not present these principles as exhaustive, being 
FIGURE 3.1 Enduring principles of learning as critical sociocultural theory in practice
The Critical Space Between 45
open to identifying other principles in general and for specific cultural groups 
(Tharp, 2006).
Critical Theory and the Sixth Principle
As with Vygotsky, Paulo Freire’s work has flourished and proliferated, branch-
ing off in different directions that interpret and employ his ideas in varying ways 
(Barros, 2020). Freire’s landmark work Pedagogy of the Oppressed (1994) articu-
lated his education theory and valued pedagogical practices as critical pedagogy. 
However, scholars often take Freire’s work out of context, invoking it as a place-
holder for “sustained engagement and articulation of social structure and the 
position of schooling within it” (Gottesman, 2016, p. 27). Furthermore, another 
body of work (e.g., Giroux, 1988; Kincheloe, 2008) is both descended and dis-
tinct from Freire’s work (Gottesman, 2016). For these reasons, we highlight 
three specific elements of Freire’s work that inform this chapter.
First, Freire’s central theme was dialogical (Barros, 2020; Taylor & Hikida, 
2020). For Freire, dialogue went beyond a mechanical, turn-taking interactional 
framework, with students as passive receptacles and teachers as authoritative 
keepers of knowledge. He described such teaching as the banking model, in 
which teachers merely deposit information into students. For him, this view of 
education threatened authentic learning (Freire & Macedo, 1995). Instead, he 
posed dialogue as epistemological curiosity, a stance in which teachers create 
“pedagogical spaces where students become apprentices in the rigors of explora-
tion” (Freire & Macedo, 1995, p. 384). He framed learning as a problem-posing 
process (Freire, 1994). In other words, dialogue was not merely a way of inter-
acting but a principle and a means for authentic learning. Freire (2016) argued:
What our past and present experiences teach us is that they cannot ever be 
simply transplanted. They can and must be explained, discussed and criti-
cally understood by those whose practice is in another context. In that new 
context, they will be valid only to the degree that they are “reinvented.”
(p. 65)
Second, Freire brought a focus to power relations in the classroom. Unlike tra-
ditional models in which teachers maintain absolute power, a Freirean dialogical 
approach calls for greater learner autonomy but not complete independence. As 
Vossoughi and Gutiérrez (2016) have explained, “for Freire, the task of mediat-
ing educational practice is also the teacher’s political responsibility” (p. 149). He 
argued that teachers who abdicated their authority could not maintain and teach 
from their epistemological curiosity or dialogically (Freire & Macedo, 1995).
Finally, a dialogic approach holds that “education is a process that takes social 
practice as a basis for learning and study” (Freire, 2016, p. 77). Freire maintained 
46 Brandon J. Sherman and Annela Teemant
that when educators dialogue with active learners, “the process is mediated by 
the concrete reality which, together, they and the learners must know and trans-
form” (p. 103). In this view, educators should see learning as inseparable from 
the outside world and inherently political.
For this chapter’s purposes, we encapsulate (and surely simplify) Freirean 
critical thought in one tenet: Authentic inquiry emerges in relation to learner 
identity, agency, and power. In highlighting identity, we draw attention to 
how authentic learning reflects an individual’s culture, background, and way of 
understanding and being in the world. Highlighting power, we examine how 
learners can share in inquiry as a legitimate process of knowledge seeking and 
creation. Finally, learner agency refers to inquiry as a natural, coherent, and 
legitimate outgrowth of learners’ identity and power.
Adding to sociocultural principles of learning (Tharp et al., 2000), Teemant 
et al. (2014) operationalized this Freirean principle as Critical Stance as a sixth 
pedagogical growth target (Figure 3.1). Enacting Critical Stance “consciously 
engages learners in interrogating conventional wisdom and practices, reflecting 
upon ramifications, and seeking actively to transform inequities within their 
scope of influence in the classroom and larger community” (p. 139). Authentic 
dialogic promotes “learning in service of transformative civic engagement 
around social inequities” (p. 139). Critical Stance calls for encountering, evalu-
ating, and engaging with multiple perspectives. In time, it culminates in action/s 
as an expression of learner voice and will. Acting within their sphere of influ-
ence, students learn to read and write the world (Freire & Macedo, 2005). In 
a study of pedagogical coaching, Teemant and Hausman (2013) validated that 
teacher use of Critical Stance had a significant and positive impact on student 
content and language learning. Effectiveness aside, Critical Stance provides a 
way to see sociocultural principles and practices in a new light.
Reading the Sociocultural through the Critical
Freirean critical theory and Vygotskian sociocultural theory are distinct in ori-
gins and focus. Critical theory tends to foreground teaching and its connection 
to larger sociopolitical contexts. Sociocultural theory centers on learning and its 
socially and culturally embedded nature (Esmonde & Booker, 2017). Thinking 
of them together is not merely a matter of joining the terms. Scholars have 
found common ground between these theories, as noted previously (Vossoughi 
& Gutiérrez, 2016). Further, Esmonde (2017) has centered power as the primary 
consideration driving the development and refinement of sociocultural theory. 
Lewis et al. (2007) highlighted the need for sociocultural theory to address the 
critical concerns of power, identity, and agency. Stetsenko (2008, 2014) provided 
a reading of Vygotsky’s sociocultural theory as entailing a transformative activist 
stance, in which learning is intertwined with identity development and action 
The Critical Space Between 47
in the world. While not drawing directly on Freire’s work, Stetsenko’s work 
resonates with Freirean ideas of learner identity, agency, and learning as praxis. 
Vossoughi and Gutiérrez (2016) reasoned sociocultural and critical theories rein-
forced each other by viewing knowledge not as an end in itself but as a tool for 
engaging with the world.
We aim to read Tharp et al.’s (2000) five sociocultural teaching practices 
through Critical Stance as informed by Freirean critical theory. Freire’s focus 
on identity, agency, and power allows us to see these sociocultural principles 
in a new light. When taken together, the EPL become a new pedagogical 
paradigm.
An Illustrative Case: Considering Columbus
Dialogue characterizes an epistemological relationship. Thus, in this sense, 
dialogue is a way of knowing and should never be viewed as a mere tactic 
to involve students in a particular task.
(Freire & Macedo, 1995, p. 379)
We have selected a classroom vignette to illustrate how Lyle, a 5th grade teacher, 
used his literacy teaching as an opportunity to cultivate agency, reexamine 
power, and develop learner identities. Lyle is a White male in his third year of 
teaching in a highly diverse midwestern elementary school, with 24% Latino, 
66% Black, 4.8% mixed race, 3.6% White students, and 79% low income. As 
part of a more extensive study of pedagogical coaching, Lyle attended a 30-hour 
summer workshop on the EPL and had six full cycles of coaching (i.e., pre-
conference, observation, and post-conference). Each coaching cycle was video 
recorded. Lyle’s classroom footage forms the basis of the vignettes presented 
here. Lyle was successful in implementing EPL, including Critical Stance. All 
names are pseudonyms.Our vignette begins with Lyle seated at a circular table with five students 
of color. The other students work quietly on individual and small group tasks 
independent of the teacher. The class has been learning about Christopher 
Columbus. Everyone at the table has an article presenting two opposing views 
about preserving Christopher Columbus Day as a national holiday (Newsela, 
2017). One student reads out loud a passage arguing for Columbus Day. Lyle 
highlights essential vocabulary from the passage, such as “demonize” and 
“anti-Columbian.” Lyle poses questions that explore these words in the con-
text of the points raised. The group considers an argument from the article 
drawing parallels between deaths from disease outbreaks among Europeans 
and Indigenous Americans. Lyle asks the group to discuss whether they feel 
Columbus was responsible for disease deaths in the Americas. Lyle listens as the 
students exchange views with each other, ultimately deciding that Columbus 
48 Brandon J. Sherman and Annela Teemant
was responsible. After some time, Lyle rejoins the conversations, saying, “So, I’m 
hearing that you believe it’s his fault. Because—why?” The students elaborate, 
articulating their positions in greater detail. As they continue to encounter and 
react to the arguments in the article, Lyle cautions, “Remember, I want you to 
keep an open mind on this.”
After completing the one view, Lyle says, “Alright, let’s flip to the other side. 
What you’ve all been waiting for.” Several students say “Yes!” as they turn to 
the argument for Indigenous People’s Day. Lyle reads the title out loud, “Con: 
We must recognize that progress for some led to injustice for others.” As with 
the other text, students take turns reading with Lyle posing questions prompting 
discussion. At one point, Lyle notes, “You say we’re forgetting about those peo-
ple?” As multiple students nod, he asks them to explain how that is happening.
LORENZO: Because in every single social studies book, history book, they’re not 
telling about the back story, of like the dark side-
MAY: Or the secrets-
BROCK: And they don’t talk about the Native Americans.
MAY: They don’t talk as much as Christopher Columbus.
Lyle asks them to reflect on a video they have viewed about Columbus. Lorenzo 
responds, “It didn’t tell about him killing all those people. It only told about 
them trading and getting along.” Lyle qualifies Lorenzo’s point, saying, “He 
wasn’t directly killing people right away, ok? So, we gotta keep that in mind.”
Lyle next displays a book they have read about Columbus (Yolen, 1996), 
which features Columbus facing forward, standing over an Indigenous child 
with only his back visible. “So, this was one of our explorers, right?” he says, 
pointing to Columbus. “If you didn’t read this book, how is this person por-
trayed? If you just look at the picture.” The students reply in various ways that 
he looks like a father. Chrystal says, “It looks like a book that’s going to be 
filled with warm things, like people being nice to each other and talking, and 
like a father.” Hearing the replies, Lyle says, “So, I think you’re starting to put 
together puzzle pieces. To be honest, you guys are coming up with, maybe, test-
ing the ideas of your social studies book.” He reviews some of the points they 
had discussed. Giving the students an instruction sheet, he asks them to work 
together to decide what they think about preserving Columbus Day as a holiday 
or changing it to Indigenous People’s Day. He said, “We were talking about, you 
guys in 8 years, you’re going to be able to vote. Right? So, we should be able 
to hear your voices as well. So, talk to each other, figure out what we can do.” 
Stepping away to check in with other students, he gives the group time to work 
independently.
Returning, he asks, “So, what did we come up with? Some things we could 
do?” While students favored Indigenous People’s Day, they have not identified 
The Critical Space Between 49
any action they could take. Lyle says, “So, I want to go back to what Lorenzo 
was saying earlier. You guys are coming up with some good ideas, and May 
helped me with this as well, but Lorenzo really didn’t appreciate the things that 
we got in our textbooks because he feels like they-”
LORENZO: They’re lies. They keep on dodging-
LYLE: I don’t know if they count as lies, but they-
BROCK: They’re not telling everything.
LYLE: They’re not telling the truth-
LORENZO: They’re telling the truth-
CHRYSTAL: But not the complete truth.
LYLE: So how would you feel if we wrote a letter to our friends over at [the 
publisher] about filling out-
LORENZO: About filling out the actual truth?
The students’ eyes light up at the possibility. Lyle calls for a piece of paper, and 
they can begin.
Critical Sociocultural Theory in Practice
Assume the authority as a teacher … helping them create the critical capac-
ity to consider and participate in the direction and dreams of education, 
rather than merely following blindly.
(Freire & Macedo, 1995, p. 379)
In this section, we define each of the five sociocultural principles of learning 
defined by Tharp et al. (2000), drawing connections to identity, power, and 
agency from Freirean thought. We explore how Critical Stance cast each of these 
sociocultural principles in a new light.
Joint Productive Activity
Joint Productive Activity, read through Critical Stance, flattens the power dynamic between 
teacher and students while developing agency through collaborative inquiry. A core tenet 
of sociocultural theory is that learning occurs in relationships between learners 
and MKO. Learners perform at higher levels with assistance from an MKO than 
they could on their own. Such mediation occurs in a learner’s zone of proxi-
mal development (ZPD) as a result of joint activity, when “experts and novices 
work together toward a common product or goal and … converse about it” 
(Tharp et al., 2000, p. 25). Products can be tangible, like a co-written letter, 
or intangible, like a shared discussion or exploration of a new idea. By taking 
shared ownership in a task, the MKO is modeling far more than task completion. 
50 Brandon J. Sherman and Annela Teemant
Joint activities provide opportunities for (a) encountering new ways of think-
ing and talking; (b) guided collaboration; and (c) competently participating in 
a social, cultural, and discourse context. Furthermore, joint activity increases 
participants’ potential to develop shared understandings of the world (i.e., inter-
subjectivity) by co-constructing meaning (Tharp, 2012).
Focusing on multiple perspectives and taking action with one’s sphere of 
influence, Critical Stance fits well with Joint Productive Activity. Critical Stance 
activities must be driven by learner—not teacher—priorities, values, and action 
(i.e., learner identity and agency). Yet, it can be challenging for learners to see 
themselves as having voice or taking action. Operating within the ZPD, the 
teacher can gradually increase learner responsibility (Pearson & Gallagher, 1983) 
by setting expectations and providing reduced support over time. In this way, 
the teacher can help students cultivate identities as change agents. As learners 
develop agentive perspectives, the teacher can gradually rebalance ownership of 
the task, allowing learners to take the lead.
Further, Tharp et al. (2000) note how roles and power relationships are cru-
cial for understanding learning activities. In sharing responsibility and direction 
in a task, a teacher can reduce power differentials between themselves and the 
learners within the bounds of that task, without surrendering or pretending to 
abdicate their role and authority. As Freire notes, a teacher acting as a facilita-
tor is still a teacher, holding institutional power (Freire & Macedo, 1995). Joint 
Activity with a Critical Stance reduces hierarchy in sharing the task rather than 
in the teacher’s overall role, helping to resolve this tensionin dialogic pedagogy.
The vignette above represents multiple joint activities with both tangible and 
intangible products. Learners brought their thoughts and perspectives about the 
text into play and learned from each other. The letter, a tangible product, was 
to be written by the group together. Lyle both directed and facilitated activities, 
never dominating, always sharing, and focusing on mediating students’ efforts. 
He shared in the activities while influencing students enough to keep them aca-
demically productive and challenged. While the idea for writing a letter came 
from Lyle, it was based on issues the students had raised. Lyle’s suggestion helped 
them see how they could be change agents.
Language and Literacy Development
Language and Literacy Development, read through Critical Stance, views meaning ful lan-
guage as authentic knowledge and power, which becomes a basis for action in the world. As 
a principle, language and literacy development focuses on teachers creating space 
for assisted academic language development and use. As Tharp et al. (2000) note, 
“Language development is best fostered through meaningful use and purposive 
conversation between teachers and students” (p. 24). Thus, language and literacy 
are central to learning, not merely as a tool for learning or a content area, but as a 
The Critical Space Between 51
vibrant sphere of interaction, growth, and culturally situated performance. From 
a Freirean perspective, academic language and literacy development are essential 
in educational rigor and power. Freire wrote of the transformative potential of 
“the word,” as both the constitutive element and essence of dialogue. For Freire 
(1994), “the word” consists of reflection and action or praxis. An “unauthentic 
word, one which is unable to transform reality” (p. 68) is a result of neglecting 
either dimension of praxis.
Freire (2016) noted, “The learning to read and write, necessarily associated 
with the development of the ability to express oneself, grows with the use of 
dynamic methods through which the teacher and learner alike seek to under-
stand the social practice in critical terms” (p. 78). Through Critical Stance, an 
educator makes academic language meaningful through reflection and power-
ful by transforming, or writing, the world. This view rejects ideas of literacy 
as objectively and inherently empowering, but rather as something socially and 
politically situated and negotiated (Street, 2013). Literacy education, according 
to Freire (2016), should not be “viewed as a kind of treatment to be applied to 
those who need it in order that they may be quickly cured of their infirmity” 
(p. 87). Rather than encountering academic language as an end in itself (as is 
often the standard in test-focused classrooms), students can understand language 
and literacy as a means to accomplish their goals and as a path to agency rather 
than status.
Lyle’s use of language and literacy activities in the above vignette was aca-
demically challenging. The reading material, adapted from real-world editorials, 
employed authentic language and argumentation that Lyle made sure to explore 
by eliciting student thought and speech. He connected the literacy activity to 
opinions students were forming on a genuine controversy, engaging them. They 
read not to comply but to encounter and challenge ideas. Writing a letter to the 
publisher amounted to challenging the status quo. Students likely did not know 
they had this power, given their traditional schooling.
Contextualization
Read through Critical Stance, Contextualization views learners as having legitimate 
knowledge, builds from their identity, and turns learning itself into the development of 
an agentive stance or identity in the world. Facts may exist in isolation, but knowledge 
and meaning do not. When teaching consists of “rules, abstractions, and verbal 
descriptions” (Tharp et al., 2000, p. 26), teachers are expecting learners to build 
knowledge on a foundation of air. Contextualization bolsters meaning making 
by connecting new concepts to learners’ existing experience and knowledge.
Freire, too, was concerned with education being abstracted away from lived 
experience. As he noted, “Implicit in the banking concept of education is the assump-
tion of a dichotomy between human beings and the world” (Freire, 1994, p. 56). 
52 Brandon J. Sherman and Annela Teemant
Banking education, as he presents it, is de-contextualized and inauthentic in 
removing the connection between academic knowledge and everyday life, neu-
tralizing its power for action in the world.
It is difficult to imagine enacting Critical Stance without integrating learner 
experience at the outset and connecting knowledge back to the learner’s world. 
In a sense, where contextualization calls for learning to incorporate experience 
and meaning from the world, Critical Stance takes this a step further by call-
ing on learners to integrate their experience back into the world in the form 
of agentive action. Thus, in Freirean terms, contextualized learning bridges 
the classroom and the world in a “dialectical relationship between the concrete 
context in which the practice takes place and the theoretical context in which 
critical reflection is done” (Freire, 2016, p. 86).
Though the students in our vignette did make incidental connections between 
the material and their daily life (including details not mentioned above), they 
strongly contextualized their learning within and against other materials they 
had encountered about Columbus. They viewed these texts as incomplete and 
inauthentic. Further, in writing a letter to the textbook publisher, the students 
took agentive action, striving to influence the world outside the classroom.
Challenging Activity
Challenging Activities, read through Critical Stance, develop cognitive complexity as part 
of an agentive stance to transform the world. As an EPL, challenging activities moves 
beyond teaching isolated facts and skills. Teaching complex thinking supports 
students in analyzing, elaborating, synthesizing, or employing metacognitive 
strategies (Dalton, 2008). It means getting to the “why” of something, uncov-
ering underlying logic, assumptions, and principles rather than accepting them 
at face value. It can also be evaluating competing perspectives or contradictory 
claims and “encouraging students to review and question their own and others’ 
beliefs and rationales” (Tharp et al., 2000, p. 30).
Tharp et al. note this requires teachers to maintain “a productive tension 
between support and challenge (2000, p. 30),” mediating within a learner’s ZPD 
to stretch performance without overtaxing the learner. For this reason, provid-
ing clear performance expectations and feedback are crucial for marking progress 
and maintaining learner motivation and resilience in the face of challenge. In 
particular, language learners are often deprived of cognitively challenging learn-
ing because their target language proficiency is all too often conflated with their 
cognitive ability (Bucholtz & Lee, 2017).
Freire (1994), like Vygotsky, rejected a transmission model of education, 
where knowledge is established and controlled. Freire proposed a “problem-
posing” model, which “involves a constant unveiling of reality” (p. 62) in 
dialogue. Ideally, such a curriculum would create opportunities for students to 
The Critical Space Between 53
see “themselves in the world and with the world” (p. 68). Moving toward greater 
(meta-) cognitive complexity means understanding “what should be known…
why it needs to be known, how, in benefit of what and in whose interest, as well 
as against what and whom” knowledge is learned (Freire, 2016, p. 87).
As a pedagogical practice, Critical Stance invites students to undertake a cog-
nitively complex endeavor, weighing multiple perspectives and challenging the 
status quo. As praxis, it requires an open-ended process of identifying problems,reflecting, and taking action. Therefore, Critical Stance challenges power in 
assessing and contesting what counts as legitimate knowledge (Foucault, 1980). 
This interrogation of accepted facts and representations of the world is central 
to Critical Stance. The ability to navigate multiple viewpoints, self-assess, and 
uncover invisible logics operating in the world allows learners to develop and 
manifest their identities, take power, and become agentive.
Lyle’s choice of text and topic was founded in cognitive complexity, present-
ing the students with multiple points of view and competing arguments. He 
expected students to evaluate and weigh these arguments and articulate their 
reactions to them. Lyle questioned them, pressing them to elaborate and pro-
vide support for their answers. Moreover, in challenging the textbooks, students 
began to challenge the authority and legitimacy of the knowledge they repre-
sented. Students then used these cognitive skills to write a letter to the textbook 
publisher, forming arguments for their position as agentive action.
Instructional Conversation
Read through Critical Stance, Instructional Conversation ensures knowledge and learning 
is lived as a dialogically social practice of reflection and action to develop an agentive stance. 
Among the EPL, Instructional Conversation is perhaps the most concrete in 
espousing dialogic learning and a specific classroom arrangement ( joint teacher/
student small groups). Instructional Conversation has the dual purpose of 
accomplishing an explicit academic goal in and through an authentic exchange 
of ideas. As a purposeful discussion, teachers assist learners through targeted 
language use and open-ended questioning to encourage elaboration and explore 
rationales (Dalton, 2008). Conducted well, the Instructional Conversation eas-
ily incorporates each of the preceding EPL and becomes a powerful setting for 
students to name, reflect, and formulate agentive action with teacher support.
Though dialogue is central to both Instructional Conversations and Freirean 
pedagogy, the term itself is not necessarily used in the same way. Freire and 
Macedo (1995) cautioned against an overemphasis on dialogue as form, focusing 
on turn-taking and a balance of speaking time. Freirean dialogue is not form, 
but a phenomenon occurring between individuals, mediated by conditions of 
the world to change the world (Freire, 1994). It is not a simple verbal exchange, 
but a purposeful sharing of views based on identity and experience in the world. 
54 Brandon J. Sherman and Annela Teemant
Participants in dialogue maintain a stance of epistemological curiosity, an open-
ness to other points of view, a willingness to understand (Freire & Macedo, 
1995).
An Instructional Conversation created around Critical Stance seeks devel-
opment of learners’ agentive positions in the world. It is both directed and 
open-ended: Directed in that the teacher brings a thematic focus, and open-ended 
in that the learners contribute with their own experience and goals, learning to 
develop and articulate priorities. A Critical Instructional Conversation should 
culminate in real action in the world based on what matters to participants. 
The teacher mediates this process dialogically, facilitating exchanges and main-
taining epistemological curiosity amongst group members. As Freire (1994) 
reminds us, “I cannot think for others or without others, nor can others think 
for me” (p. 89). The result should be authentic, organic, and empowering for 
participants.
The conversation in the vignette, organized around a text, is a fine example 
of dialogic exchange. With academic purpose, the students engaged with Lyle 
and each other, sharing ideas and building off of one another’s thoughts. Rather 
than following a clear turn-based structure, the exchange is messy, with students 
leaving sentences incomplete, only to be finished by someone else. The discus-
sion on whether the textbooks are lying represents one complete and complex 
thought expressed by four people (including Lyle). Further, Lyle demonstrates 
epistemological curiosity, an openness to understanding his student’s perspec-
tives while encouraging them to do the same.
Conclusion
We must do what we can today with whatever small resources we have. 
Only in this way will it be possible to do tomorrow what we could not 
do today.
(Freire, 2016, p. 104)
The scholarship of Vygotsky and Freire is vast and enduring. Critical and socio-
cultural perspectives are accepted as foundational to improving teaching and 
learning for historically marginalized and minoritized populations (e.g., Alim & 
Paris, 2017; Gottesman, 2016; Moll, 2001). However, as McLaren and Kincheloe 
(2007) assessed, we face the same challenges in the 21st century as we did in the 
20th century: How do we reframe schools as places of authentic learning? Current neo-
liberal practices have compounded the challenge of achieving authentic learning 
while raising the stakes for student exponentially. Teachers have been socialized 
to teach to the test, embrace compliance, and sacrifice critical thought as they 
enact scripted curricula. “Any concern with pedagogy—not what we learn but 
how we learn it—has virtually disappeared” (Leistyna, 2007, p. 99).
The Critical Space Between 55
Reframing ways of thinking and enacting literacy instruction for multi-
lingual students is a question of initial and ongoing professional learning for 
teachers and leaders. Critical and sociocultural perspectives have implications 
for curricula, pedagogy, and professional learning because educators and learners 
are part of a complex sociocultural, sociohistorical, and sociopolitical world that 
traditional schooling often ignores. Critical pedagogy, in particular, has strug-
gled as an approach to be simultaneously “intellectually rigorous and accessible 
to multiple audiences” (Kincheloe, 2007, p. 10).
In this chapter, we have argued for critical and sociocultural perspectives to 
be operationalized in tandem as pedagogical principles, foregrounding practice. 
The EPL focus on how learning occurs through collaboration, language use, 
contextualization, complex thinking, and authentic dialogue. By interpreting 
these principles of learning through Freire (1994, 2016), we demonstrate how 
learner identities, agency, and power dynamics in and outside the classroom can 
be woven and interwoven to ensure learning is a process of critical inquiry and 
becoming. As Vossoughi and Gutiérrez (2016) observed, Freirean perspectives 
make learning itself more “robust, equitable, and transformational” in “reshap-
ing lived social realities” (p. 140).
In the context of sustained pedagogical coaching, we illustrated with vignettes 
from Lyle’s classroom that a teacher can embrace critical sociocultural pedagogi-
cal practices to great effect. Through authentic dialogue, students expressed their 
hybrid identities, explored power dynamics, and had an opportunity to become 
agentive as they negotiated how Columbus Day was represented to them in mul-
tiple materials. Guided by the EPL, Lyle enacted practices of his own design that 
represented new ways of thinking (theory) and doing (behaviors).
To have any impact on the theory-practice divide, scholars committed to 
critical sociocultural perspectives must attend to the neglected link of translating 
complex theory into everyday pedagogical practices. Any discussion of refram-
ing multilingual literacy for the 21st century must also tackle the challenge of 
leading professional learning for teachers and leaders in coherent and sufficiently 
rigorous ways, at scale, to enact a new pedagogical paradigm, usurping the neo-
liberal market-oriented agenda currently undermining authentic teaching and 
learning. This chapter offers one example in which the critical and sociocultural 
have been woven together as practice, bringing into conversation how critical 
principles of learning redefine the space betweenteachers and students in pro-
ductive ways.
Note
 1 This work was supported by a National Professional Development Grant, US 
Department of Education’s Office of English Language Acquisition [T365Z170226]. 
All names used for educators are pseudonyms. We have no conflicts to disclose.
56 Brandon J. Sherman and Annela Teemant
References
Alim, H. S., & Paris, D. (2017). What is culturally sustaining pedagogy and why does it 
matter? In D. Paris & H. S. Alim (Eds.), Culturally sustaining pedagogies: Teaching and 
learning for justice in a changing world (pp. 1–21). Teachers College Press.
Barros, S. (2020). Paulo Freire in a hall of mirrors. Educational Theory, 70(2), 151–169. 
https://doi.org/10.1111/edth.12413
Bucholtz, M., & Lee, J. S. (2017). Language and culture as sustenance. In D. Paris & H. S. 
Alim (Eds.), Culturally sustaining pedagogies: Teaching and learning for justice in a changing 
world (pp. 43–59). Teachers College Press.
Dalton, S. S. (2008). Five standards for effective teaching: How to succeed with all learners, grades 
K-8. John Wiley & Sons.
Doherty, R. W., & Hilberg, R. S. (2007). Standards for effective pedagogy, classroom 
organization, English proficiency, and student achievement. The Journal of Educational 
Research, 101(1), 24–35. https://doi.org/10.3200/JOER.101.1.24-35
Esmonde, I. (2017). Power and sociocultural theories of learning. In I. Esmonde & 
A. Booker (Eds.), Power and privilege in the learning sciences: Critical and sociocultural theo-
ries of learning (pp. 6–27). Taylor & Francis.
Esmonde, I., & Booker, A. N. (2017). Toward critical sociocultural theories of learning. 
In I. Esmonde & A. Booker (Eds.), Power and privilege in the learning sciences: Critical and 
sociocultural theories of learning (pp. 162–174). Taylor & Francis.
Estrada, P. (2005). The courage to grow: A researcher and teacher linking professional 
development with small-group reading instructional and reading achievement. 
Research in the Teaching of English, 39, 320–364.
Foucault, M. (1980). Power/knowledge: Selected interviews and other writings, 1972-1977. 
Pantheon Books.
Freire, P. (1994). Pedagogy of the oppressed. Continuum.
Freire, P. (2000). Pedagogy of freedom: Ethics, democracy, and civic courage. Rowman & 
Littlefield.
Freire, P. (2016). Pedagogy in process: The letters to Guinea-Bissau. Bloomsbury Publishing.
Freire, P., & Macedo, D. (1995). A dialogue: Culture, language, and race. Harvard Educational 
Review, 65(3), 377–403. https://doi.org/10.17763/haer.65.3.12g1923330p1xhj8
Freire, P., & Macedo, D. (2005). Literacy: Reading the word and the world. Routledge.
Giroux, H. A. (1988). Teachers as intellectuals: Toward a critical pedagogy of learning. 
Greenwood Publishing Group.
Gottesman, I. (2016). The critical turn in education: From Marxist critique to poststructuralist 
feminism to critical theories of race. Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315769967
Kincheloe, J. L. (2007). Critical pedagogy in the twenty-first century: Evolution for 
survival. In P. McLaren & J. L. Kincheloe (Eds.), Critical pedagogy: Where are we now? 
(pp. 9–42). Peter Lang.
Kincheloe, J. L. (2008). Critical pedagogy primer. Peter Lang.
Leistyna, P. (2007). Neoliberal non-sense. In P. McLaren & J. L. Kincheloe (Eds.), Critical 
pedagogy: Where are we now? (pp. 97–123). Peter Lang.
Lewis, C., Enciso, P., & Moje, E. B. (2007). Reframing sociocultural research on literacy: 
Identity, agency, and power. Lawrence Erlbaum.
Lipman, P. (2006). “No child left behind”: Globalization, privatization, and the politics 
of inequality. In E. W. Ross & R. Gibson (Eds.), Neoliberalism and education reform 
(pp. 35–58). Hampton Press.
https://doi.org/10.1111/edth.12413
https://doi.org/10.3200/JOER.101.1.24-35
https://doi.org/10.17763/haer.65.3.12g1923330p1xhj8
https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315769967
The Critical Space Between 57
McLaren, P., & Kincheloe, J. L. (Eds.). (2007). Critical pedagogy: Where are we now? Peter 
Lang.
Mockler, N. (2013). Teacher professional learning in a neoliberal age: Audit, profession-
alism and identity. Australian Journal of Teacher Education, 38(10), 35–47.
Moll, L. C. (2001). Through the mediation of others: Vygotskian research on teach-
ing. In V. Richardson (Ed.), Handbook of research on teaching (4th ed., pp. 111–129). 
American Educational Research Association.
Morrell, E. (2017). Toward equity and diversity in literacy research, policy, and practice: 
A critical global approach. Journal of Literacy Research, 49(3), 454–463.
Newsela. (2017, November 6). PRO/CON: Should we celebrate Christopher Columbus? 
https://newsela.com/read/columbus-day-pro-con/id/36048/
Pearson, P. D., & Gallagher, M. C. (1983). The instruction of reading comprehension. 
Contemporary Educational Psychology, 8(3), 317–344. https://doi.org/10.1016/0361- 
476X(83)90019-X
Salazar, M. (2013). A humanizing pedagogy: Reinventing the principles and practices of 
education as a journal toward liberation. Review of Research in Education, 37, 121–148.
Saunders, W. M., & Goldenberg, C. (1999). The effects of instructional conversations and 
literature logs on the story comprehension and thematic understanding of English proficiency 
and limited English proficient students. UC Berkeley: Center for Research on Education, 
Diversity & Excellence.
Stetsenko, A. (2008). From relational ontology to transformative activist Stance on 
development and learning: Expanding Vygotsky’s (CHAT) project. Cultural Studies of 
Science Education, 3(2), 471–491. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11422-008-9111-3
Stetsenko, A. (2014). Transformative activist stance for education: The challenge of invent-
ing the future in moving beyond the status quo. In T. Corcoran (Ed.), Psychology in educa-
tion (pp. 181–198). SensePublishers. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-6209-566-3_12
Street, B. (2013). Social literacies: Critical approaches to literacy in development, ethnography and 
education. Routledge.
Taylor, L. A., & Hikida, M. (2020). Unpacking everyday critical pedagogy: Languaging 
critique and dialogue. Literacy research: Theory, method, and practice, 69(1), 266–284. 
https://doi.org/10.1177/2381336920937268
Teemant, A. (2018). Sociocultural theory as everyday practice: The challenge of K-12 
teacher preparation for multilingual and multicultural learners. In J. Lantolf & 
M. Poehner (Eds.), The Routledge handbook of sociocultural theory and second language
development (pp. 529–550). Routledge.
Teemant, A. (2020). Reframing the space between: Teachers and learners in context. 
Language Teaching Research, 24(1), 82–93. https://doi.org/10.1177/1362168818777527
Teemant, A., & Hausman, C. S. (2013). The relationship of teacher use of critical socio-
cultural practices with student achievement. Critical Education, 4(4). Retrieved from 
http://ojs.library.ubc.ca/index.php/criticaled/article/view/182434
Teemant, A., Leland, C., & Berghoff, B. (2014). Development and validation of a meas-
ure of Critical Stance for instructional coaching. Teaching and Teacher Education, 39, 
136–147. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.tate.2013.11.008
Tharp, R. G. (2006). Four hundred years of evidence: Culture, pedagogy, and native 
America. Journal of American Indiana Education, 45(2), 6–25.
Tharp, R. G. (2012). Delta theory and psychosocial systems: The practice of influence and change. 
Cambridge University Press.
https://newsela.com
https://doi.org/10.1016/0361-476X(83)90019-X
https://doi.org/10.1016/0361-476X(83)90019-X
https://doi.org/10.1007/s11422-008-9111-3
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-6209-566-3_12
https://doi.org/10.1177/2381336920937268
https://doi.org/10.1177/1362168818777527
http://ojs.library.ubc.ca
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.tate.2013.11.008
58 Brandon J. Sherman and Annela Teemant
Tharp, R., Estrada, P., Dalton, S., & Yamauchi, L. (2000). Teaching transformed: Achieving 
excellence, fairness, inclusion, and harmony. Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/ 
9780429496943
Vossoughi, S., & Gutiérrez, K. (2016). Criticalpedagogy and sociocultural theory. In 
I. Esmonde & A. Booker (Eds.), Power and privilege in the learning sciences: Critical and 
sociocultural theories of learning (pp. 138–161). Taylor & Francis.
Vygotsky, L. S. (1978). Mind in society: The development of higher psychological processes 
M. Cole, V. John-Steiner, S. Scribner, & E Souberman, Eds.). Harvard University 
Press.
Vygotsky, L. S. (1997). Educational psychology. St. Lucie Press.
Yolen, J. (1996). Encounter. Voyager Books.
https://doi.org/10.4324/9780429496943
https://doi.org/10.4324/9780429496943
DOI: 10.4324/9781003175728-5
4
TRANSFORMING PRIVILEGE
The Four R’s of Pedagogical Possibilities
Adam Howard, Patrick Dickert, 
Wallace Tucker, and Sam Jefferson
Introduction
Most elite schools across the world engage in community service practices, 
with ideas of altruism being prominently expressed in mission statements and 
integrated throughout curricula. Elite schools promote community service for 
various reasons such as providing students opportunities to ‘give back’ and to 
make a positive difference in their immediate and larger world, to learn how to 
take responsibility and further develop leadership skills, and to step outside their 
‘bubble of privilege’ to interact and form meaningful relationships with others 
different from themselves (e.g., Allan & Charles, 2014; Kenway et al., 2016). 
Much of the literature on such practices, however, concludes that the unequal 
relations of power reinscribed through these service activities limit the poten-
tial of these learning outcomes (Sriprakash, Qi & Singh, 2017). Most scholars 
consider these practices yet another means for elite schools to reinforce privilege 
(e.g., Prosser, 2016). Such practices avoid “reflection and action directed at the 
structures to be transformed” (Freire, 1970, p. 127).
Kenway et al. (2016), more specifically, argue that community service 
programs enable elite schools “to represent themselves as socially responsible 
institutions and to downplay, even disavow, their well-documented role in 
reproducing privilege” (p. 112); that is, the various forms of advantages particular 
individuals and groups have as well as a lens through which advantaged indi-
viduals and groups understand themselves, others, and the world around them 
(e.g., Howard, 2008). Similarly, privileged individuals’ involvement in benevo-
lent acts serves not only as a useful way of forming a more positive self-image 
but also has considerable ideological value in diverting attention away from their 
https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003175728-5
60 Adam Howard, Patrick Dickert, Wallace Tucker et al.
privileged circumstances that serves to protect, rationalize, and legitimize their 
advantages. As such, this raises the question about the possibilities of community 
service practices within elite spaces to provide the necessary educational process 
to transform privilege rather than a means to reproduce it.
Taking up this question, this chapter explores our efforts to engage students at 
Takau English School (TES),1 an elite secondary school in Taiwan, in a process 
aimed at transforming their understandings of self, others, and the world around 
them as they participated in a weeklong service trip teaching English to young 
children in aboriginal communities. Specifically, we explore the four tenets of 
this educational process to transform privilege: relevance, responsibility, rela-
tionships, and reflection. Building on previous work to explore the individual 
and cultural processes involved in constructing and cultivating privilege (e.g., 
Howard, Polimeno & Wheeler, 2014), we rely on a conception of privilege as 
identity in our efforts (see also, e.g., Seider, 2011). As an identity or an aspect of 
identity, privilege is a lens through which individuals with economic, social, and 
cultural advantages understand themselves, others, and the world around them. 
To think about privilege in this way is to underline the relationship between 
advantages and identity formation, and thus to understand the ways individuals 
actively construct and cultivate privilege, and the role of institutions in reinforc-
ing and reproducing privilege as a collective identity.
Our efforts during this service trip emanate from a multi-sited global eth-
nography of the lessons that students at elite schools around the world are taught 
through global citizenship education (GCE) about their place in the world, their 
relationships with others, and who they are at elite secondary schools across 
the world (e.g., Howard, 2020). The schools involved in this study were inten-
tionally selected for their differences in founding principles, overall mission, 
curriculum offerings, structures, affiliations, and geographic location. One 
strong commonality across all the schools was that they all overtly engaged with 
GCE as a main framework for educating their students. The project therefore 
largely focused on how global citizenship is defined, the lessons students learn 
about global citizenship and how these lessons shape these young people’s self-
understandings, how increasing global connections and imaginations impact 
students’ self-understandings, and the role that elite schools play in facilitating 
and mediating these influences.
These elite schools organize GCE around a set of practices and curricula 
inputs aimed at providing students with opportunities to develop awareness and 
knowledge of differences, to establish and maintain relationships across differ-
ences, to gain a sense of obligation toward others, and to accumulate valuable 
forms of human and cultural capital (Yemini & Maxwell, 2018). Located in a 
wealthy community of a large Taiwanese city, TES is an American day school, 
offering both the International Baccalaureate (IB) and Advanced Placement (AP) 
curricula while also ensuring their students get a US high school diploma. Even 
Transforming Privilege 61
though students are offered an option of which curriculum to follow, nearly 
85% of students are enrolled in the IB Programme. Students must hold non-
Taiwanese citizenship to apply, though the vast majority of the approximately 
three hundred students in the secondary school are Taiwanese but hold dual 
citizenship, enabling them to attend. The faculty of the school represents an 
international mix but most come from the United States and Canada. The 
annual tuition is nearly the same as the average Taiwanese household income 
and financial aid is not offered. Students enter through a selective admissions 
process based on assessment results, proficiency in English, and availability of 
space at specific grade levels. Because of the financial resources needed and the 
requirements to attend the school, TES student body is largely homogenous in 
terms of social class, ethnicity, and nationality. On average, 90% of graduates 
attend colleges and universities across the United States, 6% in other Northern 
countries (mostly the United Kingdom and Australia), and 4% in Asian countries 
(mainly China and Japan).
The findings of the study provided TES educators useful information to 
reflect on their practices, to dig deeper into what lessons they were actually 
teaching their students, and to reconsider what lessons they wanted their stu-
dents to learn (for further discussion, see Howard & Maxwell, 2018).
Although the findings suggested their global citizenship practices were pro-
viding their students positive and productive learning experiences, this research 
also confirmed what critics have argued: the skills, competences, and knowl-
edge developed through these experiences are mainly focused on securing 
and advancing elite status (e.g., Loh, 2016). Acknowledging that while critical 
impulses within these learning experiences (such as building awareness of others 
different from oneself and establishing relationships across differences) make an 
important move toward transforming the understandings of students at TES, 
overall,these forms of learning functioned to retrench rather than transform 
the various forces perpetuating power inequities (Pashby, 2011), and limited the 
possibilities for working toward such transformation.
Having discovered this misalignment between goals and practices, research-
ers and TES educators redirected the aims of the research project to engage in a 
justice-oriented collaboration to transform GCE, which drew upon and extended 
core principles and commitments of participatory action research efforts that 
study with elites within elite institutions (e.g., Stoudt, Fox & Fine, 2012). These 
collaborative efforts between researchers and TES educators concentrated on 
changing practices related to community service activities and trips, which are 
important components of their GCE.
As part of this work, we developed curriculum aimed at fostering students’ 
critical consciousness during a weeklong service trip in Taiwanese aboriginal 
communities. Our group engaged with the ideas of Paulo Freire in constructing 
this curriculum. Through this process, we took up the task of rethinking Freire’s 
62 Adam Howard, Patrick Dickert, Wallace Tucker et al.
pedagogical philosophy, as Freire (1994) insisted, to reinvent his ideas to fit the 
specific context and to translate his perspectives into a practicable approach 
for engaging students in this project. As discussed elsewhere in more detail 
(e.g., Howard, 2008) and addressed later in this chapter, we recognized going 
into these efforts particular barriers we would inevitably face in our efforts of 
employing Freire’s ideas to transform TES’ service programs, including parents’ 
resistance to the school ‘being too political’ and the demanding requirements 
of the IB Programme that defined and structured service activities and trips 
(for further discussion, see Howard & Maxwell, 2018). However, Freire’s ideas 
offered us a means to establish an epistemology to imagine beyond these barriers.
To nurture TES sudents’ critical consciousness during the service trip, the 
collective designed a process for students to develop individual and collective 
goals before the service trip, to work toward those goals during the experi-
ence, to engage in ongoing reflection and dialogue with other students and 
the researcher teaching the unit, to investigate questions emerging from their 
experiences, and to present their learning to others within the TES community. 
This unit centered on a video project that provided students opportunities to 
document their experiences and learning throughout the trip for the purpose 
of facilitating further reflection on their understandings of self and others, and 
exploration of questions related to privilege, oppression, and class and cultural 
differences. Through the interweaving of creative endeavor and collaborative 
production, the project was designed to be a medium for students to tackle dif-
ficult issues arising from their experiences jointly, openly, and head-on.
Service Trip
In 2009, Typhoon Morakot devastated aboriginal communities throughout the 
southern part of Taiwan and much of what brought income into the villages 
throughout this region. The high suspension bridges and hot springs owned by 
these communities, central tourist attractions, were destroyed by the winds and 
mudslides that occurred during the deadliest storm in Taiwan’s recorded his-
tory. These villages have yet to rebound from the disaster. Poverty continues to 
inflict loss and instability with an evident lack of economic mobility; the effects 
of these realities can be seen clearly through the limited educational opportuni-
ties available. Specifically, the highest level of education available is elementary 
school. For children to continue their education, they must leave their villages. 
Very few students decide to leave, but instead begin working at whatever jobs 
they can find to contribute to the survival of their families. Those few who do 
leave seldom return.
TES felt compelled to respond to the devastation that Morakot caused and 
approached schools in aboriginal communities most affected. Four elemen-
tary schools responded with a request to provide their students additional 
Transforming Privilege 63
opportunities to learn English. As a valuable form of cultural capital (Bourdieu, 
1986), the development of English language skills is an explicit focus in cur-
riculum throughout Taiwan. For disadvantaged groups specifically, developing 
English proficiency serves as a means of empowerment and addressing the divi-
sion between haves and have-nots (Crystal, 2003). Given that English is the 
primary language of instruction at TES, their students were viewed by the ele-
mentary schools as highly qualified to offer ideal learning opportunities for the 
aboriginal children. TES’ students have taught English to the children during 
this service trip for over a decade.
While at the sites, the TES students provided lessons to the aboriginal school-
children through multiple mediums such as songs in English as well as sports 
like basketball and volleyball to reinforce vocabulary. Sleeping and eating at 
the schools, the students spent nearly their entire days with the children. School 
hours lasted from the early morning to evening, and TES students ate every 
meal with the students and teachers. After classes ended, TES students interacted 
with the children and local community through recreation. The principal and 
headmaster at TES joined the students only for a brief visit once during the week. 
Because of this, in addition to their roles as facilitators of the learning process to 
transform privilege, Patrick, Wallace, and Sam served as chaperones. All three 
came to the project as Adam’s research assistants. Patrick and Sam speak and read 
Mandarin at a high-proficiency level, but like Wallace, they had never been to 
Taiwan prior to this experience. All three were born and raised in the United 
States where they also attended elite secondary schools and an elite liberal arts 
college. Wallace is African American, and Patrick and Sam are white. Despite 
differences in terms of race, ethnicity, and nationality, their educational and class 
backgrounds made them more like than different from TES students. In what 
follows, we focus on the four tenets that guided the teaching and learning process 
for the service trip. We conclude by considering the possibilities and limitations 
of our efforts. In the next section, we provide a brief overview of the service trip.
Relevance
TES students are offered multiple learning opportunities to think critically 
about their self-understandings and the concepts of social class and privilege. 
All of them engage in additional community service activities to meet gradua-
tion requirements. Students fulfill the community service requirements mostly 
through individual experiences and/or short-term projects – such as small 
fund-raising drives, volunteering at a local charitable provision, and traveling 
to other countries to undertake a small service project for an impoverished com-
munity. During interviews and focus group discussions, students reported that 
these activities were meaningful learning experiences, helping them to gain 
knowledge about the realities of others different from themselves and their 
64 Adam Howard, Patrick Dickert, Wallace Tucker et al.
own advantaging circumstances. Furthermore, through the school’s focus on 
GCE, students are provided opportunities in the classroom context aimed at 
“develop[ing] an awareness of global connectedness, a reflective distancing from 
one’s own cultural affiliations, and an orientation of openness towards [individu-
als different from themselves]” (Langmann, 2011, p. 400). For most students, 
their classes in the IB Programme also aim to provide experiences to think 
critically about self and others, and to gain knowledge of various issues related 
to differences, including social class (for further discussion on theseefforts, see 
Howard & Maxwell, 2021).
Although meaningful, these experiences mainly focus on building new 
knowledge rather than forming or transforming understanding. Having these 
forms of knowledge allows privileged individuals in many ways to maintain an 
abstract, impersonal distance from the very inequalities and injustices that they 
learn about; they see these topics as more relevant to the lives of others different 
from themselves and often outside their immediate context than to their own 
lives and experiences (Howard, 2011). These prior learning experiences rarely 
provide opportunities to form understandings, which, as Swalwell (2013) points 
out, “a willingness to implicate oneself in the issue at hand—a much more dif-
ficult task” (p. 25). Even in activities purportedly designed to increase one’s 
understanding of their privilege and the oppression of others, such as the service 
trip described in this chapter, students are often positioned in ways to take the 
relatively easier option of building knowledge of privilege and oppression rather 
than establishing a connection between these concepts and their lives.
To make this connection, Freire (1970) insists that we must adopt a problem-
posing approach whereby people are understood as conscious beings in relation 
to the world. From a Freirean perspective, teaching involves calling students’ 
attention to issues such as those related to privilege and oppression as matters of 
ethical choice and not merely as the result of some sort of societal determinism. 
Freire (1973) believes that teachers should work to help students make con-
crete connections between concepts and what is happening around them. The 
responsibility of a teacher is to use students’ experiences as a basis for facilitating 
a process necessary for students to work toward critical consciousness.
In working toward critical consciousness, Freire (1970) believes that people 
should learn to question society and see through versions of “truths” that teach 
people to accept unfairness and injustice. The process of working toward criti-
cal consciousness establishes the link between concepts and students’ lives. This 
process required us to find common ground with TES students and meeting 
them where they were rather than where we, as facilitators of the experience, 
wanted them to be. We found this common ground, for example, by connect-
ing the concepts to what was most pressing in their minds during the time, 
which revolved around them leaving home and going off to university in the 
near future. We connected the experiences of the service trip with those in their 
Transforming Privilege 65
immediate future. These connections opened up possibilities for making the ser-
vice experience relevant to TES students’ own life experiences. We aligned the 
discussions and activities to advance TES students’ understandings of privilege 
and oppression with their own needs and interests in providing, as bell hooks 
(1994) reminds us, “the necessary conditions where learning can most deeply 
and intimately begin” (p. 14).
Responsibility
“In the past, students did almost all the planning for the service trip,” the high 
school principal explained, “I wouldn’t say they’re completely on their own 
but almost.” Although the senior service trip was commonly referred to as the 
“culminating learning experience” for TES students and, according to the head-
master, “[the school’s] final effort to depart valuable lessons that we’ve tried to 
teach them over the years,” teachers and other school officials played a minimal 
role throughout the process. Students, instead, took on most of the work and 
made most decisions necessary for making the service trip happen; students were 
given considerable responsibility at all stages of this learning experience – both 
in the sense of authority/control and task/work.
In our efforts to foster the pedagogical process for students to work toward 
critical consciousness of their privilege and the relationship between their advan-
tages and others’ disadvantages, we acknowledged that it is necessary for us to 
assume a more significant role. Although we wanted students to continue having 
responsibility, we recognized that such a process requires intentional efforts on 
the part of educators to confront and transform students’ understandings (Freire, 
1993). Since critical consciousness is an ongoing, purposefully motivated pro-
cess of reflecting, critiquing, affirming, challenging, and acting that ultimately 
transforms individuals’ understandings (Freire, 1970), one of our major tasks is 
to facilitate “the process through which students learn to critically appropri-
ate knowledge existing outside their immediate experience in order to broaden 
their understanding of themselves, the world, and the possibilities for transform-
ing the taken-for-granted assumptions about the way we live” (McLaren, 1989, 
p. 186). This educational approach nurtures students’ curiosity and imagination 
and serves to motivate and reinforce their creativity in developing a greater criti-
cal capacity to construct new understandings (Darder, 2002).
Freire articulates a vision by which teachers employ pedagogical methods in 
the interest of liberation. As Darder (2002) explains, “Such a transformational 
vision clearly requires that teachers abandon authoritarian structures and rela-
tionships that silence students and conditions their uncritical acceptance and 
conformity to the status quo” (p. 102). Teachers must use the power that is 
inherent in their role, instead, in the interest of forging democratic relationships 
(Freire, 1998b) that support and cultivate students’ experiences in their efforts of 
66 Adam Howard, Patrick Dickert, Wallace Tucker et al.
developing new understandings. Educators cannot manipulate their students nor 
leave them alone in this process.
Teachers take on the responsibility of creating moments that guide students 
in the development of new understandings: “We can’t sit back and wait for stu-
dents to put all the knowing together. We have to take the initiative and set an 
example for doing it” (Shor & Freire, 1987, p. 158).
Key to Freire’s (1970) view is the conviction that both teachers and students 
contribute meaningfully to all aspects of the educational process, providing the 
conditions for cultivating a sense of ownership of that process. An overriding 
political objective of Freire is to overturn those circumstances that restrict com-
munication between individuals and treat some people as knowers and others as 
receptacles. A necessary condition for fostering critical consciousness is that no 
one has a greater capacity to contribute than anyone else. This requires everyone 
involved to take on the responsibility “to opt, to decide, to struggle, to be politi-
cal” (Freire, 1998a, p. 53) in making sense of the world and altering the world 
through their actions. In so doing, as Freire (1970) argues, everyone becomes 
“jointly responsible for a process in which all grow” (p. 67).
Throughout the process, we challenged TES students to interrogate their 
decisions on the video project and to excavate the meanings attached to those 
decisions. Specifically, we identified a problematic pattern that emerged when 
TES students first started working on their video projects. They took what the 
facilitators described as a ‘voyeuristic approach’ to capturing footage of what 
they were learning through this experience, unintentionally othering the chil-
dren and other members of the village. The facilitators posed questions that 
provoked students to think more critically about their work which enabled them 
to make different kinds of decisions about their project thereafter. Our aim was 
to focus on the underlying intent and purpose of their actions to think more 
critically about themselves and others (Shor & Freire, 1987). Our collaboration 
on each other’s video projects, for example, opened new avenues for developingnew insights on not only our role in this process but the role each other played. 
Through our collective efforts, we directed our attention toward the responsi-
bility that each of us had in creating this shared experience.
Relationships
In their daily lives, TES students are mostly insulated from such forms of 
human suffering as poverty, homelessness, and hunger. Frequently clustered in 
class-segregated contexts – what they refer to as the ‘bubble’ – they have little 
contact with the different life circumstances of so many others even in their 
own communities. Because of this, they have limited opportunity to connect 
with and subsequently care about individuals outside their own groups. Without 
these relationships, affluent individuals, like TES students, tend to have little 
Transforming Privilege 67
understanding of their own advantages and the oppression suffered by disadvan-
taged groups. The service trip, therefore, offers TES students experiences that 
they normally do not have to step outside their privileged ‘bubble’ to interact 
and develop relationships with others different from themselves.
As a collective endeavor, the service trip also allows students to form closer 
connections with each other, thus, enabling them, among other things, to gain 
deeper appreciation for collaborative relationships. Such opportunities to build 
more meaningful relationships among individuals within their own group and 
with those different from themselves can present students with valuable learning 
experiences to understand and appreciate different ways of knowing and doing. 
They can be provided the necessary educational context for encountering and 
becoming aware of competing taken-for-granted assumptions that give meaning 
to individuals’ lives, different values and worldviews that influence action and 
decisions, and varied questions about self, others, and the world around them. 
These relationships can support students in working toward critical consciousness.
Freire sees efforts toward critical consciousness as a social enterprise: people 
form their ideas through collective action and dialogue. Building meaning-
ful relationships plays an incredibly important role in this process. As Freire 
(1970) argues, transformative efforts should not be “carried out in isolation or 
individualism, but only in fellowship and solidarity” (p. 73). For Freire (1973), 
relationships are made possible particularly through dialogue, a “relation 
of ‘empathy’ between two ‘poles’ who are engaged in a joint search” (p. 45). 
Freire deploys dialogue in efforts to provoke critical consciousness and to cre-
ate spaces where facts are analyzed, causes are reconsidered, and responsibility 
is reconceived in political contexts (Weis & Fine, 2004). Freire (1970) argues 
that this form of “dialogue requires an intense faith in [others], faith in their 
power to make and remake, to create and re-create” (p. 79). Such faith is vital 
for individuals to contend with conflicts and differences that inherently emerge 
through dialogue. Facilitators used the video footage that they and TES stu-
dents generated to facilitate such dialogue. Specifically, they shared their own 
video reflections with students not only to emphasize critical questions that they 
wanted TES students to explore in their own projects but also to build trust 
between them and TES students. The facilitators demonstrated that they trusted 
TES students enough to share their own (usually messy) process for making 
sense of the experience, which invited them to do the same.
Dialogue also requires knowing the meanings others use to mediate their 
worlds. In the context of teaching, Freire (1998b) explains, “[Educators] need 
to know the universe of their [students’] dreams, the language with which they 
skillfully defend themselves from the aggressiveness of their world, what they 
know independently of the school, and how they know it” (p. 73). With this 
knowledge, teachers can provide students the necessary support in reflecting on 
their lives and experiences and making decisions for transforming their world. 
68 Adam Howard, Patrick Dickert, Wallace Tucker et al.
Reflection and action are informed by this knowledge; thus, as Darder (2002) 
explains, “dialogue could never be reduced to blind action, deprived of inten-
tion and purpose” (p. 46).
Knowledge, however, is not static, but instead a living process that grows 
and transforms within contexts informed by dialogue (Freire & Faundez, 1989). 
As facilitators, we remained mindful of the ways in which new understandings 
are actively produced and emerge out of relationships. Throughout the experi-
ence, for example, we created opportunities for TES students to step outside the 
service context to establish meaningful connections with community members. 
As TES students encountered unfamiliar and uncomfortable situations, dialogue 
provoked new understandings that forged collective action and established closer 
relationships within the group. Through action and dialogue, students began to 
think more critically about themselves and others.
Reflection
The heart of the TES mission statement is “to prepare students to be balanced 
individuals, independent learners, and global citizens.” In working toward this, 
the school emphasizes learning experiences, such as those attached to commu-
nity service activities, athletics, cocurricular activities, and curriculum, that 
foster the habits of heart and mind to be “passionate, curious, critical thinkers, 
aware, ethical, and cooperative.” For example, the school provides ample oppor-
tunities for students to work together within (such as working on group projects) 
and outside the classroom context (such as being on a sports team). Although 
becoming reflective is not stated directly in the school’s mission, the headmaster 
claimed, “We also want our students to be reflective learners; reflection is essen-
tial for getting to these other parts of learning like critical thinking, awareness, 
and finding your passions. [Reflection] is just what we do here.”
Through the IB Programme, TES students are regularly engaged in activities 
and practices that promote reflection within and outside the classroom con-
text. More specifically, one main goal of the IB curriculum is for students to: 
“thoughtfully consider the world and [their] own ideas and experiences … [and] 
work to understand [their] strengths and weaknesses in order to support [their] 
learning and personal development” (IBO, 2017). To guide students through 
this process, teachers use different forms of reflection, such as writing about an 
experience to address particular ideas or themes connected to that experience, 
participating in guided discussion, and a combination of reflection forms (verbal, 
written, and artistic). As often-recommended strategies, these reflection prac-
tices are generally used at TES after the experience to promote deeper meaning of 
that experience.
In the process of working toward critical consciousness, however, individu-
als need to maintain a reflective stance throughout the experience. In so doing, 
Transforming Privilege 69
reflection allows participants to identify the possibilities for change in situations 
that they encounter and experience. Ongoing reflection, as Freire (1970) points 
out, facilitates how people come to view those situations as “realities” whether 
as something impossible to change, something that is feared to be changed, or 
perhaps something that could be changed. The capacity to view realities as pos-
sibilities to ignite action and change necessitates reflection that brings together 
individual and collective efforts to excavate conflicting and similar understand-
ings and necessary questions to make sense of those realities. Through reflection, 
Freire (1970) argues, individuals become more capable of transforming those 
realities by “see[ing] the world not as a static reality, but as a reality in process, 
in transformation”Elites: Class Privilege and Educational Advantage, and 
Negotiating Privilege and Identity in Educational Contexts.
Sam Jefferson was a research assistant in the Education Department at Colby 
College where he earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in economics with minors in 
Contributors’ Biographies xiii
educational studies and mathematics. He is pursuing a Master’s degree in finance 
at University College London.
Heather Linville, PhD, is Associate Professor and TESOL Director at the 
University of Wisconsin, La Crosse. Her research explores how teachers act as 
advocates for English learners and how personal, experiential, and contextual 
factors influence advocacy beliefs and actions. Heather’s most recent publication 
is the co-edited volume (with James Whiting) Advocacy in English Language 
Teaching and Learning (Routledge, 2019). She has traveled and worked in 
Chile, China, Indonesia, Japan, Mexico, and Panama, among other locations.
Catherine McCarthy currently lives and works as a first-grade teacher in 
Minneapolis, Minnesota. After completing her Master’s degree and initial 
licensure in Elementary Education at the University of Minnesota—Twin Cities, 
she now hopes to keep building a love of learning and passion for change in her 
students through action research.
Michele L. McConnell, PhD has twenty-two years of combined experience 
in teaching English and English as a second language for high school and 
community colleges, and teacher education courses at a four-year university. She 
has designed and facilitated international master’s level courses for pre-service 
teachers and designed and facilitated online courses in educational equity and 
social justice. She uses ethnographic methodologies and critical race theory to 
study pedagogy and technology in secondary English classrooms. She currently 
serves as the Director of the MAT at Fresno Pacific University.
Cori McKenzie (PhD, Michigan State University) is an Assistant Professor 
of Adolescence English Education in the Department of English at SUNY 
Cortland, USA. She teaches pedagogical methods courses for pre-service 
teachers. Her current research considers how affect theory might help scholars 
and teachers to reimagine both teacher education and the secondary English 
Language Arts classroom.
Maria Camila Mejía-Vélez holds a Master of Teaching English to Speakers 
of Other Languages from La Trobe University, Melbourne, Australia. She is 
currently an English teacher at two undergraduate programs from Universidad 
EAFIT and Universidad de Medellín. She is also a course coordinator and 
curriculum designer in one of the programs and works part time as an English 
teacher at an elementary school. She has been part of the Literacies in Second 
Languages Project (LSLP) research lab at U.P.B since 2013, where she has 
gotten engaged with different projects of literacy practices in Colombia. Maria 
Camila’s research interests are centered on the integration of critical literacy and 
language critical theories in early childhood education, as well as social justice 
in education.
Kelly Metz-Matthews is the Faculty Learning Coordinator for San Diego City 
College, where she also serves as faculty in the English and English Language 
Acquisition departments. Kelly has spent nearly a decade teaching across the 
disciplines of English, English for speakers of other languages, and teacher 
education in both the community college system and the four-year university 
system. She has served as an English Language Fellow with the US Department 
of State and as a San Diego Area Writing Project Fellow. Kelly’s research 
interests center on teacher navigation of language ideologies in multilingual 
classrooms, gendered access to linguistic resources, and how English functions 
as a form of gendered symbolic power for multilingual women in postcolonial 
and patriarchal contexts.
Raúl Alberto Mora (PhD in Language and Literacy, University of Illinois 
at Urbana-Champaign) is an Associate Professor of language education and 
literacy studies at Universidad Pontificia Bolivariana in Medellín, Colombia. 
His research focuses on the critical rewriting of literacies theory in second-
language learning and teaching (the notion of “literacies in second languages”) 
and the use of sociocritical theories to question existing frameworks in language 
education today. At U.P.B., Dr. Mora chairs the Literacies in Second Languages 
Project (LSLP) research lab and teaches undergraduate- and graduate-level 
courses on language teaching methods, qualitative research, and introduction 
to critical theory. In addition, Dr. Mora is one of the founding members of 
the Transnational Critical Literacies Network and co-editor of The Handbook of 
Critical Literacies (Routledge, 2021) and was a recipient of the Divergent Award 
for Excellence in 21st-Century Literacies Research in 2019.
Gina Mikel Petrie, a Professor at Eastern Washington University, prepares 
pre-service teachers to instruct English language learners. She received her 
PhD in Education from Washington State University in 2005 and her MA in 
Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages from Indiana University in 
1995. She researches the sociocultural contexts within which language learning 
and teaching and teacher professional development occur.
Andrea da Silva Marques Ribeiro is an Associate Professor at the State 
University of Rio de Janeiro (UERJ), where she teaches English at middle 
and high schools as well as didactic subjects in undergraduate courses. She is a 
permanent member of the Postgraduate Program in Basic Education Teaching 
at the Institution of Application CAp-UERJ. She has a doctorate in Applied 
xiv Contributors’ Biographies
Linguistics and Language Studies at the Pontifical Catholic University of São 
Paulo (PUC-SP) and a Master’s in Education at UERJ.
Amanda Montes is an Assistant Professor in the Bilingual-Bicultural Education 
program at Northeastern Illinois University in Chicago, IL. She holds a PhD 
in Applied Linguistics from Arizona State University. Her areas of interest 
include examining bilingual educators from culturally and linguistically diverse 
backgrounds, language attitudes, culturally responsive teaching, liberatory 
pedagogy, and arts integration in bilingual education settings.
Autumn E. Sanders is an undergraduate student at the University of Minnesota 
majoring in microbiology and minoring in public health and teaching English 
as a second language. She is a volunteer English teacher at the Hmong American 
Partnership and the Franklin Learning Center in Minneapolis.
Brandon Sherman (PhD, Penn State, 2016) is the Research Project Manager for 
the US Department of Education grant-funded initiative, Partnering for Radical 
School Improvement. His research interests include critical and sociocultural 
pedagogies, nonlinear theoretical approaches to educational research, and 
dialogic interaction. His current research focuses on pedagogical coaching, 
professional learning, and equitable family/community/school partnerships.
Carrie Symons (PhD, University of Michigan, 2015) is an Assistant Professor of 
Language and Literacy in the Department of Teacher Education and an affiliated 
faculty member in the Second Language Studies Program at Michigan State 
University, USA. As a community-engaged scholar, Carrie’s research focuses 
on the development of, and inquiry into, innovative instructional practices that 
promote additive acculturation, reduce xenophobia, and amplify multilingual, 
immigrant-origin youth’s voices.
Amanda J. Swearingen is a doctoral student in Curriculum and Instruction 
with a specialization in Second Language Education at the University of 
Minnesota, where she teaches in the teaching English as a second language 
(TESL) undergraduate program and serves as a research assistant on multiple 
projects. She received her MA in TESL from the University of Texas at San 
Antonio and a BA in Latin American Studies from Tulane(p. 71).
As such, critical reflection makes action possible and initiates change. For 
Freire, reflection is not simply about deepening understanding but instead part 
of making a difference in the world; therefore, reflection is deeply connected to 
action. Central to his ideas is praxis, a dialectic process of constant movement 
between reflection and action “directed at the structures to be transformed” 
(Freire, 1970, p. 126). Reflection without action, according to Freire, is verbal-
ism or idle chatter, and action without reflection is simply action for action’s sake. 
For Freire, praxis is “a central defining feature of human life and a necessary 
condition of freedom” and he argued that “human nature is expressed through 
intentional, reflective, meaningful activity situated within dynamic historical and 
cultural contexts that shape and set limits on that activity” (Glass, 2001, p. 16).
Reflection, therefore, is necessary not only for naming the world (in particu-
lar, what limits activity and makes activity possible) but also acting to change 
it. We used, for example, daily video logs to facilitate reflection on lessons and 
activities, interactions with the children and each other, challenges such as the 
language or cultural barriers that we encountered, and any impressions the 
experience left on our understandings of our privilege. During debriefing ses-
sions of these video logs, we posed questions to provoke critical reflection aimed 
at leading TES students to develop deeper understandings of the meanings 
attached to their experiences and to look beyond the differences between them 
and the children to identify significant similarities. In the process of discovering 
these connections, TES students became motivated to change their actions for 
such purposes as building more meaningful relationships with the children and 
improving their lessons, thus, highlighting the symbiotic relationship between 
reflection and action (Freire, 1993).
Critical Openings
TES students’ final projects and debriefing discussions about their experiences 
after the trip confirmed what we had sensed in working with them: this process, 
to varying degrees, broadened their understandings of themselves and others 
70 Adam Howard, Patrick Dickert, Wallace Tucker et al.
to imagine beyond their taken-for-granted ways of knowing and doing.2 More 
specifically, they reported that by connecting their personal experiences to issues 
of privilege, they gained a deeper awareness of that concept. They also attrib-
uted their increased awareness to the meaningful relationships they developed 
with both the children and us through this experience and the questions posed 
to them that connected theoretical concepts related to privilege to their expe-
riences and lives. They acknowledged our efforts not only to serve as teachers 
but also equal contributors to the service project provided a useful model for 
questioning, analyzing and reflecting on their actions and relationships during 
the trip.
While participating in the service trip, TES students found themselves pay-
ing more attention to the everyday experiences of those living in the villages 
that allowed them to form deeper understanding of their own advantaging life 
circumstances. Particularly, they realized more fully that not everyone enjoys 
the advantages that they had taken for granted. Most importantly, they began 
to acknowledge that the opportunities available to them and their success in 
schooling and other spheres of their lives were not purely the result of their own 
efforts and attributes. During the trip, for example, they attributed particular 
traits to the aboriginal children such as ‘bright,’ ‘hardworking,’ and ‘outgoing’ – 
the same traits they attached to success. Upon further reflection, they realized 
that these qualities did not necessarily result in success. This realization gave 
rise to more critical discussions and surfaced questions during reflections about 
the role that life and schooling advantages played in their own success and the 
ways in which disadvantages impeded success (at least how they understood suc-
cess). The TES students began to break through assumptions upon which they 
evaluated success, and reflected more critically, as one student described, “on the 
disparity of resources, education, and other factors that the indigenous kids and 
we have and how this relates to opportunities for success.” As another student 
similarly described, “the aboriginal children don’t have the same chances as we 
have and always had that we just for granted.”
The TES students’ heightened awareness of life and schooling circumstances 
different from their own led to more critical understandings of how their advan-
tages influence their perceptions. It became evident to the students, for example, 
that what they considered ‘normal’ in their daily lives (more specifically, par-
ticular values, perspectives, assumptions, and actions) is not shared by all, but 
in fact, primarily associated with their own class group. Preconceived notions 
shaped by and filtered through sources connected to their advantages (such as 
schooling and family) were challenged by critically reflecting on their experi-
ences, which provided the necessary conditions for different understandings to 
emerge.
One student, for instance, remarked that our discussions during the service 
trip “made me realize that it’s easier for me to benefit from life when somebody 
Transforming Privilege 71
is in my [social class] position. You get this social conditioning that makes it hard 
to realize that.” Another student similarly recognized, “Because my family is 
relatively rich, I can go to an international school and receive an education that 
is just not possible for a lot of people. I hadn’t thought about that until now.” 
Through ongoing reflection, TES students arrived at the crucial realization, 
as one student put it, “that we can’t think we know everything … it’s really 
important to learn things beyond what we think is normal.” Students reported 
that through this process they developed the habits of heart and mind to ques-
tion everyday assumptions and to be more mindful of their advantages and the 
disadvantages of others. As a student explained, “This wasn’t like a trip that 
just shocked me and I just saw how lucky and blessed I am. It was way more 
than that. I learned that you have to build up habits. You just can’t question and 
notice things when they’re really obvious. You have to do that every day. It has 
to become a habit.”
Students reported that this process provided them the kinds of learning expe-
riences to develop relationships across differences, through which they deepened 
their understandings of self and others. The relationships formed with the abo-
riginal children and us and the closer bonds established with other TES students 
taught them valuable lessons about what it means to develop and maintain rela-
tionships with others different from and similar to themselves. Additionally, 
through the horizontal relationships we formed with the TES students, they 
recognized that hierarchies are not necessary for relationships. As one student 
recounted, “You acted like an authority and a peer at the same time,” which 
allowed the students to position themselves as both teachers and learners. By 
setting an example of openness and honesty that encouraged the students to 
engage in deeper, more critical dialogue, the students felt empowered to think 
otherwise about what it takes to create and maintain relationships.
Transformative Possibilities
The four tenets discussed in the above sections constructed an educational means 
for TES students to form different ways of thinking about themselves, others, 
and the world around them. The framework designed around these tenets cre-
ated transformative possibilities for privileged students. Through a process that 
provides opportunities for students to build meaningful relationships,to make 
connections between theoretical concepts and their lives, to take responsibility 
in constructing and giving meaning to that process, and to maintain a reflective 
stance, students are provided the kinds of learning experiences necessary for 
developing more critical self-understandings.
While our efforts provided TES students with meaningful learning experi-
ences, it is important to acknowledge the limits of these efforts. As scholars 
point out (e.g., Kumashiro, 2002), sharing alternative perspectives and leading 
72 Adam Howard, Patrick Dickert, Wallace Tucker et al.
students toward new understandings do not always bring about change. Students 
enter learning experiences, like the service trip described in this chapter, with 
a well-established sense of self. Those self-understandings influence how they 
think and what they know or decide not to know even when teachers open up 
pedagogical possibilities for transforming those understandings. Students from 
privileged groups, specifically, are socialized to accept (and defend) particular 
understandings of themselves, others, and the world around them – that protect 
their privileged ways of knowing and doing.
Similarly, we need to consider how these experiences facilitated yet another 
means for legitimizing privilege. As mentioned at the beginning of this article, 
working toward individual transformation within elite spaces has consider-
able ideological value in diverting attention away from the advantages of those 
involved in such efforts; thus, potentially legitimizing (and thus reinforcing) the 
very thing we aim to transform (e.g., Gaztambide-Fernández & Howard, 2013). 
Moreover, because the service trip was relatively short, the influence of this pro-
cess on their self-understandings was limited; students need additional learning 
opportunities to build on what they started through this process. As such, it will 
take intentional efforts on the part of educators (within and outside the school-
ing context) to provide them opportunities to learn more and further develop 
their understandings.
Through the process of developing the educational framework outlined in 
this chapter and then putting the tenets of that framework into practice during 
the service trip, TES teachers became more equipped to provide such learning 
opportunities (see Howard & Maxwell, 2018). This framework provides teach-
ers a conceptual framework to foster the kinds of learning experiences necessary 
for working toward critical consciousness. Our efforts at TES are ongoing; we 
continue our collaboration with teachers to develop this framework further. 
We are engaged in a continuous process, seeking to create more critical prac-
tices in other service activities. In our endeavors to open up new pedagogical 
possibilities, we realize that sometimes our commitments do not always result 
in anticipated outcomes – positive or negative. Yet, we must persist in our 
efforts to transform practices that reinforce privilege in elite spaces in working 
toward building the kind of just world through education that Freire invites 
and challenges us to create (Nurenberg, 2011). We must continue to move 
toward a future yet to be imagined. Transformational work, it is worth noting, 
never ends.
Notes
 1 Pseudonym.
 2 Here we only discuss what TES students gained from the experience and do not 
focus on what the children and teachers at the aboriginal schools gained. We did not 
have approval to study the children and teachers at the aboriginal schools.
Transforming Privilege 73
References
Allan, A., & Charles, C. (2014). Cosmo girls: Configurations of class and femininity in 
elite educational settings. British Journal of Sociology of Education, 35(3), 333–352.
Bourdieu, P. (1986). The forms of capital. In J. F. Richardson (Ed.), Handbook of theory of 
research for sociology of education (pp. 241–258). Westport, CT: Greenwood Press.
Crystal, D. (2003). English as a global language, 2nd ed. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge 
University Press.
Darder, A. (2002). Reinventing Paulo Freire: A pedagogy of love. Boulder, CO: Westview 
Press.
Freire, P. (1970). Pedagogy of the oppressed. New York, NY: Seabury Press.
Freire, P. (1973). Education for critical consciousness. New York, NY: Seabury Press.
Freire, P. (1993). Pedagogy of the city. New York, NY: Continuum.
Freire, P. (1994). Pedagogy of hope: Reliving pedagogy of the oppressed. New York, NY: 
Continuum.
Freire, P. (1998a). Pedagogy of freedom: Ethics, democracy, and civic courage. Lanham, MD: 
Rowman and Littlefield.
Freire, P. (1998b). Teachers as cultural workers: Letters to those who dare teach. Boulder, CO: 
Westview Press.
Freire, P., & Faundez, A. (1989). Learning to question: A pedagogy of liberation. New York, 
NY: Continuum.
Gaztambide-Fernández, R., & Howard, A. (2013). Social justice, deferred complicity, 
and the moral plight of the wealthy. Democracy & Education, 21(7), Article 7.
Glass, R. (2001). On Paulo Freire’s philosophy of praxis and the foundations of liberation 
education. Educational Researcher, 30(2), 15–25.
hooks, b. (1994). Teaching to transgress: Education as the practice of freedom. New York, NY: 
Routledge.
Howard, A. (2008). Learning privilege: Lessons of power and identity in affluent schooling. 
New York, NY: Routledge.
Howard, A. (2011). Privileged pursuits of social justice: Exploring privileged college 
students’ motivation for engaging in social justice. Journal of College and Character, 
12(2), 1–14.
Howard, A. (2020). Globally elite: Four domains of becoming globally-oriented within 
elite schools. Educational Review. 1–19. DOI: 10.1080/00131911.2020.1805412
Howard, A., & Maxwell, C. (2018). From conscientization to imagining redistribu-
tive strategies: Social justice collaborations in elite schools. Globalisation, Societies, and 
Education, 16(4), 526–540.
Howard, A., & Maxwell, C. (2021). East meets West: Cultural negotiations between 
parents and staff at a Taiwanese elite school. Multicultural Education Review, 13(2), 
109–127.
Howard, A., Polimeno, A., & Wheeler, B. (2014). Negotiating privilege and identity in edu-
cational contexts. New York, NY: Routledge.
International Baccalaureate Organization (2017). What is an IB education? Geneva: 
Author.
Kenway, J., Fahey, J., Epstein, D., Koh, A., McCarthy, C., & Rizvi, F. (2016). Class 
choreographies: Elite schools and globalization. London: Palgrave Macmillan.
https://doi.org/10.1080/00131911.2020.1805412
74 Adam Howard, Patrick Dickert, Wallace Tucker et al.
Kumashiro, K. K. (2002). Against repetition: Addressing resistance to anti-oppressive 
change in the practices of learning, teaching, supervising, and researching. Harvard 
Educational Review, 72, 67–92.
Langmann, E. (2011). Representational and territorial economies in global citizenship 
education: Welcoming the other at the limit of cosmopolitan hospitality. Globalisation, 
Societies and Education, 9(3–4), 399–409.
Loh, C. E. (2016). Elite schoolboys becoming global citizens: Examining the practice 
of habitus. In A. Koh, & J. Kenway (Eds.), Elite schools: Multiple geographies of privilege 
(pp. 70–86). London: Routledge.
McLaren, P. (1989). Life in schools: An introduction to critical pedagogy in the foundations of 
education. New York, NY: Longman.
Nurenberg, D. (2011). What does injustice have to do with me?: A pedagogy of the 
privileged. Harvard Educational Review, 81(1), 50–63.
Pashby, K. (2011). Cultivating global citizens: Planting new seeds or pruning the per-
ennials? Looking for the citizen-subject in global citizenship education theory. 
Globalisation, Societies and Education, 9(3–4), 427–442.
Prosser, H. (2016). Servicing elite interests: Elite education in post-neoliberal Argentina. In 
C. Maxwell, & P. Aggleton (Eds.), Elite education: International perspectives (pp. 173–185). 
London: Routledge.
Seider, S. (2011). The role of privilege as identity in adolescents’ beliefs about homeless-
ness, opportunity,and inequality. Youth & Society, 43(1), 333–364.
Shor, I., & Freire, P. (1987). A pedagogy for liberation: Dialogues on transforming education. 
South Hadley, MA: Bergin & Garvey.
Sriprakash, A., Qi, J., & Singh, M. (2017). The uses of equality in an elite school in India: 
Enterprise and merit. British Journal of Sociology of Education, 38(7), 1022–1036.
Stoudt, B., Fox, M., & Fine, M. (2012). Contesting privilege with critical participatory 
action research. Journal of Social Issues, 68(1), 178–193.
Swalwell, K. (2013). Educating activist allies: Social justice pedagogy with the suburban and urban 
elite. New York, NY: Routledge.
Weis, L., & Fine, M. (2004). Working method: Research and social justice. New York, NY: 
Routledge.
Yemini, M., & Maxwell, C. (2018). Discourses of global citizenship education: The influ-
ence of the global middle-classes. In A. Peterson, H. Stahl, & H. Soong (Eds.), The 
Palgrave handbook of citizenship and education (pp. 1–20). London: Palgrave Macmillan.
DOI: 10.4324/9781003175728-6
5
READING THE WORLD AND 
CONSCIENTIZAÇÃO
Teaching About Multilingualism for 
Social Justice for Multilingual Learners
Heather Linville
There is little doubt that Freire’s pedagogical ideas remain essential today, and 
the movement he inspired still resonates with educators around the globe. I 
have been inspired by Freire’s work as I prepare pre-service teachers (PSTs) to 
work with multilingual learners (MLs)1 in the United States (U.S.) in equitable 
ways. In this chapter, I describe how I incorporate Freire’s ideas, particularly 
the problem-posing approach and the notions of reading the world and conscientização 
(Freire, 1970; 1997), in a PST education course I teach. My goal is to encour-
age a pro-linguistic diversity stance, challenging the monolingual ideology of 
the U.S. (Spolsky, 2011), so that each PST will be able to serve their future MLs 
equitably.
Freire in Theory
Freire’s (1997) pedagogy of the oppressed changed education for marginalized 
and minoritized individuals around the world. MLs constitute such an oppressed 
group in the U.S. educational systems. Statistics on high school graduation rates 
and standardized test scores indicate that MLs tend to not do as well in school-
ing as others (i.e. NCES, 2021). MLs are also oppressed in our society where a 
discourse of monolingualism and anti-immigration abounds (Wiley et al., 2014). 
PSTs will work in such a system where the norm is thinking that there is only 
one way to express ideas and thoughts (i.e. standard English) and that there 
is only one way to teach (English monolingualism). Freire (1997) referred to 
the conformity that systems of education expect and maintain as the culture of 
silence. Yet he recognized that education can also be a force for change. Anyone 
can become a “creator of culture” (Freire, 1997, p. 15) and can transform the 
https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003175728-6
76 Heather Linville
world they will work in, in this case through working as teachers. By using 
Freire’s theories, I enter into a conversation with PSTs through which they more 
deeply understand and reflect upon the monolingual ideology of schools and 
society, and then consider actions they can take to change it. As Freire (1994) 
stated, “A more critical understanding of the situation of oppression does not 
yet liberate the oppressed. But the revelation is a step in the right direction” 
(p. 30–31).
Keeping that goal in mind, I use the problem-posing educational approach 
through which “people develop their power to perceive critically the way they 
exist in the world with which and in which they find themselves; they come to 
see the world not as a static reality, but as reality in process, in transformation” 
(p. 64). Knowledge is not given to students, as in the banking concept of education 
that Freire rejects, but rather “emerges only through invention and re-invention, 
through the restless, impatient, continuing, hopeful inquiry human beings pur-
sue in the world, with the world, and with each other” (Freire, 1997, p. 53). I 
use this approach to help PSTs better see and understand the education system 
they are entering; in other words, to help them read the world more critically. 
Ultimately, the goal is for PSTs to perceive the oppression of the monolingual 
ideology of schools and society that they may not have experienced, as mostly 
White, monolingual individuals, to be able to later engage in liberatory teaching 
with MLs in their future classrooms.
Freire’s (1997) distinction between reading the word and reading the world is 
important in this work. The PSTs I work with, like any university students, 
have high levels of literacy; they know how to read the word. Yet learning to 
read and write, decode and recode, is only a beginning, cracking the code of 
how oral language becomes written and vice versa. This is the essential first 
step, and one that PSTs will teach their own future students. Then, learning 
to read the world, PSTs (or other students) apply a critical understanding of the 
power within literacy. They understand that what is written has a purpose, to 
persuade us to do something or to think in some way. They perceive that who 
is writing is dependent upon who is allowed voice in society and which voices 
tend to be silenced (i.e. those not in English). In addition, they consider how 
they can act upon the fact that how something is written upholds or challenges 
societal norms, both in what is written (content) and how (form; i.e. if it follows 
standard English rules or not). This critical understanding must include a greater 
understanding of multilingualism and that teaching literacy just in English, as 
it occurs in most schools in the U.S., denies power to other languages and lan-
guage speakers. By developing this critical understanding, I hope my PSTs come 
to a greater sense of conscientização.
Conscientização, often translated as critical consciousness, is defined by Freire 
(1997) as “learning to perceive social, political, and economic contradictions, 
and to take action against oppressive elements of reality” (p. 17). It is important 
Reading the World and Conscientização 77
to note Freire’s belief that all humans “are conscious beings who are equally 
predisposed to reflect and act upon the world around them” (Galloway, 2012, 
p. 166). Therefore, conscientização, pedagogically, is not raising students’ (or 
PSTs’) awareness of injustice, but rather engaging in dialogue about that injus-
tice to reach a point of “response to suffering [that is] contemplated intimately, 
felt, and acted upon with immediacy” (Barros, 2020, p. 161). The majority of 
PSTs I teach do not have lived experiences of injustice or inequitable treatment 
related to multilingualism; most do not speak other languages or know those 
who do. I teach at a mid-sized midwestern university where the vast majority 
of students (89%) identify as White and native-English speaking and 80% come 
from the state where the university is located, with usually about 1% interna-
tional students. PSTs in my teacher education program are even less diverse in 
terms of race, gender, and linguistic background, with almost all identifying as 
White (93%), presumably monolingual, females (87%), a trend which has held 
for several years. The program tends not to educate low-income students, as only 
14% are Pell grant recipients. The dominant ideology of the U.S. as a monolin-
gual country (Spolsky, 2011) seems even more prevalent in the Midwest where 
there is less linguistic and ethnic/racial diversity. While 13.7% of the U.S. total 
population is foreign-born, that percentage is less than half in my state (5.1%; 
United States Census Bureau, 2021). Over one-fifth (22%) of the U.S. popula-
tion as a whole speak a language other than English at home, but in my state, 
it is less than one-tenth (8.7%; United States Census Bureau, 2021). Even so, 
I recognize the PSTs’ experiences as speakers of English whowere raised in 
a monolingual school system under the standard English myth (Lippi-Green, 
2012). They, too, have had to mold their own language to meet its strict rules of 
expression. Through this course, I try to support PSTs as they critically consider 
the situation for MLs in U.S. schools and society.
Within this context, I apply Freire’s theories: problem posing, reading the 
world, and conscientização. I want PSTs to become participatory subjects as they 
challenge and critique their own education experiences, especially related to 
language and MLs. By using Freire’s concepts, I hope they will become agents 
of change for the MLs they will encounter in their future classrooms as well as 
agents of change for themselves as teachers. I aim to empower PSTs to question, 
critique, and challenge so that they may empower their future students, espe-
cially MLs, to seek equity in their own lives.
Freire in Action
I teach PSTs a required one-credit2 teacher education course entitled “Intro-
duction to English Language Learners and EL Advocacy.” I teach the course 
hybrid over half the semester, meeting face-to-face every other week (four 
times) for almost two hours. While my state does not require any preparation 
78 Heather Linville
for working with MLs, I am fortunate that the school of education leadership at 
my university understands, as Hawkins (2011) points out, that
all teachers…must be prepared to teach students from ‘other’ language and 
cultural backgrounds, as it is now inconceivable that teachers in virtually 
any region of the country will not, in the span of their teaching practice, 
teach culturally and linguistically diverse students.
(p. 103, italics in original)
Indeed, even in my state’s less diverse setting, over 5 percent of public school 
children are identified as MLs, with one district within the university’s region 
having over 40 percent MLs. This work is vitally important.
I designed the course with a focus on linguistic diversity and social justice 
for MLs. The specific course objectives are that by the end of the course, PSTs 
will be able to:
1. evaluate the role of linguistic diversity in a multilingual society,
2. analyze challenges ELs face in U.S. public schools, and
3. plan to improve school instruction and climates for ELs.
As can be seen in the objectives, the course goals go beyond teaching best prac-
tices for working with MLs. To make a more lasting change, I also endeavor 
to positively impact PSTs’ views of linguistic diversity and have them critically 
engage with their understanding of multilingualism, leading them to consider 
how “dominant ideologies in society drive the construction of understandings 
and meanings in ways that privilege certain groups of people, while marginal-
izing others” (Hawkins & Norton, 2009, p. 31). As they read the world of MLs in 
the U.S. and public schools, they relate this understanding to how negative lan-
guage ideologies can damage MLs’ school success (Hawkins, 2011). This critical 
approach helps PSTs, perhaps for the first time, see societal inequities related to 
language usage. And as they begin to feel this inequity, I hope they engage in 
conscientização and will take action in support of MLs in their future teaching 
contexts.
Essential Questions as Problem Posing
I organize my course around essential questions, following Freire’s (1997) 
problem-posing approach to education, or “complexification” (Barros, 2020, 
p. 163). Language ideology is complexified and posed as essential questions. 
Each essential question asks PSTs to engage in inquiry and come to their own 
conclusions, based on evidence they find. These questions, discussed below, may 
appear to have a correct or single answer, however, multiple answers are possible, 
Reading the World and Conscientização 79
depending on one’s reading of the world. The goal is to have PSTs delve deeply 
into finding an answer that makes sense to them, and then be able to use that 
understanding outside of the classroom (McTighe & Wiggins, 2013). I approach 
each essential question through the dialogic process, as I attempt to “problema-
tize the world in such a way that ‘correct thinking’ stands as neither a point of 
departure nor arrival” (Barros, 2020, p. 163). Groups of PSTs discuss how they 
would answer the question, reflecting on why they would answer it in that way. 
This process helps make ideologies and relations of power visible to the PSTs 
as they look critically at their perception of reality and hear others. The goal is 
that each PST, “…can gradually perceive personal and social reality as well as 
the contradictions in it, become conscious of his or her own perception of that 
reality, and deal critically with it” (Freire, 1997, p. 14).
Essential Question #1: Is the U.S. A Multilingual Society?
On the first day of class, I challenge PSTs’ beliefs about languages and language 
usage in the U.S. by asking the essential question, Is the U.S. a multilingual society? 
PSTs complete a WebQuest to uncover the linguistic diversity that is present, 
although often hidden or misconstrued, in their city, state, and nation. As “criti-
cal co-investigators” (Freire, 1997, p. 62), they investigate linguistic diversity 
statistics at Ethnologue (www.ethnologue.com), a website dedicated to provid-
ing information on languages around the world, the U.S. Census website with 
information on linguistic and ethnic/racial diversity in the U.S. and its states, 
and my state’s Department of Public Instruction website, which has up-to-date 
school report cards with ethnic/racial and linguistic diversity statistics. Through 
this WebQuest, PSTs discover that over 200 languages are spoken in the U.S., 
a fact that generally surprises them, and that their state is less ethnically/racially 
and linguistically diverse than the U.S. as a whole, which does not surprise 
them. They also discover how many MLs are currently being served in their 
local school district (the elementary, middle, and high school that they attended). 
By comparing and contrasting with others in the class, they come to discover 
that there are areas of great linguistic diversity in the state, potentially in their 
hometowns, even if they were not aware of it. It is through this activity that 
students tend to have an “ah-ha” moment about linguistic diversity, discovering 
that their previous assumptions about their hometowns might not have been 
accurate.
After the WebQuest, the PSTs reflect on and respond to the essential ques-
tion, Is the U.S. a multilingual society?, using evidence from the WebQuest. Some 
PSTs offer a less critical response, such as in the quote that follows3.
After exploring these websites, I believe that the United States is a multi-
lingual country. Even though our country’s primary language is English, 
https://www.ethnologue.com
80 Heather Linville
there are millions of citizens that speak at least one different language at 
home…Overall, in some areas of the country we do not seem as diverse, 
such as in my small town of [town, state]. However, if we’re talking about 
our country as a whole, it is evident that there is much diversity in our 
nation.
(PST 1)
This PST is reading the word of the statistics and recognizes the multilingualism 
of the U.S., but does not bring a critical lens to understanding what the statistics 
mean based on their own experience. In other words, this person is still develop-
ing the ability to read the world and challenge the contradiction of a multilingual 
country where other languages are not present in certain areas.
Other responses show PSTs beginning to bring a nuanced understanding to 
what the statistics say and how they do not tell the full story. PSTs state that, in 
looking at the raw numbers, the U.S. is a multilingual country, but they give 
several reasons to challenge to the statistics. They often note that there are a 
small number of languages other than English spoken in the U.S. in relation to 
thetotal number of languages spoken in the world, and by a small percentage of 
people, as seen in this response:
We do have a lot of diverse languages that you can find here in the U.S., 
however, many of those languages are barely used anymore, slowly dying 
off, or only a spoken by a small amount of people.
(PST 17)
They point to the fact that they themselves have not personally experienced 
linguistic diversity in their own lives, as in this example: “I look back and won-
der which of my peers needed [language] supports—as it was never obvious to 
me growing up—and I still cannot think of any classmates speaking a language 
other than English” (PST 9). They also mention that there is a lack of societal 
acceptance of other languages, as evidenced by the rapid rate of linguistic assimi-
lation. As another PST notes,
Although we have languages other than English in our hometowns, [state], 
and the United States, we do not provide resources or show acceptance of 
those who do speak another language. There are languages other than 
English, so I suppose that technically we are a multilingual country, but 
do we really embrace that? No, we do not.
(PST 22)
These responses are more typical and indicate that PSTs are beginning to read the 
world and integrate the statistical information on diversity in the U.S. with their 
Reading the World and Conscientização 81
own experiences. Many understand that the reality they are presented with, 
the monolingual ideology, might not give the full picture of schooling for eve-
ryone in the U.S. and that linguistic diversity might be implicitly or explicitly 
discouraged in many ways. They realize, as one PST commented, “Diversity is 
debatable, relative, and subjective” (PST 11).
Essential Question #2: Are Language Rights Human Rights?
After exploring multilingualism in the U.S. and challenging their prior 
understanding of it, PSTs explore the notion of linguistic rights from a global 
perspective. With the goal of furthering PSTs’ understanding that multilingual-
ism can be perceived as normal and challenging the monolingual ideology, I 
introduce students to the ways linguistic diversity and multilingual speakers 
are valued internationally, through a variety of United Nations and UNESCO 
documents. PSTs engage in dialogue and begin to see the ideologies of language 
diversity in the world as compared to those in the U.S.. PSTs first discuss the 
Declaration of the Rights of Persons Belonging to National or Ethnic, Religious and 
Linguistic Minorities (United Nations, 1992), paying close attention to the aspects 
which deal with language and education (although they also typically comment 
on the elements of culture addressed). We also discuss the Universal Declaration 
of Linguistic Rights (1998) and how this document has yet to be ratified by the 
United Nations. Reflecting on these two documents, PSTs wonder at the lack 
of similar laws and policies in the U.S. and hypothesize why this is so. We delve 
into the pamphlet, Education in a Multilingual World (UNESCO, 2003), which 
outlines what might be considered best practices for working with minoritized 
language speakers worldwide. The emphasis on maintaining the home language 
and culture surprises most PSTs as this has not been their reality and challenges 
the monolingual myth that more English leads to more language learning.
After this discussion, PSTs reflect upon and respond to the second essential 
question of the course, Are language rights human rights? This essential question 
asks PSTs to think about and reflect on their own beliefs about language and to 
unpack or problematize the “common sense” notions of language that they have 
been taught, explicitly or implicitly, as mostly native speakers of English. All 
PSTs answer that they believe language is a human right, or that it should be. 
They give a variety of reasons for this belief, including that language is necessary 
for communication and personal expression, it is linked to identity, it is essential 
for relationships, and it is connected to culture. Some note that the U.S. has 
many immigrants but not an official language, further justifying the belief that 
people should have the choice of what language they speak. However, the PSTs 
also begin to see the contradictions in saying language is a human right and how 
this belief might not be upheld due to changing social or political climates or 
depending on where one is in the world. For example, some are cognizant of the 
82 Heather Linville
fact that freedom of speech may be limited in other parts of the world. Within 
the U.S., contradictions exist as well, as one PST noted, “We preach endlessly 
for people to embrace their diversity and culture but then we try to shut it down 
and take it away from them” (PST 6). PSTs are further reading the world of mul-
tilingualism in their own situation and reality. Understanding multilingualism 
as a common occurrence worldwide, and in the U.S., normalizes it, making it 
less strange or threatening when the PSTs will encounter it in their classrooms. 
With this essential question, PSTs reflect on their own beliefs about language 
and are primed to reflect on beliefs about language in the world around them, as 
we see in the next essential question.
Essential Question #3: Do We Value Linguistic 
Diversity In The Us And Our State?
With the background from the first two class sessions, we continue to read the 
world by looking at national and local news media for evidence of positive or 
negative views of linguistic diversity in our national and local society. PSTs 
analyze how much their communities (home and university), state, and nation 
value multilingualism. Unfortunately, it is easy to find examples of negative 
views, including the Duke professor who warned Chinese international students 
to speak English in campus buildings (Kaur, 2019) or a video-recorded rant of 
a New York attorney against two speaking-Spanish restaurant employees, say-
ing they should be speaking English because they are in the U.S. (Brito, 2018). 
However, in our state, we also have evidence of positive views of linguistic 
diversity. The legislature of one county did not pass English-only legislation 
when it was proposed (Wilgoren, 2002) and a community maintained their her-
itage language (German) for five generations, well beyond the three-generation 
norm (Okrent, 2012).
Living within this sociocultural milieu, PSTs come to class already knowing 
that speaking languages other than English can be seen as suspect. They have 
heard the anti-linguistic diversity rhetoric in their communities, and possibly 
even their own homes, and they recognize their own lack of experience learn-
ing other languages. It is not a stretch for them to understand that MLs may face 
discrimination due to their linguistic diversity. PSTs recognize that this essential 
question, perhaps even more than the others, does not have an easy answer.
To support their reading of the world and the complexities of multilingualism 
in the U.S., we create a collaborative T-chart with evidence of positive views 
of linguistic diversity on one side, and negative views on the other. On the 
positive views of multilingualism side, PSTs mention that there is no national 
language in the U.S., that the prevalence of dual-language schools is on the rise 
(although most often with only languages that are deemed desirable), that for-
eign language study is part of most high schools’ university preparation tracks, 
Reading the World and Conscientização 83
and that medical facilities are required to provide translation and interpretation 
services, as are public schools. They also cite this class as positive evidence. On 
the negative side, they note the general lack of foreign language instruction in 
public schools (American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 2017) and that even if 
they took a foreign language they learned very little. They also see the mono-
lingual ideology behind“speak English” comments (Brito, 2018), the lack of 
signs in other languages in their communities and states, and the fact that some 
states have English-only laws. PSTs find that the two sides of our T-chart have a 
similar amount of evidence, helping them more deeply seeing the contradictions 
of multilingualism in the U.S.
Through this process, PSTs are further reading the world and coming to under-
stand how their own positioning as (mostly) monolingual speakers of English 
privileges them as they are not subject to linguicism or racism in the same way as 
MLs. The PSTs begin to better understand how ELs and EL families may have 
to navigate schools and communities where pro- and anti-linguistic diversity 
stances may coexist (Deroo & Ponzio, 2019). They start to think about actions 
they can take in their own classrooms and schools to do better at educating MLs.
Essential Question #4: What Is Our Role In 
Educating A Multilingual Society?
To address the final essential question, PSTs reflect upon their own role, as 
community members and future teachers, in furthering pro-linguistic diversity 
ideologies and multilingualism in their schools and communities. They under-
stand the U.S. as a multilingual country but are critically aware of the fact that 
multilingualism is not always supported or valued. They also have expressed 
their belief that language is a human right, and believe in the right to speak 
other languages, even in what can be a hostile environment. The PSTs have also 
begun to consider what they can do in the face of the monolingual ideology 
that undervalues MLs and their linguistic diversity. The next step is to begin to 
engage in praxis, which Freire (1997) defines as “reflection and action upon the 
world in order to transform it” (p. 33). For PSTs, this is how they connect the 
theoretical to the practical, taking action based on what they understand about 
the world in order to change it.
To engage with this essential question, I present a fictional case study, a 
problem, which describes a school situation where there are several issues with 
respect to MLs’ education. The issues include having only one EL teacher across 
two schools with a heavy case-load, other staff without any preparation to work 
with MLs, a principal that sees linguistic diversity as a problem (mostly financial) 
rather than a resource (Ruiz, 1984), and a community that does not make an 
effort to use other languages or value its linguistic diversity. A common situa-
tion that teachers may find themselves in, the PSTs first analyze the case study 
84 Heather Linville
in groups, exploring perspectives and taking on the various roles of the stake-
holders. This exercise gives them the chance to critically reflect upon diverse 
perspectives and respond to different points of view as they are raised. Their 
greater conscientização helps them to understand and read the world presented 
in the case study, and relate to it on an emotional level. I encourage students 
to develop their pro-ML and pro-linguistic diversity positions and to consider 
how they can use the resources they have at hand, including laws and policies 
designed to support and protect MLs in schools, to do so.
To answer this essential question, each PST first writes an individual advocacy 
action plan in which they outline how they would, as teachers or community 
members, advocate for MLs in the school. Here they move from reflection 
to action. As Freire (1997) calls for, I “…pose this existential, concrete, pre-
sent situation to the people as a problem which challenges them and requires a 
response—not just at the intellectual level, but at the level of action” (p. 76–77). 
Thus, the PSTs engage in praxis, addressing the ways MLs’ rights are not upheld 
while a monolingual ideology is. Finally, PSTs reflect upon an individual’s role 
in advocating for social justice for MLs. They consider individual responsibility 
and collective action for change. The PSTs engage more fully in praxis through 
this final essential question as they not only envision themselves as advocates but 
make a plan to speak up for MLs in their future teaching context.
Discussion
By employing Freire’s theories and the key concepts of problem posing, reading 
the world, and conscientização, I structure the class in such a way that PSTs come 
to more critically perceive the monolingual ideology of the U.S. in opposition to 
the linguistic diversity and multilingualism they will face in our public schools. 
I use the problem-posing approach, through essential questions, to help avoid 
PSTs “simply adapt[ing] to the world as it is and to the fragmented views of real-
ity deposited in them” (Freire, 1997, p. 54). Rather, through this approach PSTs 
can envision a new world, in their future classrooms, where MLs and all their 
languages are upheld and valued. The PSTs begin to see how they can raise up 
MLs in their future teaching contexts to ensure that all students see and hear the 
diversity that is present around them.
This work is not without challenges. One challenge is that most of the PSTs 
I work with lack direct experience with MLs or even individuals who speak 
other languages. They can easily fall into the white savior trap and a deficit view 
of these students. Freire (1997) warns against “false generosity” which maintains 
oppression while appearing to help the oppressed. Recognizing this challenge, 
I try to inspire within the PSTs “true generosity” which “lies in striving so that 
these hands [of the oppressed]—whether of individuals or entire people—need 
to be extended less and less in supplication” (Freire, 1997, p. 27). I include a 
Reading the World and Conscientização 85
reading which helps highlight the assets of MLs (Israelson, 2012) and speak to 
the agency of MLs, even while often (though not always) oppressed in our edu-
cational system and society. Freire (1997) asserts that everyone, given the right 
tools, can engage in this work, regardless of prior education background or prior 
experience with critical pedagogies. However, trust in people is essential in the 
humanist, revolutionary pedagogy (Freire, 1997). Without experience or direct 
contact with MLs, trust cannot develop.
An additional challenge is that PSTs are not yet in their own classrooms, so 
any praxis or transformative action is imagined. While my institution is sup-
portive of preparing all teachers to work with MLs, competing concerns (that 
are likely perceived as more important) limit the ability to ensure all PSTs have 
experience with MLs before they graduate our program. Thus, when writing 
the advocacy action plan, PSTs struggle to identify and plan actions that are 
reasonable and within their sphere of influence (Staehr Fenner, 2014) as teachers or 
community members. They often include ideas that require more funding and 
are somewhat simplistic, not implying true structural changes, such as “hiring 
more EL teachers.” This idea, in particular, is unrealistic and does not chal-
lenge or change the monolingual ideology of schooling where MLs are taught 
by someone else until they learn English. To address this concern, I am working 
to find ways to ensure that future iterations of the course include an oppor-
tunity for all PSTs to engage with MLs at a local elementary school. In this 
way, PSTs can understand more fully the experiences of MLs, reflect on this 
learning, and discover how their actions can be transformative in their future 
classrooms.
Conclusion
Freire continues to guide and inspire me as I teach PSTs to struggle against 
the oppression of MLs and the monolingual, essentially repressive, ideology of 
schools where only one type of English is acceptable. In an education system 
where MLs are not given many opportunities to maintain their languages in 
meaningful ways beyond the home, and any deviance from standard English is 
rejected and equated with a lack of intelligence (Lippi-Green, 2012), this chapter 
offers oneexample of how Freire’s concepts of education can be implemented 
to support PSTs’ growing understanding and conscientização of the multilin-
gual reality of schools. Through problem-posing essential questions, PSTs can 
develop a pro-linguistic diversity stance, challenging the monolingual ideology 
of the U.S. and breaking the culture of silence that schools maintain around lan-
guage diversity. As PSTs read the world, they begin to see themselves as subjects 
and creators of culture, seeing ways they can transform their world and the world 
for MLs. The final goal is that all PSTs will be able to hear their future MLs, 
understand their reality, and teach them equitably and in a way serves the goal of 
86 Heather Linville
MLs moving out of a state of oppression. The ongoing relevance and importance 
of Freire and his work cannot be doubted in this work.
Notes
 1 Although English learner (EL) is the term favored by the U.S. Department of Educa-
tion, I use the term multilingual learner (ML) to recognize that these students are often 
not just learning English, and that (hopefully) their other languages will continue to 
develop and grow as they do.
 2 Since writing this chapter, the course has expanded to three credits and the title has 
changed to “Educating Multilingual Learners.”
 3 Data provided here are from one semester (Fall 2019) of data collection for a larger 
study on linguistic diversity ideologies in PSTs. Complete findings will be addressed 
in a forthcoming publication.
References
American Academy of Arts and Sciences (2017). America’s languages: Investing in language 
education for the 21st century. Commission on Language Learning: Cambridge, MA. 
Retrieved from https://www.amacad.org/publication/americas-languages
Barros, S. (2020). Paolo Freire in a hall of mirrors. Educational Theory 70(2), 151–169.
Brito, C. (May 22, 2018). “I’m not a racist:” NYC lawyer who went on viral rant against 
Spanish-speaking workers apologizes. Retrieved from https://www.cbsnews.com/
news/nyc-lawyer-aaron-schlossberg-who-went-on-racist-rant-against-spanish-
speaking-workers-apologizes-fresh-kitchen/
Deroo, M. R. & Ponzio, C. (2019). Confronting ideologies: A discourse analysis of in-
service teachers’ translanguaging stance through an ecological lens. Bilingual Research 
Journal 42, 1–18.
Freire, P. (1997). Pedagogy of the oppressed. Continuum.
Freire, P. (1994). Pedagogy of hope. Continuum.
Galloway, S. (2012). Reconsidering emancipatory eduation: Staging a conversation 
between Paulo Freire and Jacques Ranciere. Educational Theories 62(2), 163–184.
Hawkins, M. (2011). Dialogic determination: Constructing a social justice discourse in 
language teacher education. In M. Hawkins (Ed.). Social justice language teacher educa-
tion (pp. 102–123). Multilingual Matters.
Hawkins, M. & Norton, B. (2009). Critical language teacher education. In A. Burns 
& J. Richards (Eds.), Cambridge guide to second language teacher education (pp. 30–39). 
Cambridge University Press.
Israelson, J. (2012). Dreams beyond labels: Case studies of four English language learn-
ers who are beating the odds. Journal of Educational Research and Innovation, 1(1), 1–19.
Kaur, H. ( Jan. 19, 2019). A Duke professor warned Chinese students to speak English. 
Retrived from https://www.cnn.com/2019/01/28/health/duke-professor-warns-
chinese-students-speak-english-trnd/index.html
Lippi-Green, R. (2012). English with an accent, 2nd Edition. Routledge.
McTighe, J. & Wiggins, G. (2013). Essential questions: Opening doors to student understand-
ing. ASCD.
https://www.amacad.org
https://www.cbsnews.com
https://www.cbsnews.com
https://www.cbsnews.com
https://www.cnn.com
https://www.cnn.com
Reading the World and Conscientização 87
National Center for Education Statistics (NCES). (2021). The condition of education. 
Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Education. Retrieved from https://nces.
ed.gov/pubs2021/2021144.pdf
Okrent, A. (Nov. 5, 2012). The Wisconsin town that didn’t learn English for five 
generations. Retrieved from https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/13026/wisconsin- 
town-didnt-learn-english-five-generations
Ruiz, R. (1984). Orientations in language planning. NABE Journal, 8(2), 15–34.
Spolsky, B. (2011). Does the United States need a language policy? CALDigest.
Staehr Fenner, D. (2014). Advocating for English learners: A guide for educators. Corwin.
UNESCO (2003). Education in a multilingual world. Retrieved from https://unesdoc.
unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000129728_eng
United Nations (1992). Declaration of the rights of persons belonging to national or 
ethnic, religious and linguistic minorities. Retrieved from https://www.un.org/en/
genocideprevention/documents/atrocity-crimes/Doc.17_Declaration%20on%20
the%20Rights%20of %20Persons%20Belonging%20to%20National%20or%20
Ethnic.pdf
United States Census Bureau (2021). Wisconsin populations and people: Selected 
characteristics of the native and foreign-born populations. Retrieved from https:// 
d a t a .cen su s .gov/ced sc i /t able?q=Wiscon s in%20Popu l a t ion s%20and%20
People&tid=ACSST1Y2019.S0501
Universal Declaration of Linguistic Rights (1998). Universal declaration of linguistic 
rights. Retrieved at https://culturalrights.net/descargas/drets_culturals389.pdf
Wiley, T. G., Garcia, D. R., Danzig, A. B., & Stigler, M. L. (2014). Language policy, 
politics, and diversity in education. Review of Research in Education, 38, vii–xxiii. DOI: 
10.3102/0091732X13512984
Wilgoren, J. (Aug. 21, 2002). National briefing/Midwest: Wisconsin: English-only 
measure. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2002/08/21/us/national-brief-
ing-midwest-wisconsin-english-only-measure.html
https://nces.ed.gov
https://nces.ed.gov
https://www.mentalfloss.com
https://www.mentalfloss.com
https://unesdoc.unesco.org
https://unesdoc.unesco.org
https://www.un.org
https://www.un.org
https://www.un.org
https://www.un.org
https://data.census.gov
https://data.census.gov
https://data.census.gov
https://culturalrights.net
https://doi.org/10.3102/0091732X13512984
https://www.nytimes.com
https://www.nytimes.com
https://taylorandfrancis.com
PART II
Empirical Analyses
https://taylorandfrancis.com
DOI: 10.4324/9781003175728-8
6
INVOLVEMENT AND 
AUTHENTICITY
Transforming Literacy Curricula 
for Marshallese Students through 
Community-Based Writing Projects
Anny Fritzen Case, Marcy Ray Dodd, 
and Gina Mikel Petrie
Literally and figuratively landlocked in a school system designed for white kids 
in a city without a coastline, a group of Marshallese middle schoolers rehearse 
a dance from their islands to be performed at an upcoming school assembly. 
The girls attend Pine Valley Middle School (PVMS), a Title I school located in 
a mid-sized city in the Pacific Northwest in the United States. Sandy beaches, 
breadfruit, and palm trees are nowhere to be found. Instead, mountains and 
evergreen forests frame the horizon. Even on snowy winter days it is not unu-
sual for the Marshallese kids to wear flip-flops. Like many Americans, many 
educators at PVMS first learned of the Marshall Islands when Marshallese 
students started enrolling. Although Marshallese people are only 1% of the 
total population in the county, they represent about half of the English lan-
guage learners (ELLs) at PVMS. Because many of the Marshallese students at 
PVMS are designated ELL, the English language development (ELD) teach-
ers tended to know them best. Marcy, the ELD teacher, described them 
this way:
In their other classes, Marshallese students tended to be silent. To the shock 
of other teachers, at lunch, after school, or even during class, they were 
noisy in my classroom. They talked about myriad things: the relationships 
that came and went, sports—in particular, basketball for the Marshallese 
boys, volleyball for the Marshallese girls—family, friends, church, and 
why the cafeteria didn’t serve rice at lunch. They talked about dancing 
as the Manit Day celebration approached. They talkedabout grades, both 
how they didn’t matter and how they wanted to improve. They talked 
about whether they wanted to pass the English language assessment or 
https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003175728-8
92 Anny Fritzen Case, Marcy Ray Dodd, and Gina Mikel Petrie
simply stay in ELD. When presented with the intellectual opportunity, 
they would talk about big ideas, such as the dilemma of their islands and 
culture. Would it be better to artificially reconstruct the islands at the 
expense of the surrounding sea life or relocate all the Marshallese off their 
“sinking” islands? The silence they demonstrated in other content areas’ 
classrooms was never about a lack of intellectual ability.
And yet, Marshallese students’ rich dimensionality too often gets diluted 
in deficit discourse. The storyline is familiar. A “troubling characteristic has 
taken root in the Marshallese community,” the local newspaper reported, 
“Marshallese students aren’t graduating from high school” (Francovich, 2017). 
To be precise, about half of the Marshallese students did earn their diploma 
in four years, but this statistic fell far short of the district’s overall 85% grad-
uation rate. As a group, their attendance rates were lower and disciplinary 
incidents higher. And yet, these statistics present an incomplete picture. For 
instance, a Marshallese mother posted on Facebook a picture of her teenage 
daughter peering intently at a computer screen: “this girl can’t stop when she 
wanna to know about something. Research continues at 7 pm even when the 
lights are off in the house” (Personal communication accessed by Anny Case 
on November 20, 2020). Some Marshallese students might be disengaged from 
school and eager to learn. How could the school context better harness such 
engagement?
As a partial response to this question, we formed a university-school-com-
munity partnership project to develop and enact literacy with Marshallese 
students at PVMS. At the time, Marcy was the building ELD teacher; Anny 
and Gina were faculty at different universities. In this essay, we reflect on this 
project and mobilize Freirian notions to explore the tension between literacy 
instruction framed as intervention and that which is framed as involvement. First-
person teacher narratives written by Marcy (in italics) are woven throughout this 
three-part story. The structure is inspired by a Marshallese elder who described 
Marshallese culture as embodied in the language of the ocean, the language of 
the sky, and the language of the dry land (Lajuan, n.d.).
A Brief Introduction to Marshallese Students
Dispersed across a vast, remote swath of the Pacific Ocean, the Marshall Islands 
comprise a series of small, coral islands in eastern Micronesia about halfway 
between Hawaiʻi and Australia. The Marshallese people have been inextricably 
linked to the United States since 1946 when the US Military started testing 
nuclear weapons on and around the islands, leaving radiation levels in some 
areas higher than those in Chernobyl (Columbia University, 2019). Today, 
the Marshallese people are still suffering from the devastating environmental, 
Involvement and Authenticity 93
health, cultural, and economic effects rooted in years of Cold War nuclear test-
ing. Climate change and rising sea levels pose an additional existential threat to 
the Marshall Islands with predictions that some of the islands will be submerged 
by 2035 (Storlazzi et al., 2017). Tenaciously, a group of committed Marshallese 
environmental activists are organizing to save their islands. At the United 
Nations Climate Change Conference, Hilda Heine, President of the Marshall 
Islands, said, “As a nation, we refuse to flee. But we also refuse to die” (Climate 
Vulnerable Forum, 2020).
Still, the constellation of threats facing the Marshall Islands (including 
approximately 40% unemployment) has prompted many Marshallese to leave in 
search of a better life and future, especially for their children. Agreements with 
the US government allow the Marshallese to legally live and work in the United 
States as “legal non-immigrants” without a pathway to citizenship (Taibbi & 
Saltzman, 2018). It is not unusual for Marshallese families to send their children 
to the United States to attend school and live with friends or relatives, and fami-
lies commonly move back and forth between the islands and the United States 
(Lane & De Brum-Abraham, 2015). Of the 100,000 Marshallese throughout the 
world, roughly one-third live in the United States.
While Marshallese students bear features of refugees and immigrants, their 
unique history, legal status, and cultural context put them outside of existing 
educational paradigms. Makuakane-Drechsel and Hagedorn (2000) argue that 
they have more in common with Native Americans due to the constant colo-
nization they have experienced by the United States. Indeed, indigenous values 
and their deep disconnect to “western” and American values often seem to be 
the source of friction and confusion at school.
Visions of Literacy
Literacy As Intervention
Literacy as intervention, rooted in a medical metaphor of literacy as a treatment 
for a diagnosed problem, has featured prominently in US educational policy 
and curriculum since the 2001 passage of the massive educational reform leg-
islation No Child Left Behind. A hallmark of the legislation was its commitment 
to ensuring every child develops strong literacy skills through the implemen-
tation of approaches to literacy development grounded in “scientifically-based 
research” and systematically measuring students’ progress in developing grade-
level appropriate reading and writing skills to identify and track students in need 
of extra literacy support (Slavin, 2003). Success was measured through additional 
assessment.
In this context, educational research is replete with the phrase literacy inter-
vention (Pressley, Graham & Harris, 2006). For example, Response to Intervention 
94 Anny Fritzen Case, Marcy Ray Dodd, and Gina Mikel Petrie
(RTI) is a widely used framework for systematically providing students with 
tiered levels of instructional support (Brozo, 2009; Burns, 2010). In contrast 
to Freire’s rejection of literacy instruction as diagnosis, treatment, and cure for 
disease (1978/2016, 1985), RTI was designed “similar to a medical model … 
to determine a child’s response to a treatment, and the treatment was to be 
intensified or altered if the child showed no initial response to the inter-
vention” (Bineham et al., 2014, p. 232). Literacy is imagined as a series of 
constituent parts that can be systematically taught, assessed, and aggregated 
into proficiency. In other words, literacy resides outside of the learner. While 
a wide array of pedagogical strategies and curriculum may be referred to as a 
literacy intervention, for the purposes of this chapter, we are operationalizing 
literacy as intervention approaches as curriculum and instruction that is prepack-
aged, bureaucratically imposed on teachers, and emphasizes literacy skills 
development.
Intervention approaches to literacy education have been critiqued for 
“focus[ing] exclusively on the mechanics of literacy” at the expense of “social 
and creative elements, as well as critical, higher-level thinking” (Carris, 2011, 
p. 3). Others have questioned whether literacy interventions are designed to 
attend to the educational context that has led to under-developed literacy 
(Alvermann & Rush, 2004). Along these same lines, intervention programs may 
espouse white, western notions of literacy thereby diminishing other cultural 
orientations and resources of marginalized groups of students (Kostogriz, 2011; 
Pandya & Auckerman, 2014). To be fair, however, literacy intervention pro-
grams are often explicitly undertaken as an act of advocacy and equity to ensure 
that all children develop essential literacy skills (Brooks & Rodela, 2018; Wise, 
2009). The contested issue is not whether or not all childrenshould have qual-
ity literacy education; rather, the central question is what constitutes literacy 
(including whose forms of literacy are elevated) and how it should be taught and 
assessed.
Literacy As Involvement
Critics of literacy as intervention take issue with positioning students as needing 
remediation, as “struggling,” or as lacking the appropriate knowledge, language, 
and culture to be fully literate (Frankel, 2016; Hall, 2010). Instead, they assert that 
“collaboration with students, rather than intervention on students, is key” to lit-
eracy development (Greenleaf, Jiménez, & Roller, 2002, p. 487). Freire also was 
an outspoken critic of literacy curriculum and initiatives that reduced literacy to 
primers and “mechanical memorization of syllables, words and sentences which 
are given” to the students (1978/2016, Part 1 “Activities already…,” para. 3). 
He believed this transmission model of literacy diminished both the nature and 
power of literacy and the power and agency of students:
Involvement and Authenticity 95
Literacy education can never be understood as a moment of formal learn-
ing of reading and writing… Nor should it be viewed as a kind of treat-
ment to be applied to those who need it in order that they may be quickly 
cured of their infirmity ….
(1978/2016, Letter 11, para. 6)
Instead of literacy as intervention, which is often associated with a banking model 
of education, Freire’s concept of the reciprocal relationship between “reading 
the world” and “reading the word” is central to his vision of literacy educa-
tion: “reading the word is not only preceded by reading the world, but also 
by a certain form of writing it or rewriting it. In other words, of transforming 
it by means of conscious practical action” (1985, p. 18). With literacy educa-
tion thus inextricably woven into students’ experience in the world, curriculum 
and pedagogy need to be co-constructed in relationship with the students. 
The impetus for learning must emerge from students. “For this reason,” Frei 
re maintained,
I have always insisted that words used in organizing a literacy program 
come from the word universe of the people who are learning, express-
ing their actual language, their anxieties, fears, demands, dreams. Words 
should be laden with the meaning of the people’s existential experience, 
and not of the teacher’s experience.
(Freire, 1983, pp. 10–11)
Freire calls this “problem-posing education” because the process involves stu-
dents “increasingly posed with problems relating to themselves in the world 
and with the world” (1968/1998, p. 81). Because the content and purpose of 
literacy education grows out of the students (instead of being rotely derived 
from a textbook, for example), the fundamental nature of the teacher/stu-
dent relationship shifts away from teacher-as-knower depositing knowledge 
into his/her students. Instead, the relationship moves toward a reciprocal 
teaching and learning dynamic which Freire calls “teacher-student with students- 
teachers” (Freire, 1999, p. 5). In other words, didactic teaching is replaced with 
dialogue.
Because Freire’s notion of literacy education centers students as active partici-
pants not just in learning, but also in teaching and taking action, we characterize 
this approach as literacy as involvement. Students are involved in determining the 
content, purpose, and process of literacy education. Moreover, this endeavor 
is not abstract and theoretical: reading the word necessitates transformative 
action. Put differently, transformative literacy education depends on reading and 
writing being viewed and used as a tool for raising critical consciousness as a 
liberatory act.
96 Anny Fritzen Case, Marcy Ray Dodd, and Gina Mikel Petrie
The Language of the Ocean
We are papaya golden sunsets bleeding
into a glittering open sea
We are skies uncluttered
majestic in the sweeping landscape
We are the ocean
terrifying and regal in its power.
As Marshallese poet Kathy Jetn̄il-Kijiner’s lines (2017) suggest, our Marshallese 
students have ocean flowing through their veins, yet live in a place that is physi-
cally and intellectually landlocked. The educational system they are forced to 
adapt to has virtually no interaction with or concept of the ocean. In fact, the 
forms of literacy deeply rooted in Marshallese culture and history are quite dif-
ferent from those most often displayed, valued, and cultivated in US schools. 
Prior to contact with European explorers and missionaries in the early 19th cen-
tury, the Marshallese language was not written. This relatively recent imposition 
of a written alphabet by foreigners may at least partially account for the small 
number of books published by Marshallese authors. At the time Jetn ̄il-Kijiner 
wrote her thesis in 2014 about Marshallese literature, she was only aware of one 
book solo-authored by a Marshallese writer. In 2017, she published the first book 
of poetry by a Marshallese author.
The education system often views this disconnect as a lack of literacy, but as 
Freire noted, when “reconstructing” literacy education with and for Guinea-
Bissau, these multicultural students “[do] not start from zero. [Their] cultural 
and historical roots are something very much [their] own, in the very soul 
of [their] people, which the violence of the colonialists could not destroy” 
(1978/2016, Part 1 “Background and…,” para. 3). Similarly, our Marshallese 
students did not start from zero in their literacy practices. The absence of a 
strong cultural tradition of writing should not be read as an absence of literacy 
in Marshallese culture and history. Rather, their literacy practices take dif-
ferent forms as evidenced by a very long and rich tradition of oral and visual 
texts ( Jetn̄il-Kijiner, 2014). Historically, Marshallese children developed an 
advanced ability to recall and retell stories and legends told by their parents and 
elders. Additionally, Marshallese people represented their impressive knowledge 
of the ocean through sophisticated navigational charts using natural materi-
als. Through tattoos, they told stories, and they wove symbolic representations 
of history, genealogy, and culture into mats made of pandanus leaves ( Jetn ̄il- 
Kijiner, 2014).
Unfortunately, these literacy traditions had little currency at PVMS where 
the written word and academic language were at the forefront – a far cry from 
Freire’s culture circles in which teachers and students filtered what was to be 
Involvement and Authenticity 97
discussed and learned through the students’ own lived experiences and concerns 
(Freire, 1978/2016). This disconnect quickly became apparent to Marcy after a 
few months of teaching the prescribed literacy curriculum.
The district had recently purchased a high-quality ELD curriculum and 
was beginning a years-long process of instructing teachers how to implement it 
with fidelity. The reading and language portions efficiently taught vocabulary, 
syntax, elements of genre as well as exposing students to a variety of texts to 
capture their interest – articles on inventions or the science of sports – as well as 
provide perspectives they could relate to – characters making a home in a new 
country. The intent was for the writing portion to be incorporated through-
out the reading and language lessons. However, unlike the reading texts, the 
writing assignments sometimes held little interest or relevance to the students 
or their experiences. Another factor influencing literacy instruction at PVMS 
was that low test scores had landed PVMS the distinction of being a state-wide 
focus school, and they chose to focus on writing for their state-monitored school 
improvement plan. As a new teacher, Marcy wrestled with how best to engage 
her students in writing:
I was a first-year teacher, fresh out of an MIT program and not far removed 
from an MFA in creative writing, trying to adapt a district-wide cur-
riculum to a group of students whose experiencesexcluded them from 
successful participation in that curriculum. They didn’t see the point in 
pretending to write a letter to a friend explaining their favorite hobby. 
They would never write such a letter and any real friend would already 
know their hobbies. Their inability to complete the assignment demon-
strated to me the inauthenticity of the curriculum, but falsely demon-
strated to them the weakness of their intellectual and educational ability.
While the prescribed curriculum was designed specifically for ELD students, 
it wasn’t designed for Marshallese students. Nor was it designed for literacy as 
involvement. Alongside a goal of engaging students, it also functioned to inter-
vene in the problems and deficiencies of student literacy, fill in the gaps, and 
get students out of ELD which would allow them to improve their test scores. 
Unsurprisingly, many of the Marshallese students were unable to find themselves 
in the literacy curriculum and relocated themselves to the outskirts of PVMS’s 
educational agenda. They skipped classes, got poor grades, and developed a rep-
utation as unmotivated.
A colleague once asked me how she could motivate Jemlok. Like most of my male 
Marshallese students, Jemlok had plans of making it big in the NBA. He had swagger 
enough already for his future superstar self, and he had the greatest sense of humor, whether 
he was dishing it out or receiving it. I thought about this teacher’s question: Did I have any 
ideas for motivating Jemlok to engage in literacy?
98 Anny Fritzen Case, Marcy Ray Dodd, and Gina Mikel Petrie
Many ELD students ate lunch in my classroom rather than the cafeteria. One day a 
game of riddles arose. I would pose a riddle, eventually writing it on the whiteboard so they 
could visualize the pun and explain the word play. Rather than heading to the gym to play 
basketball, Jemlok and his friends chose to stay, guessing at riddles and posing their own to 
the class. As humorous forms of oral literacy, riddles felt comfortable and nonthreatening. 
Even learning about homophones and homographs, which would normally be considered 
too academic for Jemlok and his friends, was entertaining–useful even–as it allowed them 
to further develop their humor.
The problem wasn’t Jemlok’s motivation but, rather, the way he was perceived by the 
school system. Motivating Jemlok within the boundaries of school would be difficult. School 
had labelled him as a failure, and he had internalized this label. As an ELD student, he 
would claim that he wasn’t good at reading or writing, and to fit into this stigma created for 
him, like other ELD students, he would refuse to read or write–unless it mattered to him. 
Essentially Jemlok, like many ELD students, realized that the interventionist approach to 
education meant that he came to school with some sort of deficit that the system was meant 
to correct. However, when Jemlok could be authentically involved in literacy, even in small 
moments, the emphasis fell on what he was doing rather than what he couldn’t do.
The experience of Jemlok (a pseudonym, as are all student names in this essay) 
illustrates cultural mismatches that continually seemed to diminish and discour-
age our Marshallese students. The friendly, humorous banter of sharing riddles 
in Marcy’s classroom aligned with and honored Marshallese traditions of oral 
storytelling and community. During a literacy lesson, however, when Jemlok 
was expected to read informational texts about topics he didn’t care about, or 
write texts within a rigid academic structure, he was literally and figuratively 
silenced.
No wonder Marshallese students often experience literacy education as an 
intervention. In order to conform to the academic features and priorities of 
US schools, they may have to suspend a portion of themselves, leading many 
Marshallese students to believe in the absence or inferiority of their own cultural 
literacy. And yet as Marshallese poet, Kathy Jetn̄il-Kijiner, observes:
If we were to study the stories, chants, and visual texts which we have 
produced as a people before European contact and colonization, and the 
essays and writing that we produced after, what emerges are multiple per-
spectives that are bigger than the smallness so many of us have come to 
believe in.
( Jetn̄il-Kijiner, 2014, p. 14)
Consider the Marshallese method for navigating the ocean: Marshallese stick 
charts are created based on the feel of ocean swells between islands. Yet when 
Marshallese students arrived in the United States for better educational oppor-
tunities, they arrived in a system unaccustomed to the feel of things, but rather 
Involvement and Authenticity 99
measured the empirical and precise distance between two towns with road maps. 
This deep cultural disconnect could be jarring and diminishing.
To help our students escape from this identity of “smallness,” we wanted to 
engage with them in a project that would honor the “language of the ocean” 
and practice literacy as involvement. With full enthusiasm and absolutely no 
road map, the “boat project” was launched by Marcy in collaboration with 
Anny, several of her graduate students, a volunteer boatbuilder, and an artist 
from the community. PVMS administration also provided essential support. On 
the surface, the project did not take the shape of literacy education. We mar-
keted the project to the kids quite simply: “Come help us build a canoe.” That 
was our ultimate goal – to construct a Marshallese-style outrigger canoe that 
would stay afloat. As part of an optional summer-school enrichment program, 
we combined boat building with academic lessons in math, literacy, visual arts, 
and Marshallese cultural studies. For example, during a morning work session, 
students might spend an hour each on hands-on boat construction, learning 
about documentary filmmaking, writing captions for photos taken of the canoe-
construction process, and creating art to adorn the outside of the canoe. The 
summer ended with a field trip to a local lake to sail the canoe.
The seamless integration of various forms of literacy practiced in community 
with a tangible project seemed to allow the Marshallese students to thrive. What 
was most amazing to us (more so even than middle schoolers safely constructing 
a seaworthy canoe) was their attendance. Despite the early morning start time, 
students continued to show up each day and engage not only with the construc-
tion but with the academic lessons as well. The following excerpt written by a 
student participant, Bobson, demonstrates the blend of pride and multiple forms 
of literacy and language cultivated during the boat project:
My favorite thing about being in the documentary group is editing the 
picture because if I had a picture that wasn’t that good I could edit the 
picture and it will be beautiful …. I learned how to use focus, bright-
ness, exposure, and negative space. I also learned how to use rule-of-thirds 
and … how to edit like an average professional.
Through the project, Bobson toggled between concrete, hands-on action (con-
structing the boat) and more overtly academic work (learning the academic 
language of photography while writing captions for photos). Notably, the 
elements of the summer project that most closely captured Marshallese culture – 
canoe construction and visual art – served as entry points for formal literacy 
development. Bobson, with the swagger of “an average professional,” was devel-
oping English skills in a context that centered his Marshallese identity.
Through the boat project, we came to understand the power of literacy as 
involvement: Lino, a classic underperforming student, became one of the captains 
100 Anny Fritzen Case, Marcy Ray Dodd, and Gina Mikel Petrie
because of his diligence and natural leadership that arose throughout the pro-
ject; primary source documents sparked interest which led students to suggest 
other topics we should investigate; the image that would be printedUniversity. She taught 
English in Argentina for 2 years and in Korea for 8 years. Her scholarship focuses 
on language teacher education for critical intercultural consciousness, critical 
pedagogical approaches to teacher education, decolonizing teacher education 
curriculum, and practitioner inquiry through participatory and action-oriented 
research.
Contributors’ Biographies xv
Annela Teemant (PhD, Ohio State University, 1997) is a Professor of 
Language Education at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis. 
Her scholarship focuses on critical sociocultural theory and pedagogy in teacher 
preparation. She has been awarded five US Department of Education grants 
focused on teacher preparation of general education teachers for multilingual 
learners. Her mixed methods research focuses on pedagogical coaching, family, 
community, and school partnerships, and quality teacher preparation.
Andrés Esteban Tobón-Gallego holds a Bachelor of Arts in Language 
teaching from Universidad Católica Luís Amigó (2014) and a MA in Learning 
and Teaching Processes in Second Languages at Universidad Pontificia 
Bolivariana (UPB, 2020). He is a language professor at Universidad Nacional 
de Colombia, Sede Medellín. Andrés is also a researcher at the Literacies in 
Second Languages Project research lab at UPB, currently interested in the topics 
of multimodality, critical literacies, and cultural consciousness in the second-
language scenarios. He has already had the chance to present his research at 
national and international events and is at present working on publications based 
on his thesis research.
Wallace Tucker was a research assistant in the Education Department at 
Colby College where he earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in government and 
educational studies. He is now a program manager for Morehouse School of 
Medicine.
xvi Contributors’ Biographies
Eu sou na minha fe [I am in my faith].
Paulo Freire
In his preface dated Autumn 1968, written from Santiago, Chile, Paulo Freire 
remarks that his book for radicals, Pedagogy of the Oppressed, may only be read to 
the end by Marxists and Christians. Sadly, for the monolingual English-speaking 
world, and all those whose translations were based on the English translation, no 
one has ever read the book to its original end. Not even Marxists and Christians.
I am a Christian, not a Marxist. In this prefatory note, I will explain why 
those who have only read Freire in English, including Marxists and Christians, 
have, in fact, never read his book to the end. I will also introduce the English-
speaking world to a part of the lost ending of Pedagogy of the Oppressed through 
its main article of faith: the people.
“Amar” means “to love” in Portuguese and Spanish. It is the final word Freire 
wrote by hand in blue ink in Pedagogia do Oprimido. “Menos difícil amar” means 
“less difficult to love” in Brazilian Portuguese. They are the final three words 
that Freire’s hand wrote in his famous book. The final eight words are “um 
mundo em que seja menos difícil amar” that means “a world where it is less dif-
ficult to love.”
These words have all been lost to the Anglophone world because of a trans-
lation that omitted the final five full paragraphs. To this day, there is great 
resistance to correcting this simple but profound literary mistake. The final sen-
tence reads as follows in its entirety: “Nossa fé nos homens e na criação de um 
mundo em que seja menos dificil amar.” This translates to mean: “Our faith in 
people and in the creation of a world where it is less difficult to love.”
The lost final paragraph of Freire’s Pedagogia do Oprimido reads as follows in 
full: “Se nada ficar destas paginas, algo, pelo menos, esperamos que permaneça: 
nossa confiança no povo. Nossa fé nos homens e na criação de um mundo em 
que seja menos dificil amar.” In English, this says: “If nothing remains of these 
pages, we hope something, albeit small, remains: Our confidence in the people. 
FOREWORD
“The People” Lost in Translation
Samuel D. Rocha
xviii Foreword
Our faith in people and in the creation of a world where it is less difficult to 
love.”
Listen to it again, in English. Imagine Freire speaking these words in his 
Brazilian accent to you, by name, after reading every page of his Pedagogy of the 
Oppressed to you in a fictional complete translation, like a bedtime storybook: 
“If nothing remains of these pages, we hope something, albeit small, remains: 
Our confidence in the people. Our faith in people and in the creation of a world 
where it is less difficult to love.”
Freire here reduces his book down to a single element: the people. He is will-
ing to let the rest go, to empty himself, to separate the chaff from the wheat. He 
is willing to purify his book in fire, like gold, trusting that “something, albeit 
small” will remain and endure. Freire ends his most famous book with a wish, a 
prayer, a hope, a longing for “something, albeit small,” a tiny remnant. “If noth-
ing remains of these pages …” It is especially poignant to think of this in light 
of the reality that these very words themselves did not survive translation into 
English which popularized and globalized the book from its distinctly South 
American context.
What is this “something, albeit small” that Freire hopes will survive the death 
of his own ideas and authorship? “Our confidence in the people. Our faith in 
people and in the creation of a world where it is less difficult to love.” Freire 
places his confidence and faith in “the people”—el pueblo, in Spanish—a theolog-
ical and spiritual expression that is commonly used in the Liberation Theology 
of Latin America which Freire prefigured and took part in. Theologically, the 
expression is short for “the people of God”—el pueblo de Dios, in Spanish. This 
is not a purely sociological expression for a social plurality or group. It conceals 
an even deeper meaning of “the people of God”: vox populi, vox Dei, in Latin—
the voice of the people is the voice of God. We, the people, are Christ’s hands 
and feet, the body of Christ is the universal Church, the communion of saints. 
Where two or more are gathered...
Freire puts his confidence and faith in “the people” because there, in the 
voice of the people, he finds the voice of God, just as in the face of the person 
he sees the face of Christ, his friend and comrade. His work with the Brazilian 
people was precisely dedicated to the ontological problem of their voicelessness, 
an illiteracy that is not analphabetic but, more deeply, spiritual poverty. Material 
poverty acquires its moral harm and violence by its spiritual effects, robbing peo-
ple of their voice and vocation and even their very personhood, inverting their 
being as active subjects with predicates into passive and dead objects, archiving 
them in a perverse banking concept of education, one of many instruments that 
threaten the people, that make them be less rather than their true vocation to 
“ser mais,” to be more.
It is too easy to forget that the colonial enslavement of African people was 
practiced in Brazil at a higher rate than any other place in the Iberian Union 
Foreword xix
and the abolition of slavery in Brazil was the latest date in all of the Americas. 
Without this context of distinctly Brazilian anti-Blackness, it is difficult to 
appreciate the full sum of Freire’s efforts. Freire does not teach the people to read 
the word and the world from the outside; he first and foremost sends them to find 
their inner teacher, their conscience, their judgment, their freedom. Conversely, 
the people teach Freire to have faith in their voice as the voice of the Divine 
word, the logos, which creates and renews the face of the earth. While the work 
begins in his native Brazil, he visits Africa, the USA, and Europe and always 
finds its North Star in the people.
“If nothing remains of these pages,” Freire repeats, “we hope something, albeit 
small, remains: Our confidence in the people.on our field 
trip tee shirts (see below) was an extra-curricular project a few students took 
on because they liked learning about and re-creating tribal artwork. Students 
involved in the projects were truly involved; they realized that if they didn’t do 
the work, the boat would never float. The boat construction became a context 
for other forms of learning that blended “academic” and culturally responsive 
forms of literacy. As Freire explained:
Productive work, because it is visibly collective, gives teachers and stu-
dents a clear vision of goals for their own development. It enables com-
munities to view the school as something that emerges from their own life, 
not something that is “outside” or “above” them.
(1978/2016, Postscript, “The Relation Between…,” para. 14)
Language of the Dry Land
If the ocean represents the deep cultural reservoir living within our students, 
perhaps “dry land” symbolizes Marshallese students’ experience with school. 
In the same way that Marshallese people live on the land and with the ocean, 
most of our students and their families recognize that school is a necessity and a 
pathway to a future for their children. Dry land and the ocean are compatible. 
Yet, the school system’s commitment to policies that clashed with Marshallese 
cultural values, misinterpretations of Marshallese student behaviors, and rigidly 
structured literacy intervention initiatives unintentionally seemed to trap the 
students on dry land.
Academic literacy held our students back year after year. This wasn’t because 
our students weren’t capable or interested in expressing themselves; one glance 
at the artwork that adorned their notebooks proved their ability (see Figure 6.1). 
In part, it was because the core concept of literacy and the associated curriculum 
offered a very narrow path toward achievement and the “dry land” notion that 
literacy was something external to be obtained.
My students often came to my classroom to work on their history assignments, which 
were often packets of graphic organizers that could be assembled into final essays. Students 
would often stop at each question and ask me if their answer was correct before commit-
ting it to paper. When I would answer, “I don’t know. Is it?” they would stare at me for 
a few moments trying to break the code as they had long ago realized that teachers and 
English-speaking students had access to knowledge that they, as ELD students, did not. 
In frustration they would return to their seats and wait a few minutes before trying again.
In stark contrast to Freire’s conception of literacy as something that emerges 
from within, PVMS (like many school systems) imposed on them the correct 
Involvement and Authenticity 101
structure: the Pine Valley Paragraph (PVP). Firmly rooted in literacy as inter-
vention, this literacy campaign framed academic writing as a template. Poor 
test scores on standardized writing assessments (across all student groups) had 
prompted PVMS administrators and teachers to form a committee to analyze 
and respond to their students’ apparent deficits with a whole-school writing 
initiative. The PVP was really just a formula for a standard academic paragraph – 
topic sentence, supporting details, and a conclusion. Large posters were made 
to remind everyone of the schoolwide commitment to this structure and teach-
ers across all content areas were encouraged to have their students write a PVP 
FIGURE 6.1 Artwork created by students including the caption “Ocean Dreamers” 
in Marshallese and Cebuano
102 Anny Fritzen Case, Marcy Ray Dodd, and Gina Mikel Petrie
regularly. During faculty meetings, teachers assessed these paragraphs. For the 
Marshallese students, this rigid structure often had the effect of trapping authen-
tic expression. Marcy’s experience with Leban is illustrative:
Leban had been bombarded with the PVP–thesis sentence, text evidence, 
elaboration, and concluding sentence. He came to our class well equipped 
with this arsenal. Too well equipped. Leban struggled because he couldn’t 
let go of this structure. No matter how often I reassured and reminded him 
that he was just writing his own thoughts and not a PVP, he couldn’t let it 
go. And the result was a garbled mess that didn’t make sense to any audi-
ence, but even worse, didn’t make sense to him. When I would attempt 
to backtrack with him and make sense of his writing, he no longer knew 
what he was trying to say. The structure had bleached all meaning from 
his words, even to himself. This is the great tragedy of overly structured 
writing–the actual loss of student voice. Leban’s voice couldn’t espouse the 
PVP because it is not a part of his reality, and the process of it becoming 
part of his reality had rendered his own voice empty and vapid.
I don’t for a moment think that anyone on the writing committee or at 
PVMS in general wanted Leban to lose his voice. I do believe that they 
might see this as an unfortunate side effect of a necessary step in achiev-
ing academic writing–that academic structure such as the PVP must pre-
cede intellectual thought. We do not believe this is the case. Leban’s voice 
gained no authority or intellectual capacity because it attempted to use 
structures of academic writing. It reached no greater audience because of 
this. Instead his voice failed to intelligibly communicate, even to himself, 
and thus he unintentionally resigned his place in the dialogue.
The PVP was a consistent challenge for the Marshallese students because 
it didn’t make sense to them why anyone would communicate this way. It 
didn’t make sense that writing or talking would be arranged like a math 
equation or a treasure map. In Marshallese culture, talking isn’t about 
types of sentences; it’s about types of people. For the writing committee, 
of which I was a part, it was direct, logical, and would produce data to 
propel us beyond “focus” school status. It made sense to the white, west-
ern, middle-class educators because this is how schooling had taught us to 
think. It was only natural that we would pass this knowledge on to our 
non-white, non-western, lower-class students with no prior experience 
communicating in such a sterile way.
Certainly, the PVP was intended as a scaffold, not a stifler of student voice. 
However, similar to Freire’s critique of literacy primers, the PVP ran the risk of 
instantiating “a passive, receptive attitude which contradicts the creative act of 
knowing” (1978/2016, Part 1 “Background and…,” para. 12).
Involvement and Authenticity 103
Language of the Sky
Witnessing the power of literacy as involvement through the boat project and the 
limitations of literacy as intervention manifest through the PVP, we deepened our 
commitment to situate our work both on land and in the sea and look to the sky 
for that overarching connection to both. Realistically, the regular school year 
would never afford us the freedom of summer school. How could we practice 
Freirean literacy education that emerged from and involved our Marshallese stu-
dents while also attending to the mandated literacy curriculum and expectations 
of academic literacy? With the support of school and relevant district leaders, the 
same team that organized the boat project expanded to include Gina, a faculty 
member from a second university in our region. Our emboldened imagination 
led us to consider literacy from a different perspective: writing emerging from 
a local cause rather than simply a series of decontextualized writing tasks. As 
Freire taught, literacy education ought not be framed in abstract terms. Rather, 
true empowerment from education comes with the merging of the theoretical, 
the practical, and the political (Freire, 1978/2016). Literacy education could, in 
tangible ways, “serve the collective good” (Letter 11, para. 36). Accordingly, 
literacy development we envisioned emerged from intrinsic motivation to dis-
cover, learn, impact, and share rather than extrinsic motivation tosimply master 
another genre. We wanted to work on the shore – the place where land and sea 
meet.
The birth of the next phase of this project began with a discussion about an 
authentic need in the community – the lack of a map identifying the many pub-
lic art pieces in Spokane. We proposed and received approval from the school 
and district for a Writers’ Workshop class – an additional course to support 
writing for Level 3 and 4 English learners – and our project became the heart of 
the course. Quickly, we brainstormed the key moments in the narrative of the 
project: students would take a field trip visiting public art, taking pictures while 
we engaged them with art-focused conversational pedagogy (Cotner, 2010; 
Eckhoff, 2013); they would each write an artistic interpretation of a piece of art; 
write an email to the artist to request an interview, write the interview ques-
tions; carry out the interview, write a short description of their chosen art, write 
an ekphrastic poem about the art piece, and use these texts to collaboratively cre-
ate an annotated map of public art. Finally, we envisioned the students writing a 
short speech to deliver when they presented the map to the city council as a gift. 
This year-long literacy campaign was coined “the art walk project.”
The Common Core ELA/Writing standards functioned as the central link 
between the official district writing curriculum and our community-based ini-
tiative. But although we were certainly very familiar with the standards, we 
didn’t start with them. Instead, we led with the writing that naturally emerged 
from the community-based cause. Once we identified these writing causes – i.e., 
104 Anny Fritzen Case, Marcy Ray Dodd, and Gina Mikel Petrie
letters of invitation, research-based descriptions of the artwork, a speech for City 
Council – we looked through the table of contents of the writing curriculum to 
identify instruction and assignments that supported these writing causes. At the 
same time, we overlaid relevant Common Core standards. We organized our 
planning according to our core commitments:
1. Supporting our students in becoming writers with agency, voice, and power.
2. Making a real contribution to the community.
3. Incorporating the prescribed writing curriculum and standards.
The order of these priorities mattered. If our commitment to the preexist-
ing curriculum had been driving our decisions, we would have unwittingly 
obscured possibilities and reinforced writing pedagogy and practices that hadn’t 
been working. However, we discovered that by starting with a clear vision for 
our students and a potent writing cause, it was easy to layer on prescribed cur-
riculum. In fact, it became apparent that the preexisting writing curriculum 
and the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) could be genuinely useful in 
our community-based writing project. It was just a matter of rearranging and 
contextualizing the lessons a little differently.
The community-based project functioned to give life to the well-constructed 
but inanimate curriculum. Suddenly the writing, the same writing assignments 
that existed in the curriculum, made sense and mattered to the students because 
of the authenticity of purpose and audience. To write a genuine letter to an artist 
and anticipate a reply holds a great deal more weight than to write an artificial 
letter to a “friend” about a generic topic, especially knowing full well that the 
true audience for the letter is the classroom teacher. Both “assignments” were 
a part of the prescribed curriculum and aligned with CCSS, but only one held 
any power of change. Based on the reply of the artists, the project could either 
move forward or students would have to reach out to other artists. In contrast, 
with the decontextualized letter assignment in the textbook, there would be no 
reply and therefore no power to change. During the art walk project, the par-
ticipation on the part of the students was great because their involvement in the 
process was real.
Student Involvement and Literacy Learning 
Through the Art Walk Project
To those who were interested, we showed the data of improved test scores after 
the Art Walk Project, highlighting the fact that in several instances students 
improved by two (of five) ELD levels. This was pretty big news. But it wasn’t 
the news we would choose to focus on. For us, there were small moments that 
made this project: reactions, comments, and gestures that can’t be captured on a 
Involvement and Authenticity 105
spreadsheet. But these are the moments that make up the mythology of educa-
tion, the stories educators secretly pass around to each other when testing season 
is over. For example,
Lita and Miliana both took to the workshopping process, though Lita would never 
admit this. They understood the value of improving on their work and saw it as an opportu-
nity rather than a hoop to jump through. Other students clamored to workshop with either 
of these ladies, knowing they would receive legitimate suggestions. I knew I had become 
superfluous when I heard a group of Marshallese writers animatedly workshopping peer 
writing. Lita’s voice rose above the rest when she definitively said, “Right here. Ms. Dodd 
would say ‘tell me more.’” She may have borrowed my phrase and my corresponding arm 
movement, but the suggestion was all hers. She was able to consider an outside audience–a 
non-Marshallese audience–and understand where their understanding would break down 
and consequently better teach her peers about audience and authorship than I could.
Riem possesses a witty humor. Most of his peers, teachers, counselors and administrators 
would never know this because he also suffers from selective mutism. This mutism seems 
most prevalent when the affective filter is high, such as in content area classes with pre-
dominantly white, native-English speaking students, or in our writer’s workshop when it is 
time to present final drafts. Even when Riem was able to get his words out, I could barely 
hear him, and his peers never could. Perhaps the most triumphant moment of the project 
was when Riem presented his final draft of his writing for the map and his voice made the 
three-foot journey from the author’s chair to the audience.
Like the sky itself, the Art Walk Project over-arched the land and the sea, the 
requirements set forth by the district and the needs and interests of our students. 
Whereas the boat project was primarily concerned with honoring the culture of 
the students, the art walk project considered western school culture as well. In 
the process, students found their voices, realized they had opinions and interpre-
tations that could differ from their peers and even their teachers, and test scores 
improved.
Finding the Horizon: Where Earth, Sky, and Ocean Meet
These three accounts reflect differing notions of literacy and competing forces 
around them. We experienced the most promising and joyful learning when we 
embraced Freire’s notion of literacy as emerging from within the students and 
extending out and into their lives. When literacy education is crafted as a “creative 
act that involves a critical comprehension of reality,” it can be relocated beyond 
the school walls and into the community, thus taking on concrete purposes nego-
tiated in dialogue between students and teachers (Freire, 1978/2016, Activities 
Already…, para. 7). In both the boat and art walk projects, the object of study 
extended beyond academic skills to student relationship with authentic reality.
This conception of literacy, however, was in tension with school-based/
western beliefs about literacy as an external object obtained (or imposed upon) 
106 Anny Fritzen Case, Marcy Ray Dodd, and Gina Mikel Petrie
learners. The various writing projects accomplished over the course of the art 
walk project brought students no closer to the mastery of the PVP because such 
formulaic writing was not our goal. Through the boat and art walkprojects, 
students produced evidence that they had improved their ability to communi-
cate unique and complex ideas to an outside audience, but not necessarily in one, 
externally imposed format.
In addition to students’ active involvement, the community-linked literacy 
projects produced fruit beyond reading and writing the word. To co-opt the 
words of C.S. Lewis, we found ourselves “surprised by joy.” Because these 
projects invited all of us to be fully human, there was space for emotion. We 
experienced vulnerability stemming from the audacity of building a boat with 
middle schoolers. We witnessed the delight on the students’ faces as they sten-
ciled their art to the side of the canoe. We marveled at the insightful questions 
our students asked the artists. We sensed the happiness community volunteers 
felt from their generous contributions. We heard the frustration and tenacity in 
the voice of the student who bemoaned, “writing drafts over and over and over 
and over and over and OVER again!” And we observed the deep satisfaction of 
the student who wrote, “I do feel confident in my writing because now I know 
that when I am writing nothing can stop me from writing.” Our experience 
resonates with Freire’s observation that “the great difficulty - or the great adven-
ture! - is how to make education something which, in being serious, rigorous, 
methodical, and having a process, also creates happiness and joy” (Horton & 
Freire, 1990, p. 170).
In bearing witness to the joy of cocreating rich literacy experiences with our 
Marshallese students, we also acknowledge the many challenges along the way. 
For example, literacy as intervention is entrenched within bureaucratic systems that 
guard it. Some school leaders were deeply committed to the prescribed curricu-
lum, and when we proposed an alternative, we were reminded of the arduous, 
formal approval process for changing it. “We can’t have our students used as 
guinea pigs,” was the sincerely well-intended rationale. At various points, we 
bumped up against other administrative regulations: The most memorable was 
the district’s liability concern about taking kids on the water upon completion 
of the canoe. (We are eternally grateful to the principal who creatively worked 
with the district to find a solution.) Sadly, not one of our initiatives is still active. 
Half of the canoe we built sits in Marcy’s former ELD classroom as a simultane-
ous reminder of the possibility and difficulty diverging from a landlocked system 
of education.
In addition to these systemic challenges, we confronted the discomfort of 
enacting literacy instruction that digressed from what and how we had been 
taught in school and in our professional programs. In a way that was both exhila-
rating and frightening, we truly were learning (often the hard way) alongside the 
middle schoolers. Naturally, these projects did not function as elixirs, magically 
Involvement and Authenticity 107
bringing all students up to “standard.” Moreover, they required significant 
resources of time, people, and materials. And yet, we experienced this work as a 
“beautiful risk” (Beghetto, 2019, p. 19).
For our literacy campaigns to be meaningful for our Marshallese students, 
we needed to venture off dry land and acknowledge the presence and pull of 
the ocean. Buzzwords such as culturally relevant teaching are meaningless if 
they solely remain outside the context of Marshallese students’ realities. Literacy 
needs to be taught as a tool for living authentically, allowing students to over-
come their identification as an academic failure and understand they have a place 
at the table because they genuinely have something to say (rather than some-
thing they have learned to repeat). Our students don’t need literacy launched at 
them like math facts. They deserve opportunities to awaken the literacy that is 
part of their identity, which is always becoming. They need educators who, as 
Freire described, work with rather than work on them (1978/2016, Introduction, 
para. 6).
References
Alvermann, D. E., & Rush, L. S. (2004). Literacy intervention programs at the middle 
and high school levels. In T. L. Jetton & J. A. Dole. Adolescent literacy research and prac-
tice (pp. 210–227). New York, NY: Guilford.
Beghetto, R. A. (2019). Taking beautiful risks in education. Educational Leadership, 76(4), 
18–24.
Bineham, S. C., Shelby, L., Pazey, B. L., & Yates, J. R. (2014). Response to intervention: 
Perspectives of general and special education professionals. Journal of School Leadership, 
24(2), 230–252. https://doi.org/10.1177/105268461402400201
Brooks, M. D., & Rodela, K. C. (2018). Why am I in reading intervention? A dual analy-
sis of entry and exit criteria. The High School Journal, 102(1), 72–93.
Brozo, W. G. (2009). Response to intervention or responsive instruction? Challenges 
and possibilities of response to intervention for adolescent literacy. Journal of Adolescent 
& Adult Literacy, 53(4), 277–281. https://doi.org/10.1598/jaal.53.4.1
Burns, M. K. (2010). Response-to-intervention research: Is the sum of the parts as great 
as the whole? Perspectives on Language and Literacy, 36(2), 13–15. Retrieved from http://
www.academia.edu/download/50170302/RTI_Research_Burns.pdf
Carris, J. (2011). Recognizing non-reading adolescents. Counterpoints, 361, 1–24. 
Re trieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/42980975
Climate Vulnerable Forum. (2020). President Heine statement: CVF leaders event at 
COP25. Retrieved from https://thecvf.org/our-voice/statements/president-heine- 
statement-to-the-cvf-partners-leaders-event-at-unfccc-cop25/
Columbia University. (2019, July 17). Radiation in parts of Marshall Islands is 
higher than Chernobyl. ScienceDaily. Retrieved from www.sciencedaily.com/
releases/2019/07/190717105348.htm
Cotner, T. L. (2010). Teaching through the Ill Body: A Spiritual and Aesthetic Approach 
to Pedagogy and Illness. Teaching and Teacher Education, 4(26), 1112–1113.
https://doi.org/10.1177/105268461402400201
https://doi.org/10.1598/jaal.53.4.1
http://www.academia.edu
http://www.academia.edu
http://www.jstor.org
https://thecvf.org
https://thecvf.org
https://www.sciencedaily.com
https://www.sciencedaily.com
108 Anny Fritzen Case, Marcy Ray Dodd, and Gina Mikel Petrie
Eckhoff, A. (2013). Conversational pedagogy: exploring interactions between a teach-
ing artist and young learners during visual arts experiences. Early Childhood Education 
Journal, 41(5), 365–372.
Francovich, E. (2017, April 4). Low-graduation rates among Marshallese students 
prompt study in Spokane Public Schools. The Spokesman-Review. Retrieved from 
https://www.spokesman.com/stories/2017/apr/04/low-graduation-rates-among- 
marshallese-students-pr/
Frankel, K. K. (2016). The intersection of reading and identity in high school literacy 
intervention classes. Research in the Teaching of English, 51(1), 37–59. Retrieved from 
https://library.ncte.org/journals/RTE/issues/v51-1/28684
Freire, P. (1983). The importance of the act of reading. Journal of Education, 165(1), 5–11. 
https://doi.org/10.1177/002205748316500103
Freire, P. (1985). Reading the world and reading the word: An interview with Paulo Freire. 
Language Arts, 62(1), 15–21. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/41405241
Freire, P. (1968/1998). Pedagogy of the oppressed (M. B. Ramos, Trans.). New York, NY: 
Bloomsbury.
Freire, P. (1999). The “Banking” concept of education. In D. Barthaolomae & A. 
Petroskey (Eds.), Ways of reading (pp. 1–8). New York, NY: Bedford/St. Martin’s.
Freire, P. (1978/2016). Pedagogy in process: The letters to Guinea-Bissau [E-reader version]. 
New York, NY: Bloomsbury. https://doi.org/10.5040/9781474268950
Greenleaf, C. L., Jiménez, R. T., & Roller, C. M. (2002). Reclaiming secondary reading 
interventions: From limited to rich conceptions, from narrow to broad conversa-
tions. Reading Research Quarterly, 37(4), 484–496.
Hall, L. A. (2010). The negative consequences of becoming a good reader:Identity 
theory as a lens for understanding struggling readers, teachers, and reading instruc-
tion. Teachers College Record, 112(7), 1792–1829.
Horton, M., & Freire, P. (1990). We make the road by walking: Conversations on education and 
social change. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press.
Jetn̄il-Kijiner, K. (2014). Iep Jsltok: A history of Marshallese literature. Unpublished mas-
ters dissertation. University of Hawaii. Retrieved from https://scholarspace.manoa.
hawaii.edu/bitstream/10125/36868/Jetnil-Kijiner_2014.pdf
Jetn̄il-Kijiner, K. (2017). Tell them. In A. Yamashiro & N. Goodyear-Ka’ōpua (Eds.), 
The value of Hawaii (vol. 2, pp. 71–74). Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press. https://
doi.org/10.1515/9780824840259-013
Kostogriz, A. (2011). Interrogating the ethics of literacy intervention in Indigenous 
schools. English Teaching: Practice and Critique, 10(2), 24–38. Retrieved from https://
files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ944890.pdf
Lajuan, N. (n.d.) Adapted English translation for Willy Mwekto’s life story (A. Hazzard & 
T. Hazzard, Trans.). Marshall Islands Story Project. Retrieved from http://www.
mistories.org/life-Mwekto-text.php
Lane, P., & De Brum-Abraham, S. A. (2015). The Republic of the Marshall Islands education 
for all mid-decade assessment. Majuro: Ministry of Education. Retrieved from http://
unesdoc.unesco.org/images/0022/002217/221791e.pdf
Makuakane-Drechsel, T., & Hagedorn, L. S. (2000). Correlates of retention among 
Asian Pacific Americans in community colleges: The case for Hawaiian students. 
Community College Journal of Research and Practice, 24(8), 639–655. https://doi.org/ 
10.1080/10668920050140800
https://www.spokesman.com
https://www.spokesman.com
https://library.ncte.org
https://doi.org/10.1177/002205748316500103
http://www.jstor.org
https://doi.org/10.5040/9781474268950
https://scholarspace.manoa.hawaii.edu
https://scholarspace.manoa.hawaii.edu
https://doi.org/10.1515/9780824840259-013
https://doi.org/10.1515/9780824840259-013
https://files.eric.ed.gov
https://files.eric.ed.gov
http://www.mistories.org
http://www.mistories.org
http://unesdoc.unesco.org
http://unesdoc.unesco.org
https://doi.org/10.1080/10668920050140800
https://doi.org/10.1080/10668920050140800
Involvement and Authenticity 109
Pandya, J. Z., & Aukerman, M. (2014). A four resources analysis of technology in the 
CCSS. Language Arts, 91(6), 429.
Pressley, M., Graham, S., & Harris, K. (2006). The state of educational interven-
tion research as viewed through the lens of literacy intervention. British Journal of 
Educational Psychology, 76(1), 1–19. https://doi.org/10.1348/000709905x66035
Slavin, R. E. (2003). A reader’s guide to scientifically-based research. Educational Leader-
ship, 60(5), 12–16. Retrieved from http://www.ascd.org/publications/educational- 
leadership/feb03/vol60/num05/A-Reader%27s-Guide-to-Scientif ically-Based-
Research.aspx
Storlazzi, C. D., Gingerich, S., Swarzenski, P., Cheriton, O., Voss, C., Oberle, F., Logan, 
J., Rosenberger, K., Fregoso, T., Rosa, S., Johnson, A., Erikson, L., Field, D., Piniak, 
G., Malhotra, A., Finkbeiner, M., van Dongeran, A., Quartaert, E., van Rooijen, 
A., Elias, E., & Gawehn, M., (2017). The impact of sea-level rise and climate change on 
Department of Defense installations on Atolls in the Pacific Ocean (RC-2334). Alexandria, 
VA: Strategic Environmental Research and Development Program. Retrieved 
from https://www.serdp-estcp.org/Program-Areas/Resource-Conservation-and-
Resiliency/Infrastructure-Resiliency/Vulnerability-and-Impact-Assessment/
RC-2334/
Taibbi, M., & Saltzman, M. (2018, December 16). Marshall Islands: A third of 
the nation has left for the US. PBS News Hour Weekend: Public Broadcasting 
System. Retrieved from https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/marshall-islands-a- 
third-of-the-nation-has-left-for-the-us
Wise, B. (2009). Adolescent literacy: The cornerstone of student success. Journal of 
Adolescent and Adult Literacy, 52(5), 369–375. https://doi.org/10.1598/jaal.52.5
https://doi.org/10.1348/000709905x66035
http://www.ascd.org
http://www.ascd.org
http://www.ascd.org
https://www.serdp-estcp.org
https://www.serdp-estcp.org
https://www.serdp-estcp.org
https://www.pbs.org
https://www.pbs.org
https://doi.org/10.1598/jaal.52.5
DOI: 10.4324/9781003175728-9
7
LEARNING ENGLISH AS AN 
ADDITIONAL LANGUAGE FROM 
CHILDREN’S POINTS OF VIEW IN 
A PUBLIC SCHOOL IN BRAZIL
A Freirean Perspective
Andrea da Silva Marques Ribeiro and Jessica F. Cruz
Introduction
“People are free when they become aware of their word1” (Freire & Guimarães, 
2019, p. 39). This quote highlights the relevance of language as a tool for libera-
tion, going beyond the role of mere instrument of communication, since it is 
principally through language and in language that human beings interact and 
build social practices. Martin and Rose (2003) consider that language is more 
than the manifestation of a social activity. It is in language that meanings are 
constructed as individuals talk about their experiences and ways of seeing the 
world, interacting with other subjects, and organizing their ideas and messages.
Thompson (2004) states that, in addition to using language to talk about our 
physical and mental experiences in the world, we also use language to interact 
with others and establish relationships to influence their behavior and under-
stand or transform their worldviews. Bearing this view of language in mind, 
and relating to Freire and Guimarães’ (2019) statement quoted above, we argue 
that in a globalized world to know other languages besides one’s mother tongue 
contributes to an education that fosters citizenship and grants access to cultural 
and social assets that are a patrimony of humanity. This means that additional 
language offerings in public schools are paramount to developing students’ criti-
cal awareness and global citizenship dispositions in ways that will equip them 
critically to understand and negotiate with the various meanings of diversity 
presented throughout their lifelong learning.
In Brazil, English teaching is mandatory in public and private schools begin-
ning in the sixth grade. However, it has been expanding to the elementary 
grades (first to fifth) as well, which in turn introduces many challenges related 
https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003175728-9
Learning English as an Additional Language 111
to building capacity at the instructional and curricular level—e.g., didactic 
materials availability, methodological choices, and sustained professional devel-
opment. To foster a process of teaching and learning English committed to the 
development of critical awareness and citizenship in a globalized world, and 
committed to breaking the educational paradigm based on the concept of bank-
ing education, it is crucial that students’ voices be heard. In so doing, English as 
an additional language (EAL) professionals may not only gain a better under-
standing of their students’ points of view and beliefs toward the language they 
are being taught, but educators may also be able to choose more effectively the 
teaching practices genuinely assisting their students in becoming protagonists 
of their own learning. This chapter aims to report on the usefulness of culture 
circles (Freire, 1967) as an instructional planning event that foregrounds authen-
tically students’ voices, ideas, and points of view.
The Relevance of English as an Additional 
Language in Basic Education
Additional languages play an important role in schooling as they “allow stu-
dents to get in touch with other cultures and view and interpret other realities”2 
(Nacionais, 1998, p. 54). Learning an additional language also contributes to 
mother tongue instruction in meaningful ways (Lopes, 1996). As the Parâmetors 
Curriculares Nacionais (PCN) [National Curriculum Parameters] emphasize, there is 
a relationship between additional language—or foreign language, as it is referred 
to in the document—and mother tongue that provides opportunitiesto learners 
to access and understand different cultures. The learning of an additional lan-
guage, according to the PCN:
brings about a new perception of language nature; it increases understand-
ing how language works and develops greater awareness of how mother 
tongue works. At the same time, by promoting an appreciation of the 
customs and values of other cultures, [additional languages] contribute to 
developing the perception of the culture itself through the understanding 
of the foreign culture (s). Developing the skill to understand/say what 
other people, in other countries, would say in certain situations leads to an 
understanding of both foreign and one’s culture. This intercultural under-
standing also promotes the acceptance of differences in the ways of expres-
sion and behavior.3
(Nacionais, 1998, p. 37)
As the policy states, learning other languages grants access to cultural assets of 
humanity and expansion of one’s cultural repertoire. It contributes further to the 
integral education of students as citizens in a globalized world with increasingly 
112 Andrea da Silva Marques Ribeiro and Jessica F. Cruz
blurred borders, which highlights the relevance of English language learning in 
different educational contexts, including in public school. The preference for 
English is probably due to the growing participation of Brazil in international 
events and the desire instilled by the neoliberal capitalist system to meet the 
demands of a globalized world. As English is considered a lingua franca in the 
newest national policy, the Base Nacional Curricular Comum (BNCC, henceforth), 
many believe that English instruction ought to be an integral part of the com-
mon education of students, thereby enabling students to reflect on their actions in 
the world and expand their linguistic and cultural horizons in meaningful ways.
Implicit economic factors determining the choice of English as the man-
datory language in primary and secondary education are the most obvious 
determinants of this language’s institution as a de facto cultural policy worldwide, 
which recalls the influence of the United States as a world power interfering in 
the global economy, communication, culture, and education, as pointed out in 
the PCN. Crystal (2003) states that English has attained a position of global lan-
guage as it has achieved a genuinely global status recognized in most countries 
(Crystal, 2003, p. 3). As he observes, a quarter of the world population is fluent 
or competent in the use of English, being an official or second language in more 
than 70 nations.
In this chapter, we choose to use the term “additional language” (AL 
henceforth), instead of “foreign language” in reference to languages taught in 
Brazilian schools, to promote greater inclusion and foster a sentiment of global 
citizenship. From this perspective, we recognize ALs as necessary for individu-
als’ lives while avoiding dichotomizing their characterizations as either foreign 
or national (Schlatter & Garcez, 2009). ALs are built upon students’ mother 
language or language practices they already know. It takes into consideration 
that students may already speak other languages, which places the goal of AL 
as that of enhancing students’ linguistic repertoire based on what they already 
know (Leffa & Irala, 2014). As such, teachers cannot take for granted students’ 
knowledge of a mother tongue with which they identify as they plan for cur-
riculum and instruction in ALs.
Additional Language Teaching as a Practice of Freedom
There are numerous beliefs about the teaching-learning process of a target lan-
guage, especially in the context of public schools, and many are the ideological 
orientations toward characterizing language within institutional settings. “They 
don’t learn Portuguese, let alone English!” is a sentence mentioned by Moita 
Lopes (1996) in which this author reflects on the common deficit-oriented treat-
ment observed among many educators concerning the relevance of AL to early 
schooling. Lopes mentions this commonly uttered sentence while reporting on 
data from a survey on an English teaching program carried out in public schools 
Learning English as an Additional Language 113
in the city of Rio de Janeiro. In the elementary grades, she argues, students’ 
capacity to learn a new language is widely questioned, likely since children are 
at the beginning of the process of learning how to read and write in their mother 
tongue (Portuguese). This belief contributes to teaching practices of AL based 
on memorization of decontextualized vocabulary, with no social function as 
opposed to an approach to language instruction that is dialogic and embedded 
in a social context (Bakhtin, 2006). Here, one realizes how similar the argument 
Lopes examines to those arguments operationalized against bilingual education 
for linguistically minoritized students who are newcomers to a nation’s mono-
lingual habitus (Gogolin, 1997).
Likewise, Rosenthal and Jacobson’s (1968) research points out similar find-
ings to Moita Lopes’ (1996). The researchers asked teachers to administer a test 
in 18 classes. With the results in hand, they chose randomly 20% of the students 
in each class, stating that those students had greater intellectual capacity than the 
other ones. Later, all the students took the tests again, and those who obtained 
the best results were those indicated as better students by the researchers at the 
beginning of the study. Those students from whom teachers expected more in 
terms of cognitive process really had a good test performance. The researchers 
described this phenomenon as a “self-fulfilling prophecy” or the “Pygmalion 
effect” whereby: “One person’s expectation for another person’s behavior can 
quite unwittingly become a more accurate prediction simply for its having been 
made” (Rosenthal & Jacobson, 1968, p. 7). This further illustrates how teachers’ 
actions and attitudes toward AL, even if implicitly, influence students’ perfor-
mance significantly.
In our view, promoting meaningful learning opportunities means finding 
ways to motivate students to recognize their latent talents. Preventing public 
school students from learning English or building teaching practices based on 
the belief that they lack the capability to learn ALs as they are becoming alpha-
betized represents a type of symbolic violence enacted institutionally against 
socioeconomically disadvantaged students. This is a particularly salient point 
to consider as private institutions have expanded their offerings in ALs in the 
past decade. “Foreign” language teaching, while still not seen as an important 
discipline or a paramount educational right in Brazil (Nacionais, 1998, p. 24), 
still occupies a prominent role in transforming public education into a more 
equitable tool for the socioeconomic advancement of socioeconomically disen-
franchised populations.
Paulo Freire (1979) believed that education, delivered publicly or through 
grassroots initiatives, was necessary in society as we are, according to him, 
“unfinished beings.” Nevertheless, this search for “becoming more with the 
world,” as he argues throughout his works, is attainable only through collective 
efforts. If the search for education were individual, we would foment a self-
serving logic in the service of the status quo. Whereas in the banking concept 
114 Andrea da Silva Marques Ribeiro and Jessica F. Cruz
of education, as Freire (2014) argues, knowledge is granted by the ones who 
consider themselves wise to the ones that are seen as knowing nothing, in a truly 
emancipatory education such an idea does not hold. Granting knowledge to 
others, as Freire understood, buttresses one of the most pernicious myths of an 
ideology of educational oppression: absolutizing ignorance (Freire, 2014, p. 133), 
that is, to consider the ignorance of the people and their capacity to think freely as 
an a priori reason for educating others. As Freire explains,this myth “implies the 
existence of someone who decrees the ignorance of someone else. The one who 
is doing the decreeing defines himself and the class to which he belongs as those 
who know or were born to know; he thereby defines others as alien entities” 
(Freire, 2014, p. 133–134).
Freire urges educators to expand their belief system through a commitment 
toward refusing commonly diffused narratives that characterize the pedagogue 
as an entity who knows best while their students know nothing. The rigidity of 
this narrative denies a vision of education, and knowledge, as a process whose 
authority rests on teachers’ and students’ curiosity. According to Freire (2014), 
education transforms us when it provides tools allowing teachers and students 
to reflect critically and jointly about their roles in society. As he argues, pro-
vided with the proper tools for such encounter, “the individual can gradually 
perceive personal and social reality as well as the contradictions in it, become 
conscious of his or her own perception of that reality, and deal critically with it” 
(Freire, 2014, p. 32). The philosopher further adds that we “perceive the reality 
of oppression not as a closed world from which there is no exit, but as a limiting 
situation which they can transform” (Freire, 2014, p. 49).
It is worth mentioning here that Freire stands for a liberatory pedagogy in 
the face of an unjust class-based society where education contributes to the 
maintenance of an unjust order, thereby reinforcing the status quo. Based on a 
“banking system of education” (Freire, 2014), schools make deposits, material-
ized in decontextualized contents in students’ heads that are distant from their 
reality, thus domesticating them in service of a system notes for its epistemic 
oppression toward historically disenfranchised populations. Yet, Freire believed 
otherwise. He argued that education ought to manifest through authentic forms 
of dialogue that foster political and social responsibility.
Despite the many challenges they face, schools can still achieve significant 
progress if educators commit to emancipatory goals within their institutional 
culture, promoting a move away from naïve transitivity to critical transitivity as 
Freire (1967) described emancipatory education. According to him, education 
for the practice of freedom understands that students are agents in the recov-
ery of their humanity within a dehumanizing socioeconomic and institutional 
system, and that the struggle for equal rights comes through a deep analysis of 
language. Due to our creative spirit and work as we relate to the world, we trans-
form it, and it is this belief throughout Freire’s works that animates his theories’ 
Learning English as an Additional Language 115
emphasis on a radical trust in students. Considering Freire’s theorizations about 
emancipatory education and how it may be better realizing within institutions, 
we argue that it is crucial for educators to find ways to break with the cycle of 
reproduction through the teaching of English in early elementary grades in ways 
that materialize a more meaningful and dialogical process upon which curricu-
lum and instruction can be approached critically by students and educators alike.
Multiliteracy: A Possible Way to Reframe English Teaching 
and Learning Process at Brazilian Public Schools
According to Kramsch (1998, p. 56 as cited in Santos, 2005), to be part of the lit-
erate world, an individual “not only must be able to encode and decode written 
words, or make analyzes, he must be able to understand and manipulate cultural 
and social meanings of the printed language in thoughts, feelings and actions.”4 
Santos (2005) and Rocha (2007) argue that the teaching of English from first to 
fifth grades need not be restricted to vocabulary presentation, memorization of 
structures and pronunciation. In line with a wealth of contemporary empirical 
literature, students can engage discursively in the process of learning a new lan-
guage through lived experiences consistent with their social reality, interacting 
and questioning critically the meaning of cultures and what they mean to others. 
In this process, language teaching is approached as a dialogically situated prac-
tice, considering the specificities of the infinite social situations that integrate 
everyday life, across social fields, observing the ways language in them and the 
individuals who participate in its production, including their social positions, 
possible valuations and worldviews, the purposes and forms of interaction, and 
resources (Rocha, 2007).
In her doctoral thesis, Rocha (2007), in particular, advances a proposal for 
the teaching of English in the early years of elementary education based on dis-
course genres adapted to the Brazilian context (Bakhtin, 2011). There are few 
contemporary proposals to the teaching of English in elementary education in 
Brazil, particularly guided by a socio-cultural view of language understanding 
language as socially, culturally, and historically situated product, with a special 
focus on the development of multiple capacities and literacies (Rocha, 2007). As 
such, the teaching of English is articulated as related to the development of mul-
tiple practices of literacy by means of speech genres (Cope & Kalantzis, 2009; 
Rojo, 2012). Such an approach, many believe, fosters better conditions for stu-
dents to achieve a plural understanding of the world so that students themselves 
may better understand their roles confronting globalization’s unjust demands 
while negotiating with different speech forms and practices (Bakhtin, 2011).
The axis of this chapter is to report on a proposal for curriculum develop-
ment of EAL in the early elementary grades through Freire’s culture circle. In 
this report, we respond to the calls of critical educators urging professionals to 
116 Andrea da Silva Marques Ribeiro and Jessica F. Cruz
work alongside students to seek a deeper understanding of their authority over 
learning. Accordingly, we recognize that multiliteracies presents a powerful 
theoretical constellation of ideas about language (Cope & Kalantzis, 2009; Rojo, 
2012) that attunes education to contextualized forms of English teaching, with 
a focus on real and social use of language by means of developing literacy prac-
tices in society. In other words, educators should consider not only mainstream 
literacies in instruction but also the literacy practices of people and their local 
communities expressed through diverse media and genres.
The BNCC and the PNC mentioned earlier, as guiding documents in 
Brazilian public education, highlight the problem caused by structuring AL 
teaching within the traditionalist perspective. The BNCC, in particular, states 
that, in the attempt to facilitate learning, content is organized in a very simpli-
fied way, articulated around dialogues often decontextualized with a focus on 
lexical and grammatical structures worked by means of translation, copy, and 
repetition exercises (Nacionais, 1998). The document hints at the term “lit-
eracy” as the naming of social practices related to reading and writing, which 
are considered more advanced and complex than the practices of reading and 
writing resulting from the learning of the writing system alone (Soares, 2004). 
In the traditional perspective, however:
learners were passive recipients or at best, agents of reproduction of 
received, sanctioned and authoritative representational forms. The logic 
of literacy pedagogy was one that made it an instrument of social design 
that buttressed a regime of apparent stability and uniformity. In contrast, 
a pedagogy of multiliteracies requires that the enormous role of agency 
in the meaning-making process be recognized, and in that recognition, it 
seeks to create a more productive, relevant, innovative, creative and even 
perhaps emancipatory, pedagogy.
(Cope & Kalantzis, 2009, p. 175)
Language represents humanbeings, and thus it remains indicative of social rela-
tions and the values, ideologies, and intentions that permeate them. Accordingly, 
language can be a tool for alienation or liberation because, in a society marked 
by class divisions, more often than not authentic dialogue does not exist. What 
we have are pseudo-dialogues endorsed by the elites and their cunning tricks 
posing as benefactors of the oppressed class (Gadotti as cited in Freire, 1979, 
p. 4). Through the promotion of authentic critical dialogue, as Freire envisioned 
it in the culture circles, human beings can develop critical awareness and recog-
nize themselves in the roles of the oppressed and the oppressor. The absence of 
dialogue causes collective mutism and passivity, contributing to verticalization 
of social relations (Freire, 2014). This philosophical approach to language has 
a practical implication for AL teaching and curricular development. It enables 
Learning English as an Additional Language 117
educators to work in the classroom with an understanding of language that pro-
vides learning opportunities posed as ethical choices drawn from and approached 
through available discourses permeating a society (Rojo, 2009).
Indeed, language teaching has traditionally taken a “separatist” approach to 
skill building, focusing on writing, speaking, reading, and listening develop-
ment as if these activities were disconnected from discourses and media that 
organize them. Based on Freire’s conception of libertarian education, however, 
we recognize the need to integrate such skills, since their separation impairs 
a socio-critical and functional development of language learning, which ulti-
mately strengthens banking models of education. In the practice of everyday 
life, we continually integrate these four skills. As Kumaravadivelu (2003) states, 
“rare indeed is the day when we only listen, or only speak, or only read, or only 
write” (Kumaravadivelu, 2003, p. 225). Kumaravadivelu (1994) points out that 
teachers usually follow the teacher’s book (or teacher’s manual) by introducing 
language skills gradually. During activities, students practice writing, reading, 
speaking, and listening in a parallel integration, with different types of combi-
nations depending on the goal. Developing integrated skills and contributing 
to a more meaningful, critical, and socially relevant teaching of English are 
theoretical assumptions that Kumaravadivelu defends as part of a “post-method” 
approach to language pedagogy. According to this scholar, we have arrived at 
an age in which there is no exclusive method to be followed by teachers rigidly, 
but relevant principles and alternatives for a method should be sought, taking 
into consideration the socio-cultural profile and needs of the school community.
Kumaravadivelu (2003) argues for a post-method pedagogy that is tridimen-
sional and guided by three parameters: particularity, practicality and possibility. 
The first parameter, “particularity,” refers to teachers’ practices of observa-
tion, reflection, and action so that they can understand the cultural, social and 
economic contexts where they belong, based on the particularities of that com-
munity. Regarding these three parameters, Kumaravadivelu explains that “the 
parameter of particularity … is opposed to the notion that there can be an estab-
lished method with a generic set of theoretical principles and a generic set of 
classroom practices” (Kumaravadivelu, 2003, p. 34–35). Practicality relates to 
the development of theories derived from practice, which recognize the teacher 
as an intellectual producer of knowledge and overcoming verticalization of the 
relationships between school and university. Kumaravadivelu emphasizes that:
The intellectual exercise of attempting to derive a theory of practice 
enables teachers to understand and identify problems, analyze and assess 
information, consider and evaluate alternatives, and then choose the best 
available alternative that is then subjected to further critical appraisal. In 
this sense, a theory of practice involves continual reflection and action.
(Kumaravadivelu, 2003, p. 35)
118 Andrea da Silva Marques Ribeiro and Jessica F. Cruz
Finally, possibility, as articulated by Kumaravadivelu, aligns with Freire’s 
philosophical take on emancipatory education because it promotes the devel-
opment of political awareness aiming at social transformation as “critical 
pedagogists take the position that any pedagogy is implicated in relations of 
power and dominance and is implemented to create and sustain social inequali-
ties” (Kumaravadivelu, 2003, p. 36).
Thus, to better understand the context of teaching, the relationship between 
theory and practice contributing to transformative education, English teachers 
need to pay attention to what students bring to class. To illustrate this argument, 
we will focus on students’ voices and how they can guide teachers’ actions and 
practices toward a more meaningful learning of English, breaking the paradigms 
of a banking education.
The Research Context
Education in Brazil is regulated by the decree 9,394, also known as Law of 
National Education Guidelines and Bases (LDB, henceforth), published on 
December 20, 1996. According to this law, English must be offered from the sixth 
grade on in elementary school: “In the elementary school curriculum, from the 
sixth grade onwards, the English language will be mandatory”5 (Federal Law, 
LDB 9394/96, art. 26, §5°). Nevertheless, the teaching of English Language is 
not restricted to the last grades of elementary school (6–9 grades). Recently, 
English language teaching has become part of the curriculum of the first grades 
(1–5) in elementary grades in both public and private sectors of education in 
Brazil. In this scenario, there is much to be done to overcome obstacles in the 
teaching of an AL in public school, especially in the early grades of elementary 
school. Since the teaching of an AL is not legally supported in LDB or any other 
law, the segment is not part of public policies to foster AL teaching. This is the 
case of municipal schools in Niterói city, Rio de Janeiro state, where we con-
ducted this action-oriented project.
The teaching of AL in early years of public elementary education does not 
count on governmental support, whether in the form of didactic material distri-
bution for public schools or sustained teacher professional development. Within 
this scenario of utter lack of support for English AL teaching, this research 
looked at an elementary public school in Niterói, an urban site in the state of 
Rio de Janeiro, where support for AL instruction came through the Programa 
de Pós-graduação em Ensino na Educação Básica (PPGEB), a post-graduation 
program at Fernando Rodrigues da Silveira Applied Institute at Rio de Janeiro 
State University. The data was collected in a culture circle with a group of 25 
students, 14 boys and 11 girls, who were around 7 years old, in their first year of 
elementary grades.
Learning English as an Additional Language 119
Methodology
This chapter draws data from a master thesis to highlight the usefulness of 
culture circles in planning curriculum and instruction (Cruz, 2019). This 
research aimed at investigating the possibility of working with discourse gen-
res to develop the multiliteracies in elementary grades, but here we focus 
on the importance of curricular deliberation efforts, given the lack of finan-
cial support and English didactic materials. Drawing from Freire’s model of 
emancipatory education, students participated in two conversation circles 
(Freire, 1967) in which the researchers and teachers facilitated a deeper under-
standing of their interests, necessities, and perceptions about English learning 
and teaching. The goal of these circles was to explore students’ responses to 
the development and implementation of a didactic sequence to be taught in 
English.
The conversation circle, inits various iterations, constitutes one of the most 
popular pedagogical tools in Brazilian education, employed mainly in preschool 
and in the early years of elementary school. Through this approach—and not 
necessarily with guarantees—the teaching and learning process tends to favor 
dialogue to develop greater autonomy, oral and listening abilities, build a cul-
ture of mutual respect in the classroom, and avoid social hierarchizations. In 
Brazil, Freire (1967) popularized such a model. The conversation circle, also 
known as the “Paulo Freire Method,” ruptured an oppressive and authoritarian 
educational approach at its time. During Freire’s literacy campaigns with rural 
workers, he systematized cultural circles to facilitate the emergence of authentic 
forms of dialogue expressive of popular culture, with which educators could 
relate as they examined the daily life of workers and their worlds. The point 
of departure of literacy acquisition was the debate among educators and learn-
ers. Through their authentic and non-authoritarian dialogue, the development 
of critical thinking led to the acquisition of literacy skills beyond coding and 
decoding. As Freire (1967) affirms, “The programming of these debates was 
offered to us by the groups themselves, through interviews that we held with 
them and that resulted in the enumeration of problems that they would like to 
discuss”6 (p. 103).
Beyond its pedagogical applications, the culture circle can also serve as a 
qualitative research instrument of collective participation, enabling the gather-
ing of information from spontaneous conversations, contributing to exchanging 
rich experiences. Flexible in character, especially in the case of children, the tar-
get public of this project, culture circles enable participants to hear each other’s 
stance and to be heard. Tripp (2005) notes that such a methodological approach 
works as a tool for teachers and researchers to seek possible solutions for the 
improvement of teaching and a better development of the students’ learning 
process.
120 Andrea da Silva Marques Ribeiro and Jessica F. Cruz
Here, we briefly report on our observations of two conversation circles that 
drew inspiration from Freire’s emancipatory theory to plan curriculum and 
instruction. The first conversation circles focused on investigating what students 
expect from an English class, contributing to the elaboration of the didactic 
sequence, and the other one, at the end of the project, was developed to check 
students’ receptivity and impressions about the research proposal. The data was 
registered through observation notes, recordings, photos, and videos. Six ques-
tions guided the first culture circle meeting:
Question 1: What do you think of learning English?
Question 2: Do you think learning English is important? For what?
Question 3: Do you speak, listen, or read in English in your everyday 
life? Where?
Question 4: Does anyone know any English word?
Question 5: What would you like to do in English classes?
Question 6: What and how would you like to learn in English?
The second circle had the following guiding questions after the teacher incorpo-
rated the students’ suggestions:
Question 1: What did you think about the project and its activities?
Question 2: Which activity did you like most?
Question 3: What did you learn in English?
Question 4: What did you think about your participation? What was 
more difficult? What was easier?
Question 5: What would you change or include in the project?
The first conversation circle was carried out before the didactic sequence was 
introduced. It aimed at hearing and understanding students’ voices, especially 
regarding learning English. The second was conducted after the activities 
were implemented and had the objective of listening to students’ feedback and 
understanding their perspectives on its efficacy, particularly concerning the mul-
tiliteracy approach adopted.
Culture Circles and Student Authority
Listening to participants is the cornerstone of qualitative research. In our case, 
students were the protagonists. The participants’ ages, who were around 7 years 
old and becoming literate in their mother tongue (Portuguese), required a more 
purposeful focus concerning their decision-making capabilities, which aligned 
with the instructional goal of developing criticality in English language learning 
as a process that contributes to the conscientização of English as a lingua franca. 
Learning English as an Additional Language 121
Freire’s (1967) ideas offered us a way to think about the teaching of an AL in 
terms of planetary citizenship during the circles’ conversations. For instance, 
the Brazilian pedagogue advocated for an education that could enable people to 
bravely discuss their problems, thus bringing into focus the dangers of their time, 
so that we may find strength and courage to fight instead of being dragged to 
the perdition of the self, subjected to what others prescribe on our behalf. This 
education fosters a culture of constant dialogue with others and, consequently, 
predisposes groups to revise and critically analyze their findings, promoting 
“refractoriness” in the most human sense of expression, which helps in identi-
fying educational methods and processes (Freire, 1967). In the case of ALs, the 
role of critical literacy becomes apparent to the process of learning and teach-
ing languages as students find opportunities to leave the zone of alienation in 
which they may find themselves, claiming their role as knowers of ALs’ words 
and worlds, unveiling nuanced meanings introduced to them dialogically as the 
culture circle in Figure 7.1 illustrates.
Guided by the questions previously noted in the first circle, students talked 
about their interests, necessities, and expectations about the English learning 
and teaching process. They highlighted how their interest in learning English 
was primarily to communicate with others and become better informed about 
others’ lives. English as a lingua franca surfaced during discussions unrelated to 
national representations. This is an interesting finding that teachers themselves 
FIGURE 7.1 First conversation circle
122 Andrea da Silva Marques Ribeiro and Jessica F. Cruz
should become aware of, because the policy that undergirds AL curricula in 
Brazil urges educators to treat English, precisely, as such:
The treatment of English as lingua franca detaches the language from the 
notion of belonging to a certain territory and, consequently, to cultures 
of specific communities, legitimating the use of the language in its local 
contexts. This view of language fosters a linguistic education based on 
interculturality, that is, for understanding how they are produced in differ-
ent social practices of language, which contributes to critical reflection on 
different views and analyses of the world, the other(s) and the self.7
(Base Nacional Comum Curricular 
[Base Nacional Comum Curricular], 2018, p. 239)
In other words, English language as an instrument of communication and ben-
efit of the third world has nothing to do with the conception of value imposed 
by the imperialist characterization of the language (Lopes, 1996). So, to develop 
a critical appreciation of English as an AL, it is crucial that its teaching be linked 
to a social function, a goal that the instructor was able to verify through the 
culture circle.
In his work, Freire (1979) speaks of self-reflection as necessary to avoid falling 
prey to habits of thought in which one laments being born in one’s country and 
tries to imitate another, believing that the less “native” he is, the more enlight-
ened he will become8 (Freire, 1979, p. 15). Despite their young age, the students 
who participated in the culture circles in this project displayed a mature reason-
ing concerning acknowledging the importance of English in their lives without 
elevating the language to a superior status. In their spontaneous interactions,they remarked how they wanted to learn to write, speak, and read in English 
for the sheer joy of it. It is significant to note that during the two culture circles, 
students understood English was already part of their world as the activities 
they enjoyed at home placed them in contact with online cultures embedded in 
English lingua franca practices.
As mentioned earlier, the goal of the dialogic activities of the second circle was 
to stimulate students to speak and share their ideas, mobilizing whatever com-
municative resources they had. But what students reported about their favorite 
classroom activity, one in which they had to voice their opinions about their 
favorite movie, is particularly noteworthy as it served as a point of departure for 
further curriculum design opportunities. This type of activity illustrates, in our 
view, that, in the face of the problems related to the English language as an AL in 
early elementary grades, which lacks didactical guidance, listening authentically 
to students requires buying into the radical belief that despite their young ages, 
students already possess the tools to deal with complex information and assert 
their creative freedom through humanizing pedagogical actions (Freire, 1967, 
Learning English as an Additional Language 123
1979, 2014). Instructors’ attention to and trust in their students, even as early 
as seven years of age, show that such a radical trust is not only possible but also 
desirable for building equitable forms of instruction problematizing English as 
an AL and encouraging curiosity to flourish.
Conclusion
According to the emancipatory education defended by Freire, there is a dire 
need to rethink language practices that promote learning processes fomenting 
students’ criticality concerning their actions in the world. Students in early ele-
mentary grades are already aware of the significance of English in their lives. 
They encounter it outside the classroom, already engaging with various forms 
of it in their daily affairs. Nevertheless, truly listening to them is an essential 
objective to consider in curricular and pedagogical deliberation, particularly if 
criticality as a conscious instructional objective is mobilized to drive AL acqui-
sition vis-à-vis the encouragement of student curiosity. On this matter, Freire 
(2014) notes that:
It is not our role [as educators] to speak to the people about our own view 
of the world, nor to attempt to impose that view on them, but rather to 
dialogue with the people about their view and ours. We must realize that 
their view of the world, manifested variously in their action, reflects their 
situation in the world. Educational and political action which is not criti-
cally aware of this situation runs the risk either of “banking” or of preach-
ing in the desert.
(Freire, 2014, p. 95)
In this respect, students’ critical thinking shown in the culture circles on which 
this chapter reports illustrates that at early grades, educators can assist young 
children in the process of alphabetizing to become confident recognizers of lin-
guistic practices in ALs, which can be motivational to their learning in their 
mother tongue as well, without dichotomizing “mine vs. other” conceptualiza-
tions of language. Such a goal can be accomplished contextualizing language 
through its social uses in a way that students find meaning in what they are 
doing, rather than reproducing words and decontextualized phrases, which 
research shows leads to a higher risk of learner demotivation (Brown, 1994).
For Freire (1979), education needs to be critical, yes, but it is also creative, 
fundamentally—and this bears repeating—driven by curiosity. Providing the 
tools for learners to build their own knowledge base through authentic—i.e., 
non-authoritarian—expressions of dialogic education constitutes an essential 
task of emancipatory education, more than calculated plans that may ultimately 
not serve the needs and interests of a community. Yet, critical hope also remains 
124 Andrea da Silva Marques Ribeiro and Jessica F. Cruz
a paramount disposition to develop within emancipatory education as it serves 
as the starting point for educators to relate and plan alongside young learners the 
type of learning they desire for themselves. As Freire (1979) warns us, teachers 
must not dichotomize their knowledge and their students or consider one more 
important or valuable than the other. For him, teachers need to put themselves in 
a humble position and radically trust the populations they serve. Hence, for the 
emancipatory educator, uneducated people do not exist in strictum sensum, if one 
understands that knowledge always starts from the ignorance of the unknown 
and one’s curiosity toward being and knowing more with the world.
The observations about the operationalization of culture circles reported in 
this chapter as part of classroom praxis suggest that there are no insurmountable 
barriers to building a more meaningful English learning and teaching processes 
in elementary grades. Students can face the social demands that require the 
reasoning through the use of English in a critical way from the integrated devel-
opment of language skills according to the needs and interests of each classroom, 
notwithstanding what educational policies may encourage or limit through 
forms of assessments, for instance.
Notes
 1 Original in Portuguese: “Um povo é livre no momento em que adquire a consciência 
de sua palavra” (Freire & Guimarães, 2019, p. 39).
 2 Original in Portuguese: “[...] à medida que permite aos alunos entrar em contato com 
outras culturas, com modos diferentes de ver e interpretar a realidade” (Nacionais, 
1998, p. 54). http://portal.mec.gov.br/seb/arquivos/pdf/pcn_estrangeira.pdf.
 3 Original in Portuguese: “[...] leva a uma nova percepção da natureza da linguagem, 
aumenta a compreensão de como a linguagem funciona e desenvolve maior con-
sciência do funcionamento da própria língua materna. Ao mesmo tempo, ao pro-
mover uma apreciação dos costumes e valores de outras culturas, contribui para 
desenvolver a percepção da própria cultura por meio da compreensão da(s) cultura(s) 
estrangeira(s). O desenvolvimento da habilidade de entender/dizer o que outras pes-
soas, em outros países, diriam em determinadas situações leva, portanto, à compreen-
são tanto das culturas estrangeiras quanto da cultura materna. Essa compreensão 
intercultural promove, ainda, a aceitação das diferenças nas maneiras de expressão e 
de comportamento” (Nacionais, 1998, p. 37). http://portal.mec.gov.br/seb/arquivos/
pdf/pcn_estrangeira.pdf
 4 Original in Portuguese: “[...] não deve somente ser capaz de codificar e decodificar 
palavras escritas, ou fazer análises, deve ser capaz de entender e manipular os sig-
nificados culturais e sociais da linguagem impressa em pensamentos, sentimentos e 
ações.” (Santos, 2005).
 5 Original in Portuguese: “No currículo do ensino fundamental, a partir do sexto ano, 
será ofertada a Língua Inglesa” (Federal Law, LDB 9394/96, art. 26, §5°). http://
www.planalto.gov.br/ccivil_03/leis/l9394.htm
 6 Original in Portuguese: “A programação desses debates nos era oferecida pelos próp-
rios grupos, através de entrevistas que mantínhamos com eles e de que resultava a 
enumeração de problemas que gostariam de debater” (Freire, 1967, p. 103).
 7 Original in Portuguese: “[…] o tratamento do Inglês como língua franca o desvin-
cula da noção de pertencimento a um determinado território e, consequentemente, 
http://portal.mec.gov.br
http://portal.mec.gov.br
http://portal.mec.gov.br
http://www.planalto.gov.br
http://www.planalto.gov.br
Learning English as an Additional Language 125
a culturas típicas de comunidades específicas, legitimando os usos da Língua Inglesa 
em seus contextos locais. Esse entendimento favorece uma educação linguística vol-
tada para a interculturalidade, isto é, para o reconhecimento das (e o respeito às) 
diferenças, e para a compreensão de comoelas são produzidas nas diversas práticas 
sociais de linguagem, o que favorece a reflexão crítica sobre diferentes modos de ver 
e de analisar o mundo, o(s) outro(s) e a si mesmo” (Base Nacional Comum Curricular 
[Base Nacional Comum Curricular], 2018, p. 239). http://basenacionalcomum.mec.
gov.br/images/BNCC_EI_EF_110518_versaofinal_site.pdf
 8 The original passage in Portuguese reads as follows: “O ser alienado não procura um 
mundo autêntico. Isto provoca uma nostalgia: deseja outro país e lamenta ter nascido 
no seu. Tem vergonha da sua realidade. Vive em outro país e trata de imitá-la e se crê 
culto quanto menos nativo é” (Freire, 1979, p. 15).
References
Bakhtin, M. (2006). Marxismo e filosofia da linguagem [Marxism and Philosophy of Language] 
(12th ed.). São Paulo: Hucitec.
Bakhtin, M. (2011). Estética da Criação Verbal [Aesthetics of Verbal Creation] (6th ed.). São 
Paulo: Martins Fontes.
Base Nacional Comum Curricular [Base Nacional Comum Curricular]. (2018). Brasília: 
MEC. http://basenacionalcomum.mec.gov.br/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/bncc-
20dez-site.pdf
Bourdieu, P., & Passeron, J.C. (2013). A Reprodução: Elementos para uma Teoria do Sistema 
de Ensino [The Reproduction: Elements for a Theory of the Teaching System] (6th ed.). 
Petrópolis, RJ: Vozes.
Brown, H. D. (1994). Teaching by principles – An interactive approach to language pedagogy. 
Hoboken, NJ: Prentice Hall.
Cope, B., & Kalantzis, M. (2009). “Multiliteracies”: New literacies, new learning. 
Pedagogies: An International Journal, 4(3), 164–195.
Cruz, J. F. N. (2019). Novas perspectivas para o ensino de Língua Inglesa nos anos iniciais do 
Ensino Fundamental: o trabalho com os multiletramentos no 1° ano [New perspectives for teach-
ing English Language in the early years of elementary school: the work with multilingualism 
in the 1st year]. [Master’s dissertation, Instituto de Aplicação Fernando Rodrigues da 
Silveira]. Universidade do Estado do Rio de Janeiro.
Crystal, D. (2003). English as a global language. Stuttgart: Ernst Klett Sprachen.
Freire, P. (1967). Educação como Prática da Liberdade [Education as the Practice of Freedom]. 
Rio de Janeiro: Paz e Terra.
Freire, P. (1979). Educação e Mudança [Education and Change] (12th ed.). Rio de Janeiro: 
Paz e Terra.
Freire, P. (2014). Pedagogy of the oppressed. London: Bloomsbury Publishing.
Freire, P. & Guimarães, S. (2019). A África ensinando a gente: Angola, Guiné-Bissau e 
Príncipe. [Africa teaching people: Angola, Guinea-Bissau and Príncipe] (3rd ed.). São Paulo: 
Paz e Terra.
Gogolin, I. (1997). The monolingual habitus as the common feature in teaching in the 
language of the majority in different countries. Per Linguam, 13(2): 38–49.
Kumaravadivelu, B. (1994). The postmethod condition:(E) merging strategies for sec-
ond/foreign language teaching. TESOL Quarterly, 28(1), 27–48.
Kumaravadivelu, B. (2003). Beyond methods: Macrostrategies for language teaching. New 
Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
http://basenacionalcomum.mec.gov.br
http://basenacionalcomum.mec.gov.br
http://basenacionalcomum.mec.gov.br
http://basenacionalcomum.mec.gov.br
126 Andrea da Silva Marques Ribeiro and Jessica F. Cruz
Leffa, V. J., & Irala, V. B. (2014). O ensino de outra (s) língua (s) na contemporaneidade: 
questões conceituais e metodológicas [The teaching of other language(s) in contem-
porary times: conceptual and methodological issues]. Uma espiadinha na sala de aula: 
ensinando línguas adicionais no Brasil [A peek into the classroom: teaching additional languages 
in Brazil.]. Pelotas: Educat, 21–48.
Lei de Diretrizes e Bases da Educação Nacional [Law of Directives and Bases of National 
Education]. (1996). Lei Federal n° 9.394 de 20 de Dezembro de 1996 estabelece as Diretrizes 
e Bases da Educação Nacional. [Federal Law No. 9.394 of December 20, 1996 establishes the 
Directives and Bases of National Education]. Brasília: MEC.
Lopes, M. L. P. da (1996). Luiz Paulo da. Oficina de linguística aplicada [Workshop on applied 
linguistics]. Campinas, SP: Mercado das Letras.
Martin, J. R., & Rose, D. (2003). Working with discourse: Meaning beyond the clause. London: 
Bloomsbury Publishing.
Nacionais, I. A. P. C. (1998). Terceiro e quarto ciclos do Ensino Fundamental [third and 
fourth cycle of elementary school]. Brasília: MEC-Secretaria de Educação Fundamental. 
Brasília: MEC-Secretary of Basic Education.
Rocha, C. H. (2007). O ensino de línguas para crianças no contexto educacional bra-
sileiro: breves reflexões e possíveis provisões [Language teaching for children in the 
Brazilian educational context: brief reflections and possible provisions]. DELTA: 
Documentação de Estudos em Lingüística Teórica e Aplicada [Documentation of Studies in 
Theoretical and Applied Linguistics], 23, 273–319. http://www.scielo.br/scielo.php? 
script=sci_arttext&pid=S010244-502007000200005&lang=pt
Rojo, R. (2009) Letramentos múltiplos, escola e inclusão social [Multiple literacies, school, and 
social inclusion]. São Paulo: Parábola.
Rojo, R. (2012). Pedagogia dos multiletramentos: diversidade cultural e de linguagens 
na escola. [Pedagogy of multi-literacies: cultural and linguistic diversity at school]. 
Multiletramentos na escola São Paulo: Parábola Editorial [Multiliteracies at school São Paulo: 
Parábola Editorial], 90(2), 11–30.
Rosenthal, R., & Jacobson, L. (1968). Pygmalion in the classroom: teacher expectation and 
pupils’ intellectual development. New York, NY: Holt, Rinehart and Winston.
Santos, L. I. S. (2005). Crenças acerca da inclusão de Línguas Inglesas nas séries iniciais: quanto 
antes melhor? [Beliefs about the inclusion of English Language in the series: the sooner the bet-
ter?]. [Master’s dissertation, Instituto de Linguagens]. Universidade Federal do Mato 
Grosso.
Schlatter, M., & Garcez, P. (2009). Educação linguística e aprendizagem de uma lín-
gua adicional na escola [Language education and learning an additional language at 
school]. Referencias curriculares do Estado do Rio Grande do Sul: linguagens, códigos e suas 
tecnologias [Curricular references of the State of Rio Grande do Sul: languages, codes and their 
technologies].
Soares, M. (2004). Letramento e alfabetização: as muitas facetas [Literacy and Literacy: 
the many facets]. Revista brasileira de educação, [Brazilian Journal of Education], 25, 5–17. 
https://doi.org/10.1590/S1413-24782004000100002
Thompson, G. (2004). Introducing functional grammar (2a ed.). London: Arnold.
Tripp, D. (2005). Pesquisa-ação: uma introdução metodológica [Action Research: a 
methodological introduction]. Educação e pesquisa [Education and research], 31, 443–466. 
http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/S1517-97022005000300009.
http://www.scielo.br
http://www.scielo.br
https://doi.org/10.1590/S1413-24782004000100002
http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/S1517-97022005000300009
DOI: 10.4324/9781003175728-10
8
CRITICAL EDUCULTURALISM IN 
THE BORDERLANDS
Exploring Social Positionality and the 
Dialogic Processes of Culture Circles
Kelly Metz-Matthews and Michele McConnell
The linguistic landscape of California’s schools remains as strikingly diverse as 
it has ever been. In fact, as of this writing, over a million K-12 students in 
California are considered English learners (i.e., emerging bilinguals) and nearly 
half of the total students enrolled in the K-12 system speak a language other 
than English at home (California Department of Education, 2020). As teacher 
educators in the borderlands of California, we have become increasingly con-
cerned that pre-service classroom teachers lack the preparation necessary to 
navigate culturally and linguistically diverse classrooms and spaces—not solely 
in their lack of understanding of the inner workings of applied linguistics, but 
more broadly in their ability to engage meaningfully with and support emerg-
ing bilinguals whose backgrounds are often drastically different from their own 
and who experience language norms and politics in sometimes deleterious ways.
As talented and conscientiousOur faith in people…” Confidence 
and faith are forms of trust and belief; they are bonds born of love. To trust in 
something is to believe what you may not yet know, to seek and yearn for “some-
thing, albeit small.” It is to say that even if everything else fails and goes wrong 
and does not work out, even if the mountains fall and the hills turn to dust, “we 
hope something, albeit small remains.” To have faith despite it all, to belief in 
the face of trial, to listen for the voice of God in the people, even when they 
are denied their true voice, to find the beloved here and now, today—not out 
there, somewhere else, tomorrow, or long ago. The kingdom of God is always 
already at hand in the love offered through communion with and of the people.
The kingdom of heaven, the people of God, the body of Christ: These are 
expressions of an article of faith for Freire embedded in the pages of his book that 
he hopes will survive the apocalypse of history. My own faith has been tested 
since, too, as we have seen. Freire’s own original expression of hope did not sur-
vive, but that means that I must share the good news of this Freirean hope and 
trust, as he did. I must repent of my disbelief and belief that it will endure and 
live forever and ever, unto the ages of ages, amen. Though the mountains may 
fall and the hills turn to dust, the love of the Lord will stand. Where do we find 
Divine love, a love supreme? In the people, always with el pueblo.
But this is not where Freire’s prayer ends. He goes on to add to his “some-
thing, albeit small” hope: “Our faith … in the creation of a world where it is less 
difficult to love.” Here the people of God, the voice of God, and above all those 
who are robbed of the logos of their word, do not speak into nothingness or a 
vacuum. The people are never wordless or worldless. There is a world for Freire 
where the Divine word dwells and abides and delights: Sic Deus dilexit mundum, 
in Latin—For God so loved (or delighted in) the world. This world is not only 
the natural or physical nor the planetary or cosmic world, but, more radically, 
it is a fragile world that must be continually created and recreated by the people 
whose word and voice names and creates it anew. The world is always new and 
in need of renewal.
Just as the people are the people of God, the world this word and voice creates 
is a better world because it is a world where “it is less difficult to love.” One of 
xx Foreword
the words Freire uses in Portuguese to describe the people who are oppressed 
and robbed of their word is “desamados” which means “the unloved ones.” For 
Freire, oppression is about power, yes, but his sense of power is ultimately a 
matter of love-power. Those who are robbed of their voice by oppressive force 
are not merely coerced by abstract political power: they are denied love, they 
are unloved. A better world for Freire is a world where loving is less difficult, 
where the unloved are fewer, where it is harder to suffer the ultimate harm of 
being unloved.
Freire’s world is fragile and in that sense in need of creative love, which cre-
ates and recreates it, but this world’s fragility is also to be found in its capacity 
to be made in ways that are better or worse. Again: The kingdom of God and 
the voice of the people of God are not abstract and distant for Freire. In the 
same way, the creation of “a world where it is less difficult to love” is more than 
descriptive. It is ethical; it is amorous; it is political; it is theological.
There is a part of chapter three, on the banking concept of education, 
where Freire shares the insight of a Chilean member of one of his “círculos 
de cultura”—“cultural circles,” a pedagogical approach we read more about in 
Educação Como Prática de la Liberdade, Education as the Practice of Freedom. This 
Chilean rural person, uneducated by the standards of the banking concept, notes 
the anthropological and cultural relationship between the people and the world. 
Lacking this anthropology, he notes, we may still have a natural world of trees, 
animals, rivers, and stars, but “faltaria quem dissesse isto é mundo”—“someone 
who would say ‘this is the world’ would be missing.” And without this word 
and voice of the people “faltaria a consciência do mundo que, necessariamente, 
implica o mundo da consciência”—“the conscience of the world would be miss-
ing which, necessarily implies the world of conscience.” For Freire, the world is 
not a Romantic primal and natural object, animated by an abstract Divine force. 
Freire’s sense of world is a folk world, a world with a conscience and the world 
of the conscience, the ethical place where the people create and recreate—or 
destroy—the world.
What does it mean for something to be “less difficult”? Something less dif-
ficult remains difficult, but only becomes less so. In this world that Freire hopes 
for the people to create, it is still difficult to love but it only less difficult than it 
is now. Freire does not seek a utopia in the sense of a pure revolutionary place 
that cannot exist but, instead, he humbly puts his faith in a more realistic and 
immanent “world where it is less difficult to love.” Freire’s revolution is a gradual 
conversion; like the heart, it falls in love by degrees and in stages. The faith placed 
in “the creation of a world where it is less difficult to love” is not passive worship 
to a deified or pantheistic nature. On the contrary, it is a repetition of trust in the 
people to create this world through their voice, their word, their Divine logos.
Why did Freire single out Marxists and Christians as the ones who would 
read his book to the end? Clearly, it is because, despite their many differences, 
Foreword xxi
these two schools of thought share a common faith in the people. There are 
surely many others just as there are Marxists and Christian who have abandoned 
this article of faith in favor of more exclusive or sublime options.
Many today in educational research—who have yet to read Freire’s own 
words in full—seem to prefer a less anthropological Romantic idea of the world 
as a natural object because of the failure of the people to create a world where it 
is less difficult to love. This is unfortunate. The fallibility of the people is not a 
good reason to abandon hope in them. Freire does not promise us this world just 
as he does not give the people their own word from without, from the outside. 
No. Freire’s project is not a guaranteed outcome or a best practice. It is a dream, 
a wish, a prayer, a desire, a longing, a deep and everlasting faith in the people 
and their capacity to create a world where loving is still difficult but is only less 
difficult: “Menos difícil amar.” “Less difficult to love.”
http://taylorandfrancis.com
DOI: 10.4324/9781003175728-1
1
FROM ANGICOS TO THE WORLD
Paulo Freire and the Task of 
Emancipatory Multilingual Education
Sandro R. Barros and Luciana C. de Oliveira
The present edited collection serves a dual purpose. On the one hand, it provides 
an overview of how educators worldwide are reinventing Freire’s philosophies 
across transnational settings. On the other hand, it reaffirms the endurance of 
Freire’s ideas far beyond the grassroots and adult education contexts that inspired 
and motivated the Brazilian educator’s life-long pilgrimage through popular 
education movements. The chapters in this collection explore Freire’s theoreti-
cal analyses to unearth many of the dilemmas encountered in the educational 
processes related to the teaching and learning of language. As such, this book 
provides snapshots of the “history of the present” regarding Freire’s reinventions 
(Foucault, 2012) as the authors draw from the Brazilian pedagogue’s model of 
emancipatory education against the backdrop of recent scholarship and social 
activism in multilingual education (de Korne, 2016; May, 2013).
The “multi/pluri” label that has emerged within applied and sociolinguis-
tic research hasas our newly minted classroom teachers are 
in their respective subject areas, most of these teachers only received one lan-
guage acquisition course as part of their teacher preparation. Even in light of 
that course, the likelihood that most of these educators understand the potential 
effects of linguistic imperialism, internalized linguicism, or accentism (as a mere 
few examples) is not particularly high. Anecdotes from our own classrooms sug-
gest that many pre-service teachers are unaware of how language and politics 
play out in concert with one another. We have for years surmised that without a 
course in which to explore these critical topics, California pre-service teachers 
lack meaningful opportunities to develop critical consciousness around language 
and power in the borderlands. This matters. If pre-service teachers do not have 
spaces to explore language, race, and culture (i.e., raciolinguistics), for example, 
how do we, as their mentors, expect them to show up equipped to engage with 
https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003175728-10
128 Kelly Metz-Matthews and Michele McConnell
emerging bilinguals? Moreover, how can we expect these nascent educators to 
challenge the existing hegemonic and oppressive systems of power in which 
language often plays a central but overlooked role?
We are not the only educators concerned about the preparedness of pre-service 
teachers where supporting emerging bilinguals is concerned. A preponderance 
of research (e.g., Anstrom et al., 2010; Cadiero-Kaplan & Rodriguez, 2008) sug-
gests that K-12 teachers and leaders are not necessarily equipped to engage with 
and support culturally and linguistically diverse learners, many of whom are 
emerging bilinguals. This is true even as the use of culturally responsive and sus-
taining pedagogies is on the rise. The problem here is not that these pedagogies 
are unwelcome or lack value (they are not unwelcome and they are tremendously 
valuable), but that teacher education programs are substituting these highly valu-
able practices as a means of offering strategies and lesson design rather than 
providing critical framing on the politics of language and the very real and 
harmful norms of linguistic discrimination. Teachers need both strategies and 
critical frameworks. Even as these pedagogies do indeed support learning for a 
great many students, they say virtually nothing about the way English functions 
as a form of symbolic power that connects to “social advancement, opportunity, 
modernity, wealth, enlightenment, Whiteness, and cosmopolitanism” (Motha, 
2014, p. 4). In short, these pedagogies help teachers teach but not necessarily 
identify the currents of power that, when left invisible, are apt to harm emerg-
ing bilinguals.
Language and Power
Power permeates language in both explicit and obvious ways as well as in 
implicit and nuanced ones. Teachers’ abilities to recognize the subtleties with 
which language norms affect not just their students’ speech patterns but also their 
very identities is crucial. Butler (1997) engages the term linguistic vulnerability to 
demonstrate how language shapes who we perceive ourselves to be. In other 
words, linguistic vulnerability speaks to our inward understanding of ourselves. 
Outwardly, labels function as external organizing forces, playing an impor-
tant role in how teachers perceive their students and how those same students 
subsequently perceive themselves in relation to their peers. As a case in point, 
the US government currently uses the arguably deficit terms Limited English 
Proficient and English language learners instead of terms associated with asset 
thinking like emerging bilingual or emerging multilingual. Yet even bilingual/ 
multilingual may not be ideal—though we use them ourselves for lack of what 
we perceive to be better choices—in how they inaccurately normalize mono-
lingualism as part of the American identity when used as proxies for terms like 
nonnative speaker or ESOL student (Matsuda & Duran, 2013). What is clear is 
that the unresolved discussion around labels is a function, above all, of the ways 
Critical Educulturalism in the Borderlands 129
language shapes both the internal and external perceptions we have of ourselves 
and others.
Before we ever set foot in our English-language classrooms, scholars (e.g., 
Pennycook, 1998; Phillipson, 1992) were debating the cultural politics of 
English and the tensions that arise in contexts in which English holds a particu-
lar grasp on power. Some scholars more than others (e.g., Canagarajah, 1999; 
Kubota, 2011; Motha, 2014) acknowledge that even as English is still caught up 
in the problematic and sticky web of colonialism, we cannot ignore the realities 
of people’s lives and desires, a fact that is certainly true in the borderlands of 
California. After all, English is also, as Hastings and Jacob (2016) convincingly 
argue, a means of and toward social justice for many emerging bilinguals. Still 
others (e.g., Motha & Lin, 2013) have successfully theorized that students’ desires 
play a central role in English-language education even if that desire comes from 
narratives and perceptions that have been ushered in as a result of colonialist and 
imperialist narratives connecting English to whiteness and power.
English, as a result of both its colonial legacy and “globalized status,” acts as 
a gateway to power, privilege, and access, even as there is some evidence that it 
does not always result in the contentment with which it is assumed to offer (Park, 
2011). In fact, in the same way that English might serve to empower some, it 
might equally serve to discriminate against others (Lippi-Green, 2012). Perhaps 
just as interesting as the fact that linguistic privileging and discrimination exist, 
however, is the fact that they are not necessarily always seen in a negative light in 
the communities in which they perniciously play out. Certainly, just about any 
English-language educator can attest to the fact that most students of English 
show up with a genuine desire to learn English and an informed belief that English 
will provide critical access to systems of power and privilege. The reality is plain: 
In many cases, English is desired and it does provide critical access. However, 
because the history of the spread of English is so very complicated, and because 
language politics and planning in California are so deeply fraught and tied to 
notions of nationalism and whiteness, the ways in which those dynamics play out 
in students’ lives are also profoundly complicated.
California and Teacher Education
As California is a state with one of the highest immigration rates in the United 
States, the California Commission on Teacher Credentialing (CCTC) has 
attempted to respond to the needs of diverse language learners since the enact-
ment of the Chacon-Moscone Bilingual Bicultural Education Act in 1976. At 
that time, teachers could elect to earn a Bilingual Certificate of Competence 
(BCC) and learn to implement Specially Designed Academic Instruction 
in English (SDAIE) or pursue instruction in the primary language. By the 
1990s, the BCC transformed into the Crosscultural Language, and Academic 
130 Kelly Metz-Matthews and Michele McConnell
Development (CLAD) and Bilingual CLAD certificates for teachers. During this 
time, pre-service teachers were given an additional course in language acquisi-
tion within their credentialing program and in-service teachers could take an 
exam to demonstrate their CLAD competence. The bilingual CLAD required 
further proof of fluency in a second language.
With the passing of SB 2042 and Proposition 227 in 1998, California teacher 
preparation programs were required to incorporate language acquisition and 
standards for teaching emerging bilinguals. Within these standards, there was a 
noticeable lack of criticality in favor of more superficial coverage of the mechan-
ics of English language acquisition. Coincidentally, Propositionbeen operationalized to describe a myriad of communicative 
phenomena tied to the intensification of global migration and technological 
developments post-1990s (Blommaert, 2010). However, multilingualism has 
a long history within educational linguistics (Spolsky, 1981, 2008). Since the 
1970s—in the global north, at least—bilingual education researchers and bilin-
gualism advocates have grappled with the scientific community’s tendency to 
uphold a willful ignorance toward othered communities’ sciences (Labov, 1972; 
Fishman, 1989; Spolsky, 1981).
While the multi/pluri turn across the various subfields that comprise linguis-
tics has contributed significantly to advocating a shift in the ways communities’ 
linguistic repertoires are studied—moving us away from notions of native-
speakerism attached to nation-state constructs of language—challenges persist 
https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003175728-1
2 Sandro R. Barros and Luciana C. de Oliveira
concerning how academic cultures’ paradigms compete to define language and 
gain a share of the educational linguistic market. For instance, the code-switching 
paradigms of past decades have given way to translinguistic perspectives prem-
ised on poststructuralist philosophies (Canagarajah, 2013; García and Lin, 2016; 
Ortega, 2019). As Freire would likely argue, the struggle over the definition of 
languages through competing paradigms represents both a spiritual and material 
problem as it is connected to power and those who find themselves in positions 
to advance language study and shape its curricular and instructional orientation 
in schooling processes.
Whereas scholars researching the issue of code-switching in the 1970s 
through the 1990s were concerned with a descriptive study of bilingual stu-
dents’ alternating patterns of language use across named languages and 
additive approaches (e.g., Cummins, 1981; Faltis, 1989; MacSwan, 2000; 
Martin-Jones, 1995), today’s scholarship has integrated multimodality, as well 
as critical, ontological, and epistemological concerns that express a certain 
skepticism toward universal definitions of language. A primary goal of this 
paradigmatic shift has been to abandon deficit orientation seen in more tra-
ditional structuralist research to illuminate how bi- and multilingual students 
shape the life of classrooms in creative ways and how educators might catalyze 
features of bi/multilingual students’ practices to ameliorate persisting educa-
tional disadvantages (Barros et al., 2021; Caldas, 2019; de Oliveira et al., 2020; 
Goodman, 2014).
In the last few years, research has shown what early code-switching work had 
already identified. Simply stated, minoritized bilingual and multilingual students 
mobilize their linguistic repertoires skillfully to make sense of new information 
presented in another language, a fact that deserves the attention of educa-
tional researchers and practitioners. It would be unfair to suggest, however, the 
early research on code-switching, with its separate treatment of languages and 
deficit-oriented terminology—e.g., inter-language, semilingualism, etc.—did 
not possess the activist edge that the present critical educational research features 
(Gramling, 2021; Pennycook, 2017). In the broad field of educational linguistics, 
a great deal of time and effort has been devoted to reversing the influence of 
modernist assumptions about languages that continue to disadvantage minor-
itized groups in schools.
Still, despite its long history of advocacy, a cursory look at the empirical 
research on bi- and multilingual education reveals that monolingual perspec-
tives endure as a rule (Barros et al., 2021), even though multilingualism remains 
the norm worldwide (Grosjean, 2010). Over the past two decades, in particular, 
language scholars have increasingly focused on the influences of standard lan-
guage discourse on classroom reality (Spolsky, 2008) to grasp how monolingual 
habitus reproduction operates in schools’ curricula and instruction (Gogolin, 
1997). Researchers have also considered how standard language discourse 
From Angicos to the World 3
propagates notions of success and citizenship cultivated by ruling elites and how 
this discourse permeates education congealing as a model narrative (Bauman 
et al., 2003; Bourdieu, 1991). Furthermore, scholars have argued, from vary-
ing perspectives and across different fields, that socioeconomically and racially 
minoritized bi- and multilingual groups have been constructed as such under a 
pernicious linguistic deficiency characterization that has had a deleterious effect 
on the academic challenges minoritized students face when educated in another 
language, consequently affecting their sense of self-esteem and social belonging 
(Alim et al., 2009; Rosa and Flores, 2017).
The present history of education reveals a growing excitement for the advo-
cacy of multilingualism as a new norm, whether through World Englishes 
discourse or through the support of additional language study. Notwithstanding 
this excitement, some have viewed the multi/pluri turn with a certain degree 
of skepticism, especially in how it affects the education of minoritized stu-
dents—and for a good reason. As Kubota (2016) points out, the agenda of 
multilingualism is easily co-opted by neoliberalism. Proponents of market- 
oriented solutions are obsessed with commoditizing everything, education being 
no exception. Consequently, the celebration of diversity buttressed by neoliberal 
discourse around multilingualism cannot avoid the ironies that accompany it, 
revealing just how complex the institution of linguistic regimes, no matter how 
well-intended, risk the further disenfranchisement of vulnerable populations.
The first of these ironies relates to how urban multilingualism appears char-
acterized as a phenomenon of modernity. In contrast, there is ample evidence 
of multilingualism’s prominence in earlier historical periods, before the rise of 
nationalism and the nation-state and the present global migration and com-
munication patterns facilitated by technological advancements (Canagarajah, 
2012). Another irony becomes apparent when we consider the lack of diversity 
in linguistics research itself, as scholars active outside Western academic cul-
tures and paradigms are silenced for working in languages othered by English 
or deploying methodologies regarded as “unscientific.” Outside Western 
institutions, the study and advocacy of ecological analyses of multilingual-
ism, differently from the established scientific logic of academic knowledge 
production, have been the norm for decades, long before the multi/pluri turn 
became part of an academic agenda (Canagarajah, 2012). Because this work does 
not conform to the standards of academic production, it has been dismissed 
as valuable. One example is Freire’s own theorizations around “popular lan-
guage” within grassroots adult literacy movements, a theme to which we shall 
return in the next sections of this chapter. Lastly, the celebratory tone around 
multilingualism constitutes an ironic phenomenon as well, as scholars tend to 
approach and study hybridity as something sui generis, a novelty that, in fact, 
represents the sine qua non of the human condition—although there is some-
thing to be said about the particularities of recent patterns of language contact, 
4 Sandro R. Barros and Luciana C. de Oliveira
transformation, and valuation associated with global migration and technologi-
cal processes (Foucault, 2012; Pennycook, 2017).
Within this scenario, we turn to Freire’s work; not to disregard the body 
of critical observations conjectured about multilingualism research stated ear-
lier but to perhaps find common ground from which to collaborate and labor 
toward making language education a humane and dialogical enterprise centered 
on people’s voices and ideologies. In one way or another, the chapters that follow 
this introduction touch upon a rich tradition of educationallinguistics research 
moving us forward in envisioning meaningful opportunities for minoritized 
populations to thrive and for teachers to build capacity to realize multilingual-
ism’s promises. In this volume, we aim to underscore Freire’s critical literacy 
work to advocate for its relevance to multilingualism in ways that give voice to 
a scholarly tradition that, in some respects, displaces the dominance of World 
English as the primary focus of multilingual education discourse.
Reconsidering Freire’s work within multilingual education debates can assist 
us in revising many of the arguments that precede the multi/plural discussions 
without recourse to the sophisticated conceptual tools invented to analyze and 
situate multilingualism as a problem to be solved. We want to argue from the 
offset, then, that the challenge for multilingual education is not to locate and 
narrate multilingualism as the problem to be solved. Instead, we need to focus 
on monolingualism as the challenge educational linguistics needs to address. In 
other words, how might we approach and (re)present monolingualism as a mind-
set inherited from modernity’s epistemic regimes without reproducing the same 
colonizing logic of modernity’s concerns for prediction, fatalism, and theoretical 
hierarchizations (Mignolo, 2011)?
Coming to Freire: Reading the Multilingual 
World to Read the Multilingual Word
As we know, the Brazilian educator Paulo Reglus Neves Freire (1921–1997) 
was not a linguist. Nor did he consider himself a literacy expert. He was, first 
and foremost, um andarilho do obvio [a wonderer of the obvious] (Freire, 1997, 
2014a, 2014b), a cosmopolitan citizen avant le lettre who labored incessantly 
across cultures and languages to expand what education meant and what lan-
guage and literacy could mean as emancipatory tools for free-thinking. In this 
sense, Freire’s philosophy of emancipation does not suggest that individuals are 
free from bonds. As co-inhabitants of the same planet, we are responsible for its 
custody and, thus, responsible for each other. Accordingly, to become emanci-
pated, as Freire believed, we must seek out modes of conviviality that enable us 
to become better attached. The most powerful way to become “better attached” 
is to imagine more functional, supportive, and empowering relationships allow-
ing us to better relate to the world and contribute to its ecological balance.
From Angicos to the World 5
Freire’s literacy campaigns in the Brazilian backlands of Angicos, where 
peasants reportedly learned how to read and write in about 40 hours, earned 
him exile for its subversive critical stance on education (Gadotti, 1994). His 
subsequent experiences with grassroots literacy occurred mostly outside of 
Brazil and were conducted in languages other than Brazilian Portuguese. 
Indeed, Freire’s involvement in grassroots movements of popular education in 
exile helped him refine his views on language education and pedagogy as he 
had to translate himself to international audiences to communicate his ideas 
(Kohan, 2021). Freire notably systematized his emancipatory philosophy of 
education in Pedagogy of the Oppressed (1996), his most famous book, written in 
Portuguese while working alongside grassroots literacy groups in Chile. The 
book was first published in English in the 1970s. Freire continually revisited 
the ideas laid out in his magnum opus until his death on May 2, 1997. A passing 
glance at Freire’s writings reveals the work of a committed intellectual deeply 
concerned with the political nature of language. As he remarks in Pedagogy of 
the Oppressed (1996),
educators and politicians speak and are not understood because their lan-
guage is not attuned to the concrete situation of the people they address. 
Accordingly, their talk is just alienated and alienating rhetoric. The lan-
guage of the educator or the politician (and it seems more and more clear 
that the latter must also become an educator, in the broadest sense of the 
word), like the language of the people, cannot exist without thought; and 
neither language nor thought can exist without a structure to which they 
refer. In order to communicate effectively, educator and politician must 
understand the structural conditions in which the thought and lan-guage 
of the people are dialectically framed.
(p. 96)
The phenomenological and sociocultural perspective on language Freire 
espoused formed the basis of his understanding of critical literacy as a non-
dichotomist and de-hierarchical approach to educative processes instantiating 
humane student-teacher relationships. Freire (1996) believed that “the object of 
educational investigation is not persons (as if they were anatomical fragments), 
but rather the thought-language with which men and women refer to reality, 
the levels at which they perceive that reality, and their view of the world, in 
which their generative themes are found” (p. 97). Thus, for him, “alphabeti-
zation”—the domain of the linguistic code—and “literacy”—the competence 
in reading and writing about a subject—comprised the social domain of lan-
guage and should not be distinguished or dichotomized (Guilherme, 2021). 
Accordingly, Freire regarded the respect for others’ language as a precondition 
for realizing literacy education as a socially just and emancipatory enterprise. The 
6 Sandro R. Barros and Luciana C. de Oliveira
non-dichotomous stance Freire maintained as an ideological principle did not 
mean that he believed one should not confront the very idealizations of language 
conditioned as an institutional practice. For instance, Freire’s characterizations 
of language and literacy as “limiting situations” represent his conscious attempt 
at avoiding modalities of behavior ostracizing difference by treating it as a subal-
tern expression of being in the world.
In a conversation with American educator Ira Shor, Freire reminisces on his 
early experiences in reading and writing that posed to him questions leading 
him to reflect on the nature of language authority and its power over our lives. 
As the Brazilian pedagogue states, “In some moments, you have to fight against 
grammar, in order to be free to write … when I was 19 years old … I remember 
how ugly I wrote … I was following the so-called ‘literate’ patterns of the lan-
guage” (Shor, 1987, p. 20). In this statement and several others throughout his 
extensive oeuvre, Freire remained keenly aware that, contrary to conventional 
wisdom, the availability of a common language is not necessarily a precondi-
tion for communication. As Rajagopalan (2001) observes—and Freire would 
likely have concurred—“it is the very sensation that one is somehow able to 
communicate with the people around one that prompts one to hypostatize a 
common language for the group” (Rajagopalan, 2001, p. 18). Thus, the key to 
understanding Freire’s emancipatory education framework lies in our disposi-
tion to accept the radical equality of intelligence in others involved in the same 
educational task as we are (Rancière, 1991). What ensues from this idea pivots to a 
comprehension of language and literacy practices whereby teacher-students [edu-
cadores] relate to student-teachers [educandos] moved by common interests. The 
Brazilian pedagogue insisted on the radicalism of compassion through dialogic 
action as a precondition to improving upon the ways we imagine democracy vis-
à-vis the expansion of its exercise as the practice of freedom (Freire, 1976). This 
idea is clearly imprinted in Freire’s international work.
After living and working in adult education programs in Bolivia, Chile, and 
spending one year as a visiting scholar at Harvard University in the United 
States, Freire finally settled in Geneva, where he and a group of Brazilian intel-
lectuals, also exiled, founded the Institute of Cultural Action (IDAC) at the 
World Council of Churches (Gadotti, 1994). One of the main goals of the IDAC 
was to offer educational services targetedat providing aid to developing nations 
struggling to achieve their independence. The process of consciousness-raising 
developed by Freire in his early grassroots literacy experiments served as the 
basis for developing education programs spearheaded by the IDAC.
The years that followed the IDAC’s establishment were met with increased 
requests for collaborations, mainly through the organization of seminars and 
workshops that disseminated Freire’s emancipatory theories about literacy and 
education. Freire himself, however, was not entirely comfortable with becom-
ing a guru of sorts to an international community of followers who increasingly 
From Angicos to the World 7
viewed the work he did as an “evangelism of liberation.” Freire often went 
to great lengths to distance himself from the images formed about him and 
his work projected by both left- and right-wingers around the world to whom 
his ideas exerted a considerable appeal, but for different reasons (Torres, 1998, 
p. 107).
Certainly, as is to be expected, translational problems, epistemic and techni-
cal, exist regarding the treatment of Freire’s rich conceptual terminology and 
neologisms, both inside and outside Brazil. A detailed description of appro-
priations of Freire’s work outside the field of adult education is beyond the 
purpose of this introductory chapter (see Barros, 2020). Nevertheless, it is cru-
cial to note that Freire’s continual engagement with interlocutors worldwide 
produced particular understandings of his ideas vis-à-vis others’ reinventions 
of them without diminishing his commitment and resistance to the authority 
bestowed upon him.
In 1975, Mário Cabral, revolutionary leader Amílcar Cabral’s brother and then 
Minister of Education in Guinea-Bissau, contacted Freire and the IDAC team to 
assist in developing a national literacy program in the former Portuguese colony. 
In this small African country, Freire’s critical literacy theories would develop in 
new and interesting directions. At the time, Guinea-Bissau counted with a lack 
of material resources, low performance of teachers, and vestiges of the old ideol-
ogies of developmentalism common in the culture of the so-called Third World 
nations dependent on external aid. Guinea-Bissau was not the only African 
nation where Freire’s consultancy was requested but was certainly an experi-
ence that Freire reflected most in his writings. Between 1975 and 1980, Freire 
also worked in São Tomé and Principe, Mozambique, Angola, and Nicaragua 
(Kirkendall, 2010). The African State of São Tomé and Principe, newly liber-
ated from Portuguese colonization, entrusted Freire with a large-scale literacy 
program that obtained more positive results than the more politically unstable 
Guinea-Bissau. After four years, a letter from the then education minister of São 
Tomé e Príncipe arrived at Freire’s IDAC office reporting that 55% of students 
enrolled in schools after his literacy program was implemented were no longer 
illiterate, and that 72% had graduated (Gadotti, 1989).
The specific challenges Freire encountered in Guinea-Bissau, about which he 
reflects at length in Pedagogy in Process (2021), shifted his thinking in significant 
ways regarding the connection between literacy programs and socioeconomic 
development. In a sense, one could argue that Freire’s intervention in Guinea-
Bissau’s national literacy program, though unsuccessful by many accounts, had a 
decisive influence on the overall trajectory of his thinking post-exile, including 
his direct involvement in politics serving as Secretary of Education for the city 
of São Paulo from 1988 until 1990, when he resigned (Gadotti, 1994).
In his relationship with the government of Guinea-Bissau, Freire was intro-
duced to the work of revolutionary leader Amilcar Cabral (1924–1973), an 
8 Sandro R. Barros and Luciana C. de Oliveira
extraordinary intellectual for whom he nurtured a deep-seated respect, even 
though Cabral was assassinated prior to his nation’s independence and both 
intellectuals never met. Freire mentions Amílcar Cabral in many of his writings 
post Pedagogy of the Oppressed, especially when discoursing about the usefulness 
of Cabral’s revolutionary tactics to grassroots education efforts.
Freire’s advisement of the national literacy program in post-revolution 
Guinea-Bissau led him to appreciate the complexity of multilingualism more 
attentively as a fundamentally political issue, considering this nation’s linguis-
tic profile and history of colonial violence. Whereas early on in his writings 
Freire understood the authenticity and complexity of the linguagem popular [liter-
ally the language of the people] as the basis of literacy development initiatives, 
Africa, and particularly Guinea-Bissau, attuned Freire to the importance of 
assuming an anti-dichotomist stance in the treatment of linguistic diversity in 
formal education. Freire’s literacy programs were still premised on an anthro-
pological, phenomenological, and theological appreciation of language (Freire 
and Macedo, 2005). However, African nations’ multilingualism added a new 
dimension to his ideas related to the politics of popular education movements in 
circumstances in which the people who inhabited the same territory had little in 
common with one another besides a history biased against the common enemy: 
the former Portuguese colonizer.
Guinea-Bissau’s literacy campaign was deemed crucial to the political recon-
struction of a multilingual and multi-ethnic nation after the liberation war 
against Portugal was over (Kirkendall, 2010). At the time of Freire’s involve-
ment, the choice of the language that would serve as the medium of instruction 
was a central point of debate. Should Portuguese be prioritized to the detriment 
of local languages? The revolutionary leader Amilcar Cabral (1974b) enthusiasti-
cally defended Portuguese as a language of national unity, even though he knew 
that approximately 80% of the population of his emerging nation did not speak 
it (Gadotti and Romão, 2012). Creole was spoken by approximately 45% of the 
groups. It was an oral language of great potential, yet it lacked a systematized 
written form. Basil Davidson (1975, p. 50) makes an interesting analogy that 
gives us an idea about the ignored possibility of Creole spoken in Guinea as 
a unifying force within movements of popular literacy education. Creole was 
equivalent to the old trade English spoken in the Niger Delta, a language with 
an African base and a large fusion of Portuguese words facilitating communica-
tive bridges. Still, Amílcar Cabral believed, rather naively, that Portuguese was 
the most “neutral” language as a foreign presence in Africa, thus auspicious to 
national unification ideals as no ethnic group would be favored—except for the 
urban elites who already spoke Portuguese.
Guinea-Bissau’s government opted not to use Creole as a medium of instruc-
tion for a myriad of ideological, pragmatic, and economic reasons that went 
contrary to Freire’s counsel. The Brazilian pedagogue did not believe, as Amilcar 
From Angicos to the World 9
Cabral did, that languages served as mere tools of communication. The learning 
of Creole as an official and national language represented the best chance at cre-
ating the new society to which the revolutionary government aspired without 
necessarily replicating the colonial logics inherited from Portuguese discursive 
authority as a European language. Moreover, in Guinea-Bissau, the concept 
of national language was alien to much of the population that conducted their 
daily lives in and out of named languages. Regardless, Freire believed that 
it would be impossible to “re-africanize” citizens, as Amilcar Cabral (1974a) 
desired, without critically approaching the very medium that had de-africanized 
them in the first place: the Portuguese language. The use of the Portuguese was 
therefore not a neutral choice, as Cabral thought, and proved to have profoundconsequences for the organization of education in the nascent African nation for 
generations to come.
In Cabral’s book PAIGC: Unidade e Luta (1974), readers will find a passage that 
Freire underlines in his own copy (Gadotti and Romão, 2012). The passage reads 
as follows: “The Portuguese (language) is one of the best things that the Tugas 
[pejorative form of the Portuguese people] left us, because language is nothing 
more than an instrument for men to relate to each other: it is an instrument, a 
means to speak to express the realities of life and the world” (Cabral, 1974b, p. 
214). At the bottom of the page, Freire’s annotation makes the following asser-
tion, which works as a rejoinder to Cabral’s statement: “This is an unquestionable 
mistake by Amilcar [Cabral].” In a footnote in his Por uma pedagogia da pergunta 
(2014), written in partnership with Antonio Faundez, Freire further clarifies his 
assessment of Cabral’s choice of Portuguese. He notes that Cabral had “failed to 
realize the ideological nature of language, which [was] not something neutral, 
that is, a phenomenon without a history, without affective entanglements and 
emotional residues left by colonialism’s imprints” (Faundez and Freire, 2014, p. 
126). Despite his disagreement with the choice of Portuguese as a medium of 
instruction, Freire complied with the government’s desire to uphold the lan-
guage disregarding cultural, linguistic, tribal, ethnic, and economic differences.
The IDAC supplied the Bissauan government with the didactic materials 
needed and technical support mainly from afar. Ultimately, the inefficiency of the 
state apparatuses and the lack of cohesive leadership led to Freire-inspired literacy 
program’s demise. In several passages of Pedagogy in Process (2021), Freire expresses 
a posteriori how he believed that the support for Creole’s recognition within lit-
eracy and post-literacy instruction would have fared better in the government’s 
efforts. For Freire, Creole was not a language to be introduced concurrently but 
instead introduced through what we would recognize today as a translinguistic 
instructional framework—though Freire did not employ such a term.
Throughout his consultancy work at the head of the IDAC, Freire remained 
coherent in his ideology, insisting that to reconquer the word, colonized peoples 
must first gain a greater awareness of their right to speak, pronounce, and name 
10 Sandro R. Barros and Luciana C. de Oliveira
their world. In his letters to African educators compiled in Pedagogy in Process, 
Freire asserts numerous times that the imposition of colonizer’s language on the 
colonized represented an adherence to colonial domination, which extended to 
neocolonial forms of control as well. As he remarks, it is not by chance that “the 
colonizers speak of their own language as ‘language’ and the language of the 
colonized as ‘dialect’; the superiority and richness of the former is placed over 
against the poverty and inferiority of the latter” (Freire, 2021, p. 102).
The Guinea-Bissau government officialization of Portuguese as the language 
of instruction, coupled with the ideological proclivities of educators agreeing 
with Cabral’s views on the symbolic capital of Portuguese, limited the effects 
of Freire’s professional development recommendations. His reflections on this 
matter in Pedagogy in Process are particularly telling of how Freire understood 
the challenges of literacy instruction within de-colonial and nation-building 
efforts in superdiverse settings (Vertovec, 2007) where populations from dif-
ferent places, social classes, and cultures collide with different or no agendas at 
all. While it is true that Freire’s involvement in the literacy campaign of post- 
revolution Guinea-Bissau did not present the same results as other more 
politically stable and resourceful African nations like São Tomé and Príncipe 
(Kirkendall, 2010), the revolutionary government did accomplish some sensible 
improvements. As Pereira and Motta note:
In the academic year 1971–72, PAIGC had a total of 164 schools in the 
liberated zones where 258 teachers taught 14,531 students. Later, the best 
students were selected to attend boarding schools set up in neighboring 
countries by the Party. In addition, PAIGC was always very conscious 
of the requirements of national reconstruction and not merely of those 
created by the war with its need for young people in military service. 
Therefore, particular attention was given to offering middle school and 
higher education to many groups of students. These students counted with 
the support of nearby countries for this purpose and the result has been 
that a far larger number of Guinean students have completed advanced 
courses during the war years than during the whole period of Portuguese 
occupation. More classes graduated in ten years under PAIGC than in five 
centuries of Portuguese domination.
(cited in Freire, 2021, p. 11)
Be that as it may, several of Freire’s critics have characterized Guinea-Bissau’s 
literacy program as a failure, often blaming Freire’s ideas for its demise (see 
Facundo, 1984; Harasim, 1985). However, these critics fail to mention that 
Freire’s role was rather limited as a consultant, a fact that merits some attention. 
By and large, the Brazilian educator worked with the Guinea-Bissau govern-
ment, as mentioned earlier, from afar, visiting the African continent only on two 
From Angicos to the World 11
occasions (Freire, 2014). Moreover, those who disparage Freire’s literacy program 
in Guinea-Bissau tend to rely on one empirical study, Linda Harasim’s PhD dis-
sertation (1985), where the author acknowledges the paucity of government data 
available on the literacy campaigns, as well as the lack of common metrics used 
to determine what reading achievement meant and what indicators were used 
to measure literacy development across the board. Additionally, Guinea-Bissau’s 
political instability, as to be expected, made it impossible for any initiative to suc-
ceed, thereby delaying the nation-building effort the revolutionary government 
desired. A letter addressed to Freire on June 10th, 1985 by the then Minister 
of Commerce, Fisheries and Crafts, Mário Cabral, explained the reasons 
for the apparent “failure” of the literacy campaign in Guinea-Bissau as follows:
Were it not for the non-existence of the codification of the Portuguese 
dialect in Africa and the absolute ignorance of Portuguese in rural areas, 
I am sure, we would have had a great success, such was the political avail-
ability and popular receptivity. Years later, I still think that the analyses we 
made then form the basis of any literacy venture. If Creole begins to have 
the necessary elements for its use in teaching, the problem remains that 
Portuguese continues to be the official and teaching language.
(quoted in Gadotti, 1996, p. 136)
Despite Cabral’s insightful observation above, and as Freire noted, any literacy 
program is fated to fail under Guinea-Bissau’s conditions (Gadotti and Romão, 
2012).
There is no denying that the literacy proposal advanced by Freire in Guinea-
Bissau was as idealistic as it was contradictory, considering it was paired with a 
tradition of mechanical learning based on rote memorization. Notwithstanding 
the poor results obtained in the post-revolution literacy program, the challenges 
Freire encountered extended far beyond Cabral’s insistence on Portuguese 
as a medium of instruction. To wit, at the time the Freirean-inspired liter-
acy campaigns in Guinea-Bissau took place, there were around 30 languages 
spoken—and not written—across different ethnolinguistic communities. This 
is remarkable for a nation of a little over a million inhabitants. Hence, the crite-
rion for choosing an official language was politically complicated from the start, 
compounded by the country’s lack of infrastructure and its legacy of colonialism 
imposing a particular mindset among the educated elites sympathetic