Published: 2017-04-04

The Notion of Radicality in the Work of Henry A. Giroux

Wojciech Kruszelnicki
Pedagogical Forum
Section: Articles and essays
https://doi.org/10.21697/fp.2017.1.12

Abstract

This paper comes as a supplementary follow-up to my two previously published essays discussing neo-Marxism in educational studies as a set of radical theories that lay the foundations for the development of radical and critical pedagogy as represented in the work of Henry A. Giroux. The statement that Giroux’s pedagogy is a continuation of radical educational theory I would interpret as not being persuasive in so far as the notion of radicality is restricted solely to neo-Marxist educational criticism that utilizes the concept of social, cultural, and economic reproduction to unmask the ideological aims of formal schooling. By accentuating the importance of the discourse of democracy and ethics as the major element of the language used to debate school reform, I analyze the pedagogical conceptions that exhibit “radicality” and that serve for Giroux as signifiers to insert the ethical and the political back into the struggle over schooling and the construction of a viable democratic society. The concluding remarks posit that the identity of critical pedagogy remains deeply historically rooted both in intellectual, educational movements per se and in different spontaneous civic acts of disobedience, therefore it is inadvisable to either advocate further “radicalization” of existing radical pedagogies, or attribute to one’s own thinking – as Giroux sometimes does – the proper pedagogical radicality.

Keywords:

Henry Giroux, radical pedagogy, critical pedagogy, radicality, educational theory

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Citation rules

Kruszelnicki, W. (2017). The Notion of Radicality in the Work of Henry A. Giroux. Pedagogical Forum, 7(1), 163–184. https://doi.org/10.21697/fp.2017.1.12

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