Freire, Conscientization, and Adult Education

Paulo Freire, Brazilian educator, has elaborated an educational theory within the framework of a theory of radical social change and expressed in a literacy training program. A central concept is "conscientization," and development of critical consciousness through a process of reflection and action. Opposed to this "problem-posing" education, committed to personal and social liberation, is a "banking" education whose objective is domesti cation. Although American adult educators acknowledge the need for social change, their chief focus is on individual self-fulfillment. Predominantly a middle-class enterprise, adult education neither shares the perspectives nor serves the interests of "marginal" groups. Although its most obvious application may be with "oppressed" people, conscientization should have applicability to any education which includes as goals both democratization and radical social change.