Review: 'Pedagogy of Resistance: Against Manufactured Ignorance' by Henry A. Giroux

I really should have read this book when it first came out because now, four years later, education and academia are even more under threat and Trump is back. That's on me though, and Giroux's book is an excellent call to action for everyone. Thanks to Bloomsbury Academic and NetGalley for providing me with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. My sincere apologies for the delay in reviewing.

Pub. Date: 21 April 2022
Publisher: Bloomsbury Academic

Henry A. Giroux argues that education holds a crucial role in shaping politics at a time when ignorance, lies and fake news have empowered right-wing groups and created deep divisions in society. Education, with its increasingly corporate and conservative-based technologies, is partly responsible for creating these division. It contributes to the pitting of people against each other through the lens of class, race, and any other differences that don't embrace White nationalism. Giroux's analysis ranges from the pandemic and the inequality it has revealed, to the rise of Trumpism and its afterlife, and to the work of Paulo Freire and how his book Pedagogy of Hope can guide us in these dark times and help us produce critical and informed citizens. He argues that underlying the current climate of inequity, isolation, and social atomization (all exacerbated by the pandemic) is a crisis of education. Out of this comes the need for a pedagogy of resistance that is accessible to everyone, built around a vision of hope for an alternative society rooted in the ideals of justice, equality, and freedom.

I work in academia, which means that education is a big part, if not the biggest part, of my job. With everything happening in the world, I think it is more important than ever that as many people as possible have access to a rigorous education which fosters both critical thinking and an active engagement with the world around us. I myself benefitted immensely from teachers and educational systems that forced me to confront difficult things, to try and think beyond what was currently established, and to always connect what I was learning to my own lived experience.. I try to do this for my students as well, although I'll let them be the judge of how well it works. Academia currently is under attack, especially in the US but also in the UK and parts of Europe. These attacks are not just matters of policy but can become deeply personal and dangerous, as the recent sad events around Prof. Dr. Arday in the UK showed us. Universities have to be independent from political pressure in order to provide a space for students to express their thoughts freely and develop their own philosophies of knowledge. For me, Pedagogy of Resistance was a very useful book to think with, weighing up my own experiences of education with my own current role in it and my hopes for how it might develop in the future.

Giroux's Pedagogy of Resistance is split into three parts. The first, 'The Crisis of Democracy and the Deep Roots of Racial Terror' dives deeply into the state the United States found itself in 2021 and 2022. This part is deeply marked by the Covid-19 pandemic and, of course, by the first presidency of Donald J. Trump. What I wouldn't give to hear Giroux's thoughts on the second term we're currently finding ourselves in! The second part, 'The Crisis of Pedagogy' focuses on the attacks aimed against educational institutions in the US, for example political attacks against Critical Race Theory and a desire for a patriotic education. He terms this "apartheid pedagogy", which is focused on maintaining and strengthening current power structures while ignoring the urgency of issues around race/ethnicity, class, gender, climate change, and more. In the final part, 'From Hope to Resistance in the Age of Plagues', Giroux explores Paulo Freire's Pedagogy of Hope and I really liked this emphasis on the need for hope in the face of neoliberalism's and capitalism's doom narrative. I will say the book is entirely focused on the US and its cultural narratives, which means that not all of its points or lessons will be equally applicable to the rest of the world. However, its main argument, that education has always been political and takes place outside of the classroom too, is evergreen and urgently needed.

I give this book...

4 Universes!

Pedagogy of Resistance is a useful read for anyone involved in education in some way, which is probably most of us. Despite its US-focus, the book gave me a lot to think about which I will definitely take into my further work.