"Made by people and ... in turn making them"

I really appreciate Paulo Freire's perspective in Pedagogy of the Oppressed. Although I will admit at times, it's a bit abstract and I start to have mini-existential crises about what certain abstract words actually mean. I have had my students read what is Chapter 2 but also known as the essay on "The Banking Concept of Higher Education." With that, I also showed them the video that some of us watched in Dr. Lee's class as well. As a refresher/reference, here it is:

This video connects to the ideas that children are being indoctrinated in order to be cogs in the greater machine that is capitalism. They are not getting an "authentic education" (Freire 66), as they are not learning through "'A' with 'B'" (Freire 66). Moreover, their standardization of behavior, tests, and thinking allows for them to stunt their capacity for critical thinking as well as further oppress them in the system. Also connected to this, Freire declares (and worth quoting in full):

Reflection upon situationally is reflection about the very condition of existence: critical thinking by means of which people discover each other to be 'in a situation.' [...] Humankind emerge from their submersion and acquire the ability to intervene in reality as it is unveiled. Intervention in reality—historical awareness itself—thus represents a step forward from emergence, and results from the conscientização of the situation. Conscientização is the deepening of the attitude of awareness characteristic of all emergence. (82)

So, with that in mind, my questions become: How do we "emerge" from our "submersion" as graduate students? How can we do the same with our students? How can we help develop true and lasting conscientização both inside and outside the classroom? How can we begin to destroy these systems that oppress? How do we move beyond "mere activists" (Freire 99)? How do we destroy and rebuild with everyone else?


P.S. I would like to apologize if any of this is repeated information from what y'all discussed in class on Thursday, as I was away for a conference.

Fish Casts a Wide Net but Catches Very Little

In Stanley Fish's Save the World on Your Own Time, higher education is under attack. It's under attack by neoliberals and neoconservatives alike, all wishing to purpose and indoctrinate their ideologies on their students. What's hard about Stanley Fish's book is that a lot of his arguments follow fairly sound logic, even agreeable logic at times. My purpose in this blog isn't to outline exactly what it is that I agree with or disagree with--that argument would require much more space than I have here--but instead to focus on the last two chapters in his book. One focuses on funding and the other acts as a quick bowtie that includes two rebuttals, or voices from the opposition. Fish casts a wide net with Save the World on Your Own Time and, though he catches very little in my opinion, there are some logically sound arguments I think we should be discussing all day, every day.

I won't try to understand how a university is ran, how money is moved, how it is attained, where it goes, etc., but what I can say is that I agree with Fish on one thing: public perception makes or loses money for a university. There's a strong opinion, specifically from Republicans, that students are wasting their time in college, especially at liberal arts schools, like Ball State. They pander on their media soapboxes, write blogs and articles for Breitbart, and podcasters like Alex Jones work hard to persuade their audiences that higher education is bloated and a money pit for the public.

In chapter six, I felt there might be some solutions to academia's struggle for cash and fighting public perception. Albeit, these are two solutions Fish thinks will never be implemented. We can all agree that his lack of faith might be a ploy to move academics to action, like a truth or dare. One solution is to educate the public on the happenings of a university. This comes with a catch for it would then make colleges and universities "accountable" (159). Educating the public and then hoping for more public funding would indeed make universities more accountable. However, as Fish points out later, academics are too soft. We must stand up to the challenge, play the offensive, and not be afraid to be aggressive. I like this idea. And when it comes to funding and public perception, what better way than to be bold? Educating citizens, particularly ones outside the realm of academia, could then enable universities to justify and boldly ask for more funding, funding that could, in theory, lessen the cost for its students (even though, as Fish points out, not much of student funding goes to the school).

So should we be more aggressive when confronting false public perceptions? I absolutely think so. The people that downplay the importance of a higher education are the same ones who think we all sit around safely in arm chairs typing away on social media, attacking anyone we disagree with, when, in reality, we're in the business of fighting ignorance. Aren't we? Well, I agree with Fish on this one, we're still losing. I want to add again that I know absolutely very little on the administration side of higher ed but, as Fish details, the very same administration I'm criticizing here are the ones that have the power to confront politicians, to treat them as equals, and to show a sort of bipartisan (I don't like that word but it works here) effort to work together. We have a student loan crisis and students are not confident in their decisions to come to college since the real world is telling them to get a real job. We need to work on that.  

Something's Fish-y (Get it?): Funding and Stanley Fish

In Chapter 6 of Save the World on Your Own Time, Fish gets into the funding aspect of higher education. I found his argument to be a complete double standard with what he has already presented as his argument about the role of higher education. When discussing what higher education should do about politicians refusing to support funding, he states that we should be "making them uncomfortable" and "causing them pain" like he did during his time as a dean (which he will NOT let us forget about) in order to get our voices heard and create real change in university funding. We should be fighting back against politicians that make false claims against higher education in hopes of educating the public and securing more money. In this way, does this not go against his argument that educators should simply "do their jobs," which he defines in Chapter 7 as "setting up a course, preparing a syllabus, devising exams, assigning papers or experiments, giving feedback, holding office hours, etc"? (169). He even goes on to specify that "instructors should do neither less nor more," yet now he wants us to fight politicians for funding as well?  We are expected to keep politics out of our instruction while still subjecting ourselves to politics for funding. The initial fight for funding originates with the needs that arise in our classrooms that are then brought to the administration, giving us a direct role. Not to mention that most administrators serve as instructors as well. Are we still therefore not responsible in some way to get funding for our universities? Fish seems to expect us to be political in our professions only when he deems appropriate, like to pander for money and support from politicians who mostly don't care. We are expected to shelter our students from real political arguments, but still take them on ourselves behind the scenes.

Another issue I have with Fish's argument in Chapter 6 is this idea that college tuition is low. He discusses this "pact" between the state and the university where "In return for financial support from taxpayers, universities agreed to keep tuition low and provide access for students from a broad range of economic backgrounds, train graduate and professional students, promote arts and culture, help solve problems in the community, and perform groundbreaking research" (155). He then focuses on how states have broken this pact by not supplying more funding as costs for colleges rise. He does not really address that colleges have broken it as well and how we could fix it together, instead stating that "the universities have pretty much been doing their part." Since when has tuition ever been low enough to truly serve students from a wide range of economic backgrounds? There are still MANY who cannot afford to take on this debt and do not go to college because of it. In comparison to other costs, as Fish breaks down further into the chapter, tuition barely covers the true cost of an education, but it is still by no means low and is still used as a gate-keeping method. Scholarships, grants, funding etc. help, but for Fish to not even discuss how this could all be solved by pushing for the implementation of free college education for all is just frustrating and ignorant. He's obviously not Feeling the Bern.

I Didn't Sign Up For This!

Now, my dream has always been to inspire people to create something.  And my journey through academia has been one where I have consistently redefined my definition of creative writing, but alas, that was what I signed up for. To teach writing, in some compacity, to give the students the tools to creatively think, to critically think and to come to their own views.  In no way, shape, form, or in hell am I trying to save the world. There are times I forget to eat my breakfast and you want me to save the world?  Nope.

Now, something I probably neglect a lot in my thinking is the idea of time.  The mental stress that being in graduate school has often had this weird effect on the time for me. It squishes the joyful moments and likes to stretch out the bad. But I also think the classroom itself has this weird effect on time as well. I think Fish highlights that the college classroom seeks to do a lot of work in very little time. However,  I think something that I seem to be missing from this perspective is how as a graduate student there is little time to myself. I am constantly thinking about how to use the classroom better reinventing ideas and assignments and in-class activities.  Every little moment counts, and it is devoted to my studies and my class. There are times where I am like nope today is a day for me to do nothing, however, the majority of that time is still am thinking about class and my job.  Now that I think more about time as a resource in class, I am found with a bunch of questions, how do I use time more efficiently? are my class activities too lofty and take away valuable time. I know Fish discusses much more then this in is the first chapter but I could help but hone in on my own time thing. Mainly, cause I have none. So How does one get more time?