Reflections on the Educational Crisis and the Tasks of the Critical Scholar/Activist

Michael W Apple

doi:10.17585/ntpk.v1.90

Abstract

This is a time when education has become even more of a site of struggle. Dominant groups in a number of countries have attempted, often more than a little successfully, to limit criticism, to control access to research that documents the negative effects of their policies, and to deny the possibility of critically democratic alternatives. At the same time, critical perspectives have been built to challenge dominant understandings of education and the larger society. In this article, I want to do three things: 1) provide a general picture of the ideological situation we are facing; 2) publicly reflect on some of the critical perspectives in education that have grown in influence over the past years, since I have some worries about these perspectives if they are not more adequately* and actively*connected to counter-hegemonic movements and struggles; and 3) suggest a set of actions that more adequately deal with the responsibilities of critical educators in a time of crisis and of the growing influences of conservative modernization. In order to do this, I will also need to ground some of my points in a series of personal reflections.

Highlights

This is a time when education has become even more of a site of struggle
I want to do two things: 1) to publicly reflect on some of the critical perspectives in education that have grown in influence over the past years. (As you will see, I have some worries about these perspectives if they are not more adequately*and actively*connected to counter-hegemonic movements and struggles.); and 2) suggest a set of actions that more adequately deal with the responsibilities of critical educators in a time of crisis and of the growing influences of conservative modernization
If one of the most powerful insights of the literature in critical pedagogy and in the growing turn toward theories of globalization and postcolonial perspectives is the valorization of knowledge from below, is this sufficient? We know that the issue is not whether ‘the subaltern speak’, but whether they are listened to (Apple & Buras, 2006; Spivak, 1988)

Summary

Conservative modernization and the current crisis

I have given a rather personal introduction to this article to remind us that this is a time when education has become even more of a site of struggle. They were (and are) the results of struggles over who has the right to be called a person, over what it means to be educated, over what counts as official or legitimate knowledge, and over who has the authority to speak to these issues (Apple, 2013, 2014; Darnton, 2014; Mills, 1997) These struggles need to be thought about using a range of critical tools, among them analyses based on theories of the state, of globalization, of the postcolonial, and so much more. When not used rhetorically, they are essential tools in our struggles against the global neoliberal and neoconservative agendas As they have influenced critical educational efforts, some of the core politics behind postcolonial positions are summarized well by Dimitriadis and McCarthy (2001) when they state that ‘The work of the postcolonial imagination subverts extant power relations, questions authority, and destabilizes received traditions of identity’

Knowledge from below

Conclusion