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Rampton, B. (1995). Crossings: Language and ethnicity among adolescents. London:Longman.

Selinker, L. (1972). Interlanguage. International Review of Applied Linguistics, 105,209–231.

Thorne, S. (1999a, March). An activity theory analysis of foreign language electronicdiscourse. Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Association ofApplied Linguistics, Stamford, CT.

Thorne, S. (1999b). The sociocultural organization of foreign language electronic discourse.Doctoral dissertation in progress, University of California, Berkeley.

Valdman, A. (1992). Authenticity, variation, and communication in the foreignlanguage classroom. In C. Kramsch & S. McConnell-Ginet (Eds.), Text and context:Cross-disciplinary perspectives on language study (pp. 79–97). Lexington, MA: D. C.Heath.

van Lier, L. (in press). From input to affordance: Social-interactive learning from anecological perspective. In J. Lantolf (Ed.), Sociocultural theory and second languagelearning. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Vygotsky, L. (1978). Mind in society. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Wertsch, J. (1991). Voices of the mind. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

Putting Critical Pedagogy in Its Place:A Personal Account

BILL JOHNSTONUniversity of Minnesota

■ In this account, I offer a personal reflection on the role criticalpedagogy has played in my own professional development. Although thisrole has been a profound and lasting one, I explain here why I personallyhave resisted embracing critical pedagogy unreservedly.

Since I first read Freire’s (1972) Pedagogy of the Oppressed and Giroux’s(1988) Teachers as Intellectuals and subsequently began to explore theliterature of critical pedagogy, the ideas and practices this literatureoffers have had a profound effect on virtually every aspect of myteaching. At one level this influence has been general and has affectedmy whole approach to the teaching profession. More than anything else,perhaps, critical pedagogy offers a way of combining a trenchant critiqueof previously unquestioned practices in education with concrete ways ofintroducing change—that is, with a belief in the transformative power ofthe individual teacher.

It was critical pedagogy that helped me understand that all teachingmethods are ideological in nature (Benesch, 1993; Pennycook, 1989)and that differential power relations and political interests are crucial inunderstanding the global spread of English teaching (Pennycook, 1994;Phillipson, 1992; Tollefson, 1995). The exploration of these ideas forms

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a vital element in the methods courses that I teach: Along with discus-sions of methods and techniques in teaching, my students and I considerthe political dimensions of teaching in second and foreign languagecontexts and the implications of the globalization of English—as well asour own involvement in this process.

Also in this category is the acceptability of—indeed, the necessityfor—a politically committed pedagogy. As a politically engaged indi-vidual, I had always found myself wondering about the extent to whichmy political beliefs belonged in the classroom. Through critical peda-gogy I came to understand that a teacher must necessarily be a politicalcreature and that, without proselytizing, it is possible to integrate one’spersonal political beliefs into one’s pedagogy and, through teachereducation, to encourage and enable other teachers to do the same.

Another, more local set of influences directly affects my day-to-daypractice both as an ESL/EFL teacher and as a teacher educator: theideological implications of English-only in the classroom, for instance(Auerbach, 1993), or the dialogical nature of teaching and learning(Freire, 1972), which in my case informs my whole approach to teachereducation, including my use of dialogue journals, process writing, andnegotiated syllabuses ( Johnston, 1998). This influence has perhaps beenall the more profound because, as Auerbach (1998) and others havepointed out, critical pedagogy does not in itself constitute a method; themicrolevel pedagogical implications of a critical stance often have to beworked through by the individual teacher, as was the case with myexploration of dialogue in my own classroom ( Johnston, in press-b).

The influence of critical pedagogy, then, has been central in mydevelopment as a teacher and teacher educator. At the same time,however, I have been troubled by often only semirealized doubts aboutthis approach, doubts that have prevented me from labeling what I do ascritical pedagogy and from identifying myself as a critical pedagogist. Myprincipal purpose in writing this account is to work through some of myobjections and reservations regarding critical pedagogy. I hope here totread a fine line between personal beliefs and the TESOL field’s shareddiscourse on language teaching and learning—that is, between whatHargreaves and Fullan (1992) call voice and vision.

LIMITATIONS AND RESERVATIONS

Critical approaches to critical pedagogy are not new. Ellsworth (1989)objected to critical pedagogy on its own terms: She claimed that it isinherently undemocratic and not at all liberating, as it claims to be. Herseminal and much-cited critique of the oppressive myths of critical peda-gogy was followed by numerous other less-than-favorable analyses. Gore(1992, 1993), for example, accuses critical pedagogists of a lack of

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reflexivity, that is, an inability to take critical purchase on their own work:“In his insistence that teachers are intellectuals who need to be consciousof the contradictory efforts of their work, it seems Giroux has ignoredthe possibility that his own position as an intellectual is also vulnerable asa ‘regime of truth’” (1992, p. 62). Gore also objects to the way thatcritical pedagogy’s “claims to empowerment attribute extraordinaryabilities to the teacher” (p. 57), a point echoed by Janangelo (1993) inhis critique of the unreasonable expectations critical pedagogy places onteachers. The passivity on the part of students implicit in this view andthe one-way relationship it suggests have in turn been attacked by Lather(1992), who points out that “too often, such pedagogies have failed toprobe the degree to which ‘empowerment’ becomes something done‘by’ liberated pedagogists ‘to’ or ‘for’ the as-yet-unliberated” (p. 122). Asa feminist, Lather also excoriates critical pedagogy as “largely maleinscribed” and “a site men have constructed to serve themselves” (p.129). Lastly, Usher and Edwards (1994) raise a number of objections tocritical pedagogy, including its “curious silence on concrete educationalpractices” (p. 218), that is, its failure to make explicit connectionsbetween its abstract philosophical position and what does or should goon in actual classroom teaching.

These analyses have helped me pinpoint some aspects of my ownresistance to critical pedagogy. Yet when I analyze this resistance, myreservations turn out to be somewhat different. I find that my principalobjections reside at the level of what Whitehead (1993) calls livingeducational theory—that is, the set of values and beliefs that are acombination of ideas and practice and that have arisen more or lessorganically at the meeting point of my professional and intellectualdevelopment. It is at this level that I will address critical pedagogy: Thatis, I see critical pedagogy as representing a living contradiction (White-head, 1993) in my own work, and in this account I explore and perhapsto some extent resolve that contradiction. I focus on four aspects ofcritical pedagogy that are of concern to me: (a) the nature of power inclassrooms, (b) the view of education as primarily political in nature,(c)␣ the positioning of critical pedagogy with relation to the postmodern,and (d) the language used by critical pedagogists.

The Nature of Power in Classrooms

A great deal of work in critical pedagogy has focused on the disem-powered status of learners and has explored ways in which teachers canempower their students (Kreisberg, 1992; Shor, 1996). Indeed, the wordempowerment has become something of a shibboleth amongst criticalpedagogists. However, both my own experience working primarily withadults of many different backgrounds in various national contexts and

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the empirical educational research literature I have read suggest stronglythat unequal power relations are a permanent feature of educationalsettings. Most convincing for me has been the work of Gore (e.g., 1998),who has conducted fine-grained analyses of power relations in variouseducational sites, including those where a so-called radical approachsuch as critical pedagogy is taken. Gore has based her analysis on atheoretical framework drawn from Foucault’s (1977, 1980) conceptionof power. She has convincingly demonstrated the operation of powerrelations in all sites, including the supposedly radical ones. Her conclu-sion is that “no site was free of power relations and no site ‘escaped’ theuse of techniques of power” (p. 245).

This conclusion strongly suggests real limits on the possibilities forempowerment in the classroom. My own belief is that, although studentscan be more or less empowered—for example, they can be given moreresponsibility for their own learning, they can take part in the design oftheir own courses, and they can be given more meaningful and lesscompetitive assignments—teachers still retain authority in the classroom(Oyler, 1996). I concur with Gore’s (1998) conclusion that it is moreinteresting and useful to work on putting this power to good use than toimagine it can be removed (pp. 247–249).1

Furthermore, part of the problem here seems to be an overlysimplistic understanding of the nature of power itself. As Gore (1992)points out in her earlier work, critical pedagogists “conceive of power asproperty, something the teacher has and can give to the students” (p.57). She argues for a more complex, Foucaultian conception of power as“something that circulates” (p. 58) and thus can be exercised by studentsas well as teachers, a point reinforced by Usher and Edwards (1994, p.219). This, too, accords with my own experience, in which power is notshared like a commodity so much as negotiated as a process.

The View of Education as Primarily Political

My central objection to critical pedagogy, however, is not that it is initself mistaken but that it fails to capture the heart of what teaching is allabout. Critical pedagogy is “fundamentally concerned with the centralityof politics and power in our understanding of how schools work”(McLaren, 1989, p. 159). As I made clear above, I agree wholeheartedlywith the claim that schooling is political in nature, and I believe that it is

1 Incidentally, Freire himself believed that teacher authority was a constant:For me the question is not for the teacher to have less and less authority. The issue isthat the democratic teacher never, never transforms authority into authoritarianism.He or she can never stop being an authority or having authority [italics added]. Withoutauthority it is very difficult for the liberties of students to be shaped. (Shor & Freire,1987, p. 91, cited in Oyler, 1996, p. 25)

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crucial to understand the workings of power in educational systems andcontexts. However, I also believe very firmly that in essence teaching isnot primarily about power or politics. My own view is that fundamentallyteaching is about the moral relation between teacher and students; thatis, the essence of teaching is moral, not political, in nature ( Jackson,Boostrom, & Hansen, 1993; Johnston, Juhász, Marken, & Ruiz, 1998;Noblit & Dempsey, 1993; Noddings, 1984). I believe that althoughquestions of power and culture and their attendant classifications(gender, race, sexual orientation) are of vital importance in understand-ing the processes of education, these can only be properly understoodthrough the lens of moral interaction—that is, of the juxtaposition ofvalues. What distinguishes humans and their social interactions are notprimarily economic or political relations but the questions of good andbad, right or wrong, which, though they include matters of power, cannever be reduced to these alone. As Noddings (1984) says, the moralrelation is “ontologically basic” (p. 3). It is my belief that criticalpedagogy, though it frequently acknowledges the moral and ethical di-mension of teaching, fails to perceive its centrality in the educationalenterprise, instead, as the above quotation of McLaren (1989) demon-strates, placing political relations at the center of teaching and learning.Such a position, in my view, falsifies the essential nature of education.

The Positioning of Critical Pedagogy WithRelation to the Postmodern

My third objection is more philosophical, though it also has verytangible real-world implications. Many critical pedagogists embrace theterm postmodern and indeed claim that critical pedagogy is an inherentlypostmodern enterprise (Aronowitz & Giroux, 1990). It is my view,however, that this claim is based on a partial and faulted (or perhapsmisleadingly selective) understanding of what is meant by the postmoderncondition and that many aspects of postmodern analysis in fact presentphilosophical problems for critical pedagogy. A central confusion is thefailure to distinguish between postmodernism and postmodernity( Johnston, in press-a; Lyon, 1994): that is, between postmodern ascritique and postmodern as description (Brock, 1997, p. 5). Criticalpedagogists (e.g., Cherryholmes, 1988) have favored the former in itscelebration of difference, its challenging of hegemonies, and its questfor alternative forms of expression.

The latter, however—postmodernity, or the description of a socialcondition—poses a challenge. A postmodern reading of society seesfragmentation and a descent into relativism of all kinds (political andsocial as well as cultural). Above all, it rejects the possibility of trueprogress: Jameson (1991), for example, describes postmodern architecture

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as comprising “a random cannibalization of all the styles of the past” (p.18), and similar trends can be identified in domains such as education.This reading lies utterly counter to the goals of critical pedagogy, which,contrary to the opinion of Kanpol (1994) and others, are irrevocablygrounded in a teleological vision of history-as-(potential at least)-progress,which in turn is rooted in modernism (Usher & Edwards, 1994, p. 218).One cannot have the modernist cake of social progress and eat it with apostmodern fork.

My own research into the lives of EFL and ESL teachers (e.g.,Johnston, in press-a) and the personal stories of colleagues in manycountries have led me to believe that this profession is quintessentiallypostmodern in nature (in the second sense outlined above). At least as itstands at present, it is an occupation in which careers develop sidewaysand there is a lack of a “grand narrative” of the ESL/EFL teacher’scareer; in which transnational encounters occur and transnationalidentities develop with a lack of teleological logic; and in which method-ological change for change’s sake is the name of the game (witness thenever-ending torrent of “the latest” textbooks). Under such conditions—those of postmodernity as description—it becomes particularly hard tobelieve in the rationalist account of progress touted by and for criticalpedagogy.2

The Language Used by Critical Pedagogists

My last objection to the field of critical pedagogy concerns not itssubstantive ideas so much as the forms in which its proponents choose toexpress them. Gore (1992, 1993) has analyzed the discourse of criticalpedagogy as a regime of truth, in the process, as mentioned above,pointing out the lack of reflexivity it displays. My own objections here aremore personal and direct. Quite simply, I find myself put off by thelanguage used by critical pedagogists. To use their own terminology, Ifind myself excluded. This point in itself is not a new: Many writers in thefield have felt the need to defend their use of a specialized, academic-sounding discourse (e.g., Kanpol, 1994; Macedo, 1994). Kanpol, forexample, claims that it would be patronizing to avoid such languagewhen writing for teachers.

However, as a consumer of these writings I remain unconvinced. Itseems to me that a distinction can be drawn between a patronizing use oflanguage and obscurantism and that writing plainly and clearly is not thesame as writing down to one’s audience. Furthermore, whereas writers

2 In fact, I believe postmodernity presents other problems that critical pedagogy has notproperly addressed, such as the centrality of consumption and the commodification of culture;these phenomena, and their relation to the claims of critical pedagogy and to the practice ofESL/EFL, deserve separate treatment elsewhere.

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such as Macedo (1994) claim that ordinary teachers understand thewritings of critical pedagogists, citing examples, I can also produceexamples of my own of teachers who find the same writings exclusionaryand off-putting—though not necessarily difficult.

Obscurantism, however—Giroux’s (1988) “new discourse” (p. 3)—isonly part of the problem. It seems to me that critical pedagogists havealso commandeered a certain political vocabulary that gives them claimto the moral high ground. They borrow extensively from the language ofproletarian protest, talking frequently of struggle, emancipation, andliberation. Their favorite adjectives are revolutionary and radical. Theirmetaphoric use of such terms seems intended to make readers feel likeromantic rebels.

I object to such language, and not because I am anti–working class oranti-Marxist (in fact, unlike many critical pedagogists, I can claim both tohave working-class origins and to have lived for 6 years under a real-lifesoi-disant Marxist system, in Poland). I object because in academic andeducational circles in the United States it is mere posturing. I personallydo not feel the need to dress up what I do in pseudorevolutionarybluster. There is something more than faintly absurd about the phrasetenured radical (Nelson, 1997), and I do not wish to be associated withthose who label themselves thus, even if it is partly in jest. In addition, Iagree with Janangelo (1993), who argues that this hyperbolic use oflanguage and the “tropes of martyrdom and selflessness” (p. 149) thatform part of it are in fact dangerous for the well-being of teachersthemselves.

In sum, I feel that critical pedagogy would do well to exercisemoderation in its use of language. There will be no revolution—at leastnot one led by university professors; and I believe critical pedagogywould find a broader hearing if it did not require its adherents to dressthemselves up linguistically as Che Guevara. In this case, it seems as if themedium is at odds with the message.

A PLACE FOR CRITICAL PEDAGOGY

I conclude, first, by reiterating what I said at the beginning of thisaccount: Critical pedagogy has been and will continue to be a majorinfluence on my teaching practice and my teaching philosophy. Theobjections I have expressed here by and large address critical pedagogy’sambitions (or perhaps pretensions) rather than its substantive contribu-tion to educational thinking and practice. Above all, I see criticalpedagogy as offering a way of conceptualizing the crucial question ofpower in classrooms and educational systems at both a local and asystemic level and of offering a philosophical justification for a politicallycommitted pedagogy.

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Yet I believe that, in essence, people are not definable as politicalcreatures alone, just as they are not definable as individual agents alone.Critical pedagogy has given me insights into and understandings of theeducational process that I would not otherwise have had, but its truecontribution can be grasped only when it is seen as part of a biggerpicture. The political dimension of teaching is crucial, but it is notenough to capture the complex essence of teaching, especially of ESL/EFL teaching in the postmodern world.

THE AUTHOR

Bill Johnston is an assistant professor of ESL at the University of Minnesota. Hisresearch interests include teacher life stories and the moral dimension of languageteaching. He has published widely in the areas of language teaching and teacherdevelopment.

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Aronowitz, S., & Giroux, H. A. (1990). Postmodern education: Politics, culture, and socialcriticism. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.

Auerbach, E. R. (1993). Reexamining English only in the ESL classroom. TESOLQuarterly, 27, 9–32.

Auerbach, E. R. (1998, March). Freire tales and gold mines: Problems in Freire-inspiredteacher education. Paper presented at the 32nd Annual TESOL Convention, Seattle,WA.

Benesch, S. (1993). ESL, ideology, and the politics of pragmatism. TESOL Quarterly,27, 705–717.

Brock, A. A. (1997). I’m only bleeding: Education as the practice of social violence againstchildren. New York: Peter Lang.

Cherryholmes, C. H. (1988). Power and criticism: Poststructural investigations in educa-tion. New York: Teachers College Press.

Ellsworth, M. (1989). Why doesn’t this feel empowering? Working through therepressive myths of critical pedagogy. Harvard Educational Review, 59, 297–324.

Foucault, M. (1977). Discipline and punish: The birth of the prison (A. M. SheridanSmith, Trans.). New York: Pantheon Books.

Foucault, M. (1980). Power/knowledge: Selected interviews and other writings of MichelFoucault (C. Gordon, Ed.). Brighton, England: Harvester.

Freire, P. (1972). Pedagogy of the oppressed (M. B. Ramos, Trans.). London: PenguinBooks.

Giroux, H. A. (1988). Teachers as intellectuals: Towards a critical pedagogy of learning.Granby, MA: Bergin & Garvey.

Gore, J. M. (1992). What we can do for you! What can “we” do for “you”? Strugglingover empowerment in critical and feminist pedagogy. In C. Luke & J. M. Gore(Eds.), Feminisms and critical pedagogy (pp. 54–73). New York: Routledge.

Gore, J. M. (1993). The struggle for pedagogies: Critical and feminist discourses as regimes oftruth. New York: Routledge.

Gore, J. M. (1998). Disciplining bodies: On the continuity of power relations inpedagogy. In T. S. Popkewitz & M. Brennan (Eds.), Foucault’s challenge: Discourse,knowledge, and power in education (pp. 231–251). New York: Teachers College Press.

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Hargreaves, A., & Fullan, M. G. (1992). Introduction. In A. Hargreaves & M. G.Fullan (Eds.), Understanding teacher development (pp. 1–19). London: Cassell.

Jackson, P. W., Boostrom, R. E., & Hansen, D. T. (1993). The moral life of schools. SanFrancisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Jameson, F. (1991). Postmodernism, or the cultural logic of late capitalism. Durham, NC:Duke University Press.

Janangelo, J. (1993). To serve, with love: Liberation theory and the mystification ofteaching. In P. Kahaney, L. A. M. Perry, & J. Janangelo (Eds.), Theoretical andcritical perspectives on teacher change (pp. 134–150). Norwood, NJ: Ablex.

Johnston, B. (1998, March). Towards a Freirean dialogics in language teacher education.Paper presented at the 32nd Annual TESOL Convention, Seattle, WA.

Johnston, B. (in press-a). The expatriate teacher as postmodern paladin. Research inthe Teaching of English.

Johnston, B. (in press-b). Investigating dialogue in language teacher education: Theteacher educator as learner. In K. E. Johnson (Ed.), Case studies in teacher education.Alexandria, VA: TESOL.

Johnston, B., Juhász, A., Marken, J., & Ruiz, B. R. (1998). The ESL teacher as moralagent. Research in the Teaching of English, 32, 161–181.

Kanpol, B. (1994). Critical pedagogy: An introduction. Westport, CT: Bergin & Garvey.Kreisberg, S. (1992). Transforming power: Domination, empowerment, and education.

Albany, NY: SUNY Press.Lather, P. (1992). Post-critical pedagogies: A feminist reading. In C. Luke & J. M.

Gore (Eds.), Feminisms and critical pedagogy (pp. 120–137). New York: Routledge.Lyon, D. (1994). Postmodernity. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.Macedo, D. P. (1994). Literacies of power: What Americans are not allowed to know.

Boulder, CO: Westview Press.McLaren, P. (1989). Life in schools: An introduction to critical pedagogy in the foundations

of education. New York: Longman.Nelson, C. (1997). Manifesto of a tenured radical. New York: New York University Press.Noblit, G. W., & Dempsey, V. O. (1993). The social construction of virtue: The moral life

of schools. Albany, NY: SUNY Press.Noddings, N. (1984). Caring: A feminine approach to ethics and moral education.

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politics of language teaching. TESOL Quarterly, 23, 589–618.Pennycook, A. (1994). The cultural politics of English as an international language.

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Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Tollefson, J. W. (1995). Power and inequality in language education. Cambridge:

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