[MD] Rethinking Education as the Practice of Freedom: Paulo Freire and the Promise of Critical Pedagogy

[John Carl]

All,

On 6/26/14, Ant McWatt <antmcwatt at hotmail.co.uk> wrote:

>
> The Indians' spokesman replied:
>
> "We know that you highly esteem the kind of learning taught in those
> colleges, and that the maintenance of our young men, while with you, would
> be very expensive to you. We are convinced, therefore, that you mean to do
> us good by your proposal and we thank you heartily."
>
> "But you, who are wise, must know that different nations have different
> conceptions of things; and you will not therefore take it amiss, if our
> ideas of this kind of education happen not to be the same with yours. We
> have had some experience of it; several of our young people were formerly
> brought up at the colleges of the northern provinces; they were instructed
> in all your
> sciences; but, when they came back to us, they were bad runners, ignorant of
> every means of living in the woods, unable to bear either cold or hunger,
> knew neither how to build a cabin, take a deer, nor kill an enemy, spoke our
> language imperfectly, were therefore neither fit for hunters, warriors, nor
> counsellors; they were totally good for nothing."  [Ant note: does that
> remind you of anyone who posts here "occasionally"???  Sorry no signed ZMM
> copies for anyone who provides the first correct answer...]

Jc:  Which part?  The part about not being able to live in the woods,
take a deer or kill an enemy?    That kinda sounds like how you
describe yourself, Ant.    I don't need a signed copy because the mark
of social celebrity is  morally inferior to the words within and the
words (the law) is best written on the heart than in the page


>
> "We are however not the less obligated by your kind offer, though we decline
> accepting it, and to show our grateful sense of it, if the gentlemen of
> Virginia will send us a dozen of their sons, we will take care of their
> education, instruct them in all we know, and make men of them." [Ant note:
> Too bloody right as well.  These Indians needed a 'white man's education' as
> much as a fish needs a bike!"]
>
> (Benjamin Franklin: Remarks Concerning the Savages of North America)
>

Jc:  Rudy al James told me about that story.  According to him, the
white fathers took him up on it and sent a hundred likely youths to go
learn the ways of the natives.   Also, they had a major problem on
their hands of how to form a federation of states and keep the peace.
That was where a lot of the US constitution got its "inspiration"
Most of them never came back because the ways of the  tribes of the
Iroquois nation were superior to the European ways.

But that was when the country was undeveloped.  Nowadays, the ways of
the Europeans totally repress and oppress the simpler patterns which
concerned earth, sun, water and the living souls of the place.

But we'll see how all that technological progress works out in the end, eh?

JohnC