In critical pedagogy, Freire argues for an ethic of humanization, based on radical democratic political principles13 and grounded in a rereading of humanist traditions (Aronowitz, 1993). That is, the dynamic relations between knower and known is not merely an unreflective being-in-the-world, but an active consciousness involving the deliberate use of the imagination, the emotions, and the ability to conjecture and compare (Freire, 1998).14 For instance, Freire’s notion of conscientization 15 or consciousness raising, is a political act in which oppressed people are raised from their oppressed stupor to recognize that oppression and to move from being passive pawns in the system to active transformers of the oppressive system. That is, the manner in which oppressed people emerge from their submersion in the oppressor/oppressed relationship through conscientization is structurally similar to how students get to know reality generally, namely, being conscious of their conscious relation to objective reality. Thus, consciousness (rational) is a condition for knowledge, and Freire believes that knowledge always is actively manufactured, in dialogue:
knowledge is constructed by a conscious relation to the world. However, in my argument, sometimes the camp of critical pedagogy overemphasizes consciousness or rational,
12 Maybe we need meta-thinking about this in the future: can anger or resentment become motivation for social movement?
13 In Laclau’s opinion, radical democracy opens new positions of speech and thus both empowers previously excluded groups and enables new aspects of social life to become part of the political process (Laclau, 1990).
That is, radical democracy is a strong way to empower people, and participation is the central creative mechanism mediating between institutions and motives. Public discussion is seen as a mechanism ensuring that any political action has to pass the test of public consent.
14 As Freire says, “curiosity as restless questioning, as movement towards revelation of something hidden, as a question verbalized or not, as search for clarity, as a moment of attention, suggestion, and vigilance, constitutes an integral part of the phenomenon of being alive” (Freire, 1998: 38).
15Freire’s notion of “conscientizacão,” which is a process that invites one to engage the world and others critically through reading the word and the world. In this process, knowledge emerges in dialectical relationship
and this will lead researchers to focus on the dimension of domination and struggle instead of emotion while they interpreting the relevant issues in educational fields. Like Boler (1999) mocks the phenomenon of Freire’s work base on CR being heroized. Weiler (1996) suggests that much of this literature constitutes a “canonization of Freire,” and thus a betrayal of the ideals Freire himself is calling for.
In my conclusion, both emotional solidarity and rational deliberation are equal significant. On the one hand, I agree that liberation is defined not as an ideal state of mind or as an endpoint but as a process of active, dialogical, critical striving to be more. On the other hand, I consider that emotional express and unconsciousness are also the part of this struggling process. For instance, Eliasoph (1998: 93) explores solidarity that operates without words: a culture’s rhythms, sounds, and emotions can create a kind of physical togetherness, meanings that cannot be reduced to words or beliefs or ideas but that have to be experienced in practice.
That is, social change sometimes happens on emotional forms of communication over rational ones.
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