pedagogy of the oppressed

This review is based of Pedagogy of The Oppressed by Paolo Freire.

So, the educational system is broken.

We’ve established that in the last packet where we talked about the many stresses and anxieties that students go through today. But what can we do about it? Considering that the modern schooling system is a tool that is used for oppression and conditioning of students not the think for themselves, the only logical answer is the completely destroy and restructure the schooling system in its entirety.

Paulo Freire, the father of critical educational theory and a huge influence on modern educational tactics, believes that school should be more free and accommodating to those who have been oppressed, and lays out guides on how that oppression affects a child.

The “banking model of education” details current educational systems as a form of oppression through the punishment and humiliation of students by the teacher, who knows best in each and every situation regardless of context. The student is an blank slate, and the teacher must “deposit” their information into their heads, regardless of their lived situation.

Freire claims this system is enforced so that students remain docile and incapable of standing up and fighting against the forms of oppression enforced by the government, society, and other everyday life in modern day. The alternative style of education proposed by Freire is Problem Posing Education, with a focus on Dialogue, Discussion, and Shared Learning. The teachers job in this model is to introduce a problem relevant to the lived experience of the students, and the students, rather than sitting quietly and being uninvolved, are active participants in this system, communicating and creating their own solutions and theories within the space.

Students develop a critical consciousness about the world that engages them to be better able to problem solve and approach the many aspects of life. In the design classroom, for example, a advisor could introduce the problem “Are unpaid internships in the design field fair?”, this could create a discussion within the classroom leading to the students reflecting on fairness, the field of design, and the ethics of working without pay.

This leads to engaging dialogues between students that allow them to learn while practicing necessary skills such as communication and collaberation, while simultaneously not enforcing any certain way of thinking.

While allowing these modes of thinking to creep into the classroom, design students may also find themselves enjoying a topic enough to create a project on it. They can learn how to actively engage with modern social design problems, while also keeping their own autonomy on what types of projects they are making. If they have time to discuss and flesh out their projects, they may find more creative and elaborate approaches they could not have thought up on their own.

To continue in this line of thought, I believe an emphasis on collaboration in projects can help increase necessary social skills for when working in the field, but forced collaberation always . ends up with problems. Students should be encouraged to collaberate, however not required if they instead have an idea for a small solo project. Projects in this sense are freely made, and graded flexibly on effort and enthusiasm, rather than a hierarchical value of “quality” which branches towards thoughts on the philosophy of ungrading.

For example, in a corporate identity class, why must we have such a competitive format to the way we learn? The branding class in my undergrad was focused on individual, forced projects where we wouldnt even be allowed to choose our own location for our Olympics assignment, in my case, I drew Toronto, which I was entirely unenthused about. The argument for this is that in this career field, you don’t get to choose you clients.

How true is that? Most studios in the design space can very much deny a client for any reason, or as a freelancer choose to specialize in one type of design. There is a responsibility present for us, as educators, to ensure that the students we teach are prepared to be successful in the field. I agree that we must guide them, but the purpose of education is not only to create a worker. Creating critical thinking and engaged students is also part of our responibility, people ready to tackle the world as it is, which is not always a pretty sight.

Behind the mask of grades and degrees, a human with hobbies, interests, and life goals remains. Aspirations beyond that of work and and money. Some may have a deep passion for the field they study, some may only see the field as a means of making a living, and some both. In my view, being an educator is about helping a person grow.

Guiding them to whatever they feel is the right path for them, not lecturing them on the correct way to use Garamond. Teaching is a complex mixture of preparing them for this reality of capital, but trying to keep them in one one piece mentally on the way there. Even if that means we have to break down the barriers of “student” and “teacher” and be vulnerable again.

caps lock

This review is for the book CAPS LOCK: How Capitalism Took Hold of Graphic Design, and How to Escape from It by Ruben Pater.

Through our time being raised in this capitalist centered economy and system, we’ve been taught to view the world through hierarchical eyes. Your job is equal to your status, your value is your wage. This meritocratic lifestyle, where those who “work hard” get the recognition they deserve and are paid accordingly, easily falls apart like a tower of playing cards at the slightest opposition.

But why do we look down on those who don’t feel particularly engaged in this hierarchy?

When we spout the ideals of freedom, we never explain the fine print of exactly what freedom means in our governments recognition of it. How very capitalistic of us. The anarchistic framework for freedom and action operates under the idea that freedom is exactly as stated, the right to do whatever you like with your life, at the one condition that you do not impose upon others freedoms.

This is how our system operates, to maintain our level of freedom and comfort in “first world” society, we impose upon and take away the freedom others could have. We underpay workers, drive children into forced labor, and build our corporations out of foundations established by the slave trade. As a part of the privileged in society, those who have the comfort of a warm home, the power of the internet, and the commodities of Starbucks and iPhones.

We are caught, bound within these systems, one would have to carry a book of corporate history into a supermarket to avoid brands that cause these conditions to people across the globe, and yet when they try they find brands without said connections, they walk out with next to nothing to stock their shelves. To boycott is near impossible, as humane or equitable alternatives simply cannot thrive on a market that drives prices down at the cost of others. The game was rigged from the start. This problem is and institutional, not individual one.

In a fantastically written analysis of design history, Pater points out the uncomfortable truth tying design in with historical oppression, colonialism, and imperialism behind the people who created the design profession. The most difficult part of this topic, however, is identifying which ways we can fight against this history while simultaneously acknowledging the damages done by the profession to the oppressed, especially as a priveleged person such as myself.

As said by some of the example studios featured in the book, to build an ethical design collective is very hard. One thing that Ruben Pater talks about a lot is the usage of the commons, a form of skill sharing/ trading in the shape of a community. I’ve always loved this idea, but struggle when thinking about how I could establish it in my own community. The “Tragedy of the Commons” is a term associated with how a highly individualistic society can incentivise a person to act on self-interest at the expense of others, which is how society functions in it’s entirety under the existing system of capitalism.

The real “tragedy of the commons” acts as a critique of capital rather than the commons itself. Many ideas flash through my mind, such as creating a collaborative and open to use workshop/ crafts place. Or, creating an online skill swap community, with emphasis on openly learning any skill. Another idea is create free online classes that teach subjects that I am familiar with that others are typically paywalled from learning, held up by a tipping system.

These many variations of a commons would allow me the freedom to teach and create a form of “antischool” or “free skool.” This has been on my mind a lot recently, and I’d love to dedicate time to this aim. I want to do something with purpose, a form of teaching, educational content, or usage of my design skills mixed with my ability to write and think within the design space. I’m glad I got to spend this time this semester fleshing and branching out on all the topics I’ve explored, as it most definitely helped me find a path forward for the rest of my masters.

playing around; thoughts on work

This review is based on the book Play: How it Shapes the Brain, Opens the Imagination, and Invigorates the Soul by Stuart Brown.

I wanted to establish a better understanding of my thoughts on what it means to be “playful” in modern society, and how necessary breaks and relaxation time can be to enrich our personal lives and health. What brought me to this book? While reading CAPS LOCK by Ruben Pater, I found myself wondering how we’ve established that those in society with the mindset in which they would rather spend their life playing, learning, or engaging in critical thought are often looked upon as “lazy,” “childish,” or “immature.”

Since society in the modern age has established that living requires work-life balance, we’ve connected growth with learning to pay taxes, starting a family, and working a 9-5. If I was to step aside and ask you, dear reader, what you might view to be your dream job, what would you answer? Would you want to be a Lawyer, defending the public in court? Maybe a YouTuber, playing games to entertain others? Or rather you might want to use your creative skills to produce art for big companies.

When asked this question now, I still have the same answer as when I was just leaving secondary school. To put it simply, why dream of labor in the first place? I personally don’t fall asleep and excitedly await a dream to do household chores, or file some paperwork at the office. Whether you truly feel you love your job or not, in the end you will still be working. You are trading time(the most invaluable thing in a humans short life) for capital, which you then turn around and spend to maintain your own standard of living.

Can you really say without an ounce of hesitation that you would rather be doing that work instead of relaxing on a beach, playing a game, or acting out any of your hobbies? I think that we can agree that the answer to that is no.

Even a YouTuber, for example, which is considered a rather privileged position for a person to spend their life working in; has days in which they feel that they hate their job. In fact, most YouTubers can often be depressed or go through “Average Life In Numbers”, Clockify mental health issues due to the stress and isolation of being a micro-celebrity online. They are expected to display a cheery, perfect personality to their viewers regardless of their own health. The higher their viewership, the more this pressure can build, often leading to the common sudden hiatuses or retirements.

Don’t get me wrong here, I understand that society in it’s current configuration cannot function without work. Especially in the capitalist economic system, which is built upon underpaid “lower end” workers to maintain the market, someone is needed to stock each shelf, clean each bathroom, or pour each coffee. The problem here is instead how much time, and how little we get back for this time. A week has exactly 168 hours in it, and the average worker in America spends roughly 38 hours at their job in 2023. This may seem easy, “Work-Life balance? yeah I got this, look how much time I have!”

However, if you break that day down into each category, such as eating, chores, sleep, and work, you find that a person may only have 5 or 6 hours a day to themselves. This is assuming a normal 8 hour work day, the average sleep of 7.6 hours, 1 hour for chores, and 1 hour for eating in drinking. This time does not calculate travel to and from work, which for some could take another hour or two from their schedule. With only 5 hours a day to yourself, the numbers look bleak. That’s only roughly 20% of your day, and by extension we can say that including all of these elements, it can take up roughly over 2/3rd of your entire life.

Graphic Designers suffer from often unpaid overtime as well, adding to the total time we may spend working depending on a strict deadline schedule. It’s easy to point out how ridiculous a system such as this is when you see these numbers, and when I look at them. Frankly, I don’t want to spend my short time here creating templates and filing papers for a company that in the end, is meaningless. I think this is where my own thoughts and the book separate, as when you continue reading, you find some older ways of thinking within Stuart Browns thoughts.

For example, he writes “This kid, Harry, was a very smart and pseudo sophisticated couch potato, preoccupied with dark themes in video games, and drawn to ponderous existential literature, but clearly stuck in his juvenility. I had been active on the Outward Bound Board, and knew that the program then operative in the mountains of North Carolina was well-led, rigorous, and safe. So on my advice, Harry’s parents enrolled him.” (p. 120)

Brown then goes on to explain Harrys experience at the camp, stouting how great it was that they had been denied food, had to kill their own chickens to create dinner. He boasts that after the trip, Harry was a confident triathlete and medical student. While I have no problem with children needing to learn self-autonomy and reliance, I think it’s easy to point out the flaws in this line of thinking. First off, I think we need to mention that Outward Bound has countless traumatic survivor stories related the general lack of treatment and abuse suffered at these types of camps. Most staff within these camps are untrained.

Typically there is no license or papers enforcing proper care. This is especially the case for many of the said “troubled teens industry” programs across America. In this case, I would assume by the wording of “His parents enrolled him” means that Harry did not want to participate in this camp. This is of course speculation, but it’s very possible Harry had decided to “straighten his life out” out of the fear and trauma of having to go back. Rather, I can say easily that I believe Harry’s “growth” in becoming an athlete and medical student did not correlate with anything the camp could have “taught” him.

These types of “life camps” are by no means safe, well-led programs. Without federal oversight, these programs operate to simply extract money and take advantage of troubled youth, while manipulating parents into believing this will be good for them. However, something I also take issue with in Browns edorsement of this type of camp is the meritocratic and condescending nature of his arguments for why Harry needed re-educated. He denounces video games, and ponderous existential literature in what I would call an attack on the humanities and arts. In his established viewpoint, it is clear he views athletes and doctors as hierarchically superior to those within the arts.

There is nothing wrong with enjoying the dark themes of the well-written story of the Dark Souls series, or reading the existential literature of the philosopher Osamu Dazai, for example. Some of the most important life lessons I’ve learned in my time come from the media I have consumed, the video games, the literature, the music and more. The artists and musicians are of course just as important as the doctors and athletes in society.

Brown argues that through play, we learn everything important to social animals such as humans. Brown then uses that information to aim his focus at work culture, using the “power of play” as a tool for corporations to utilize in their employees. “play” in his definition is no longer about enjoying rest or relaxation, but about efficacy and productivity. This is clear in some of his last lines in the book; “Play is how we are made, and how we develop and adjust to change. It can foster innovation and lead to multibillion dollar fortunes... as Freud says, life is about love and work.” (p.218)

While there are many insights I can take from Brown, I find that in his support of certain system through his writing, it reveals his true character, and I personally don’t feel that most of those thoughts align with my own way of thinking, centered towards a society without the systems he endorses. As I’ve learned myself over the past few months, I can definitely agree that physical activity and social sports such as climbing invigorate the mind and soul. Yet play can be so much more, it can be life lessons delivered in a amazing show, or problem solving learned from a puzzle filled video game. If you open your mind to what you can learn, you can find that you can acquire many life lessons from just about anything.

Media as art, in that sense, is limitless in possibility.

anarchist pedagogies

This is a review of the book Anarchist Pedagogies: Collective Actions, Theories, and Critical Reflections on Education edited by Robert H. Haworth.

I think Anarchist Pedagogies created a revolution within my head.

Wait, let me explain. Essentially, I’ve been locked inside my own head. As I’ve grappled with what it means to be a masters candidate in design, I’ve found myself paralyzed when it came to making work for myself.

How do others perceive my work?

Asking questions such as “Is this worthy of a masters program?”

“What would David want me to do with this idea?”

“How should I make this from an academic perspective?”

These questions, as with the many others swirling within a spiral of how to be an “Ideal Student,” stunted my active growth and demonstrated my lack of autonomy within the creative space. I have grown dependent on the institutionalized mechanisms of education that have removed my ability to work for myself, waiting to be told what to do next or where to go.

It is this book that helped me to finally understand and unlock this mindset, and allowed me to create this packet and work for myself. Thus, as it is so fitting with the style of this packet and my new perspective, I will talk first about my thoughts on pedagogy, anarchy, the education system, and where I belong within the mechanisms controlling our lives.

The schooling system, especially within the United States of America, has systematically used its authority and power to create and foster not an education of critical thinking. Instead, the education is found most commonly as a tool at the disposal of the government, intended not to enrich an individual, but force them into complicity in their system. Placed in evenly spaced seats in a small room, students are forced to fit a mold made for everyone, with no regard for their individual learning abilities or preferences.

Teachers enforce rules such as raising your hand to use the bathroom, and not leaving your seat for any reason during class time. The right to speak is granted only by the authority, you may not chat with a classmate or even discuss a relevant class topic without permission. The curriculum is set by the state, ensuring students are taught a perspective that aligns with the thinking of their ruling classes.

The reasoning for this is quite clear; The American public is educated in this way to create a subservient and docile working class. Silent and unquestioning, the average student is taught from day one that the system in which they live and operate is the only true and correct way of being. Any other form of government or societal rule is below the American people, instilling the idea of American Exceptionalism, Individualism, and Nationalism.

The book Anarchist Pedagogies shares multiple essays from critical thinkers in the anarchist community attempting to introduce and provide insight onto the shortcomings of this system of education, as well as demonstrate alternatives educational models that could foster a more free and whole education while emphasizing the role of the educator and the student. However, something you may be wondering is how that really has anything to do with something as radical as “creating a revolution in my head.” To illustrate this, let’s unpack various quotes and ideas presented in the book that have helped me incredibly escape my creative rut.

If you find it hard to believe my claims on the intention of the schooling system to be used as a system of obedience, maybe it would help to see for yourself the words directly from Benjamin Rush. As a signer of the declaration of independence in the founding of our country, and considered the father of American Psychiatry, he would say this in his 1786 document “Thoughts upon the Mode of Education Proper in a Republic.” It reads as follows;

“In order more effectually to secure to our youth the advantages of a religious education, it is necessary to impose upon them the doctrines and discipline of a particular church.

Man is naturally an ungovernable animal, and observations on particular societies and countries will teach us that when we add the restraints of ecclesiastical to those of domestic and civil government, we produce in him
the highest degrees of order and virtue...

Let our pupil be taught that he does not belong to himself, but that he is public property. Let him be taught to love his family, but let him be taught at the same time that he must forsake and even forget them when the welfare of his country requires it...

In the education of youth, let the authority of our masters be as absolute as possible. The government of schools like the government of private families should be arbitrary, that it may not be severe. By this mode of education, we prepare our youth for the subordination of laws and thereby qualify them for becoming good citizens of the republic.

I am satisfied that the most useful citizens have been formed from those youth who have never known or felt their own wills till they were one and twenty years of age, and I have often thought that society owes a great deal of its order and happiness to the deficiencies of parental government being supplied by those habits of obedience and subordination which are contracted at schools...

From the observations that have been made it is plain that I consider it as possible to convert men into republican machines. This must be done if we expect them to perform their parts properly in the great machine of the government of the state. That republic is sophisticated with monarchy or aristocracy that does not revolve upon the wills of the people, and these must be fitted to each other by means of education before they can be made to produce regularity and unison in government...”

— Benjamin Rush, Thoughts upon the Mode of Education Proper in a Republic. (1786)

Although spoken 200 years ago, these fundamental ideas have never left the school systems and government. The advent of technology and the industrial revolution has even more so created a necessity of this system, as the internet allows more freedom to educate oneself and realized the problems hidden within the core of the education system.

Where does this everything connect?

Coming to the realization that this is the system in which I was raised gave me a whole bunch of questions in need of answering. Over time I found many answers to my existential crisis on my own education within the book, answers which brought me to recontextualizing the entire idea of my undergraduate education. In my undergrad, we were taught the highly capitalistic and economic version of what it means to fulfill the role of the graphic designer.

Classes focused on technical skills and client relationships, projects based themselves around corporate identity and visual communication. This is not to say that these are not important topics to learn, as after all, we still live inside a highly capitalistic system of economy and must find a way to commodify our skills and provides services deemed of monetary value. However as I reflect back on my education, I wonder what, if any, time I had to dedicate to myself or my own mission as an artist.

Personal “styles” meant nothing in the broad scheme, as corporations would look for flexible designer able to replicate what brand or style they already operated within as a conglomerate. What I felt was all to absent at the classroom setting was discussion on the theory and concept behind our ideas. Why did we spend so much time enforcing archaic design rules established and canonized by old white men that claimed that their form of design is “objectified” or “correct”?

Why did we not discuss the greater reasoning behind a decision, the reason behind our choices on a broader level. How do we feel about a specific idea or topic, and how does that affect our design practice? Often we see students falling within the camp of making whatever is “trendy” within the design space, or claims of a love for minimalism and clean aesthetics paired with overconsumption of online design through sites like Pinterest create a homogenous class design style. 20 portfolios walk out of the classroom with the same projects, same style, essentially the same work.

Breaking away from this idea can lead to punishment for experimentation, as what is not considered “good” design can be immediately rejected, students dogpile on the outcast of the class or the student who experimented receives a lower grade for their work(which in itself is a strong argument for the philosophy of ungrading). This creates a tension within the community of the classroom where students find themselves requiring to submit to “authority.” In the words of Joel Spring, a professor and activist writer;

“By attempting to teach automobile driving, sex education, dressing, adjustment to personality problems and a host of related topics, the school also teaches that there is an expert and correct way of doing all of these things and that one should depend on the expertise of others. Students in the school ask for freedom and what they receive is the lesson that freedom is only conferred by authorities and must be used “expertly.” This dependency creates a form of alienation which destroys peoples ability to act. Activity no longer belongs to the individual, but the the expert and the institution.”

— (Spring, 1998, pp. 26-27)

This moment, upon reading this exact quote, is when the entirety of my realization had set in.

Throughout my time and experience in education, I had constantly been taught that I must conform and fit within the acknowledgement of authority, be that the literal definition of authority in the form of a hierarchy between student and teacher, or a metaphorical, hidden authority that requires you to create art for the sake of others rather than yourself.

Students are removed of free will and autonomy through this process, nothing is created without the intention of proving worth or receiving validation from some sort of authoritarian figure. The teacher in this situation is not a gentle guide or helping hand to assist the process of learning, but instead the floor manager of a factory, ensuring that quotas are met and the workers(students) are kept in line.

That is exactly where I found myself caught up, as I transitioned to the world of VCFA, a school very similar in pedagogical process to the free schools I’ve been reading about, I had to venture outside of this authoritarian comfort zone in which I had not been required to think for myself.

My decisions were guided not by a pursuit of personal gain and enlightenment, but on whether or not it would be good to include in a packet, and whether my advisor (the authority) would view me as worthy and having met my quota. This line of thinking lead to personal stunted growth and a lack of understanding of how to create beyond the boundary lines. Every project and idea must be “valid” and “worthy”, and the projects must be large and perfectly researched and executed.

Enlightenment and the classroom.
(or, “Where the #$*! do we go from here?”)

Of course, no problem can be solved without the creation of another problem. In the tumultuous time we live in, and with the recent protests and encampments happening across the world at university campuses, we see a rise in dissent and confliction with the narrative told by the US governments.

However, even with the flak the university system is taking for it’s support of openly genocidal regimes and actively being fought against on that front, I still wonder how much ground we can clear in the fight for a more free and desirable educational system at a lesser cost. As someone who will be throwing myself into the fire of teaching at a University eventually, I worry that my research and line of thinking, as well as the pedagogy I am developing, will be seen as dangerous to the overall mission of the public schooling system of America.

Alternatively, I wonder what breakthroughs can be made to implement more of anarchistic and free schooling levels of thinking into a classroom as someone acting within the machine we are fighting against. The definition of Anarchism and the school of thought is so misunderstood within culture and media, viewed as violent and rowdy embodiments of teenage angst and punk ethos. I myself used to believe that as I leaned more towards other schools of thought in my lack of understanding.

What I’ve encountered instead is a truly welcoming community of critical thinkers dedicated to providing freedom and liberation from all forms of oppression. Communities of interesting and caring people who want desperately to make change in the world and recognize the system of oppression and suffering inherent within the capitalist structure of living.

My personal pedagogy as such grows and sides towards these lines of thought as I learn and flesh out what it means to teach in the modern age. Empathy and compassion, as well as understanding and mutualism are essential within the classroom to create an environment where every person is capable of growth and learning.

The act of teaching is also an act of learning, as every new student will present a new challenge or personality you will encounter, but what comes of developing a standoff-ish persona that pushes the students away? Mutual respect in the classroom must go both ways, as the role of the teacher will never stop continuing to be the role of the student as well.