If you're not pissed off you're not paying attention" "Let's fuck things up": Reflecting on Critical and Radical Pedagogy

At the heart of radical and critical pedagogies are the concepts of equality, inclusive practice, challenging oppressive practices and mainstream pedagogies and theories around learning and teaching. Due to oppressive practices being challenged and the ‘measures’ used in teaching and learning increasingly discouraging risk taking , there is often resistance to adopting radical and critical approaches. In addition, critical pedagogies do not appear to be widely discussed at UoN, despite a large number of people engaging in critical pedagogical practices and the focus on the Changemaker agenda. Such practices include (among others) using punk pedagogy, pedagogy of the oppressed and critical race theory and feminism.

Adopting a radical and critical approaches to pedagogy can have huge benefits for all students, but particularly for excluded or marginalised students. Some of the aims/benefits of a critical approach to pedagogy are:

• To develop an appreciative enquiry – seeking the best of ‘what is’ to ignite the collective imagination of ‘what might be’.
• To tell stories of success in discovering the positive core on which to build – strength based model, not deficit based.
• To co-create knowledge to develop critical consciousness.
• To critique oppressive forces.
• To lead to social action and/or personal empowerment and transformation.

The aim of the cracker barrel will be to discuss what radical and critical approaches to pedagogy are, what motivates people to undertake such methods, how these methods can be applied in different contexts and the benefits to inclusive practice which can arise from using radical and critical approaches.