Good critics, good criticism: rethinking critical pedagogy in a production economy

Abstract

ABSTRACT As symbolic production has eclipsed critical consumption, teaching critical communication methods is marked by challenges and opportunities. In this essay, I describe the impact of a critical-pedagogical incongruity on our discipline’s ability to fulfill its vocational and civic potential. I trace the confluence of historical, institutional, and economic factors contributing to our discipline’s critical-pedagogical challenges. And I consider how critical communication instructors can reaffirm the centrality of criticism through a meliorative pedagogy that amplifies critical communication’s unique contributions to a comprehensive liberal arts education by teaching students how to unite critical methods, character, and lived experience.