paulo freire we make the road by walking

This final conversation between two educators from different continents reveals their common dream of human liberation, their common commitment to love and justice.'

People interested in learning and social change will find in these pages hope, humor, passion, guidance, and humility.

Giroux, Director, Center for Education and Cultural Studies, Miami University This book offers hope by demonstrating in the voices and practices of two of the great educator-activists of the twentieth century the reason for making pedagogy practical and theoretical in the service of social justice.' The dialogue between Horton and Freire opens up new insights into the meaning of pedagogy, social criticism, and collective struggle. How could two men, working in such different social spaces and times, arrive at similar ideas and methods? These conversations answer that question in rich detail and engaging anecdotes, and show that, underlying the philosophy of both, is the idea that theory emanates from practice and that knowledge grows from and is a reflection of social experience.'We Make the Road by Walking is a book of compelling passion, politics, and hope. The themes they discuss illuminate problems faced by educators and activists around the world who are concerned with linking participatory education to the practice of liberation and social change. He has been active in educational development programs worldwide.įor both men, real liberation is achieved through popular participation. Paulo Freire, author of Pedagogy of the Oppressed, established the Popular Culture Movement in Recife, Brazil's poorest region, and later was named head of the New National Literacy Campaign until a military coup forced his exile from Brazil. Myles Horton, who died in January 1990, was a major figure in the civil rights movement and founder of the Highlander Folk School, later the highlander Research and Education Center. The ideas of these men developed through two very different channels: Horton's, from the Highlander Center, a small, independent residential education center situated outside the formal schooling system and the state Freire's, from within university and state-sponsored programs. Throughout their highly personal conversations recorded here, Horton and Freire discuss the nature of social change and empowerment and their individual literacy campaigns. This dialogue between two of the most prominent thinkers on social change in the twentieth century was certainly a meeting of giants.

Paulo freire we make the road by walking