Learning in the Social Context: Youth as critical thinkers or functionaries in the knowledge economy

Abstract

There is a challenge facing teachers, teacher - educators and educational reformers. Do we continue with a narrow technocratic model with no relation to a progressive ideology and social consciousness (indeed the governing ideology is either conservative or Liberal); do we adopt a modernist model that supports and reinforces existing power structures, discourses, languages; do we use a critical-radical model which has a close relation to a liberation/emancipatory ideology and political action. I argue that in addition to teaching a curriculum (common or contested), schools have responsibilities to produce 'public intellectuals' who are capable of engaging in socially relevant criticism of the problems and issues existing in society. Teachers, instead of viewing themselves as powerless, can in fact play a critical and constructive role in advancing a critical discourse among their colleagues as well as among the young people under their care. To achieve this, they need to permeate the 'social integration discourse' and embrace a 'socially critical approach'. Students will then be able to break free from hierarchically imposed discourses and pedagogies that make them socially-invalid outcasts, and develop critical abilities which enable them to contribute to a vibrant democracy and society.