Paulo Freire’s Ideas And Their Relevance In Western Settings

Advancement of Technology and the Irrelevance of Western and Eastern Divide

Paulo Freire’s ideas are not relevant to community work in ‘western’ settings!’ Discuss.

Paulo Freire has continued to be a great influence to those who seek to formulate some development theories. He was a philosopher from Brazil who drew most of his inspiration from the socially established structure that were around him. However, it would be incorrect to say that his thought cannot be useful to other fields such as education. To conclude that Paulo’s thoughts do not match with the western settings view of community work will be leaving many things hanging and many question unanswered. However, this could be true if the if there is no way the western society joins with the eastern influences. It could also be making some sense if learners who come from different settings in the western culture are not affected linguistically. If there was no abuse and injustices in the western, this conclusion could still be true. This assertion could also be considered if the western setting culture has little or nothing that relates to the environment it evolved from. We will have a chance to see how all this assumption miss their mark hence becoming untrue and misleading at the same time. What does the term “western setting” mean? This would be the most important question to answer in the first place. This term is associated with educational and social advancement as it comes from the view of a developed economy. It is a term that is birthed from viewing a community from a development perspective. The Merriam Webster dictionary refers to this terms as to have a relation to the west or have some characteristics of the west.

With the advancement of technology, the whole issue of western and eastern people has become irrelevant. Gone are the days when these terms were mentioned and what came in the mind of many people was under development in the eastern and vast development in the eastern. Internet has come to make thing easier where people talk all over the globe (Freire, Ramos, Macedo, & Shor, 2018). This has broken the gap that existed long ago and joined these two society into a common village. People have embraced migration in this two regions causing a vast development in the educational sector and the community at large. These makes Paulo’s ideas viable into the west rendering the notion and this assumption irrelevant. There exist a strong connection that can’t be broken even in the education sector. With time, these two regions seems to have resolved their differences to produce a kind of blend in the community and education development. The world politics too have continued to intensify and to become hotter and hotter making these two region to join (Roberts, 2016). This has diversified the relation internationally making the countries that seemed to lag behind in under development to heighten their game too. The eastern countries have embraced modernization and technology. This intertwining makes it impossible to conclude that Freire ideas cannot work in the western settings

Linguistic Diversity in Western Settings

Linguistic is a study that tries to show the relationship that exist in a language and the culture. The reality is that these two cannot be separated at all (Gries, & Divjak, 2012). It would be incorrect to say that the students in the western setting do not get affected linguistically. It is evident that with the current rates of globalization, you do not expect to find people of the same culture in the same place. The world is full of a mixture of diverse cultures. A good case will be The USA. if we were to go back to the history of this country, it would be evident that it has different types of languages. This were highly contributed by the immigration among other factors. It is recorded that by the time this country was atta8ining the independence it had about 0.25 of its total population being comprised of non-English speaking immigrants. By the year 2010, 20.3% of the population of this country were non-English speaking people. This has found its way even into the education sector and has had a great effect on the same. Students in senior schools and universities come from different cultures and uses different languages too. Some of these have gone to these country to further their studies both the fact remains that they come from countries such as Africa, Brazil and many other eastern countries (Ferguson, Heath, & Hwang, 1981).  They experience difficulties in their studies as many of them have testified while sharing their experiences. This fact makes Paulo Freire’s ideas viable even in the western setting rendering the notion that this is impossible irrelevant.  Freire’s ideas are important in the western countries since they will address such problems.

Does the western countries have cases of injustices and oppression? The answer to this question would be a determinant whether Freire’s ideas are viable to the western settings or not. Research shows that these region is not an exemption from oppression either (David, 2011). One of the most rampart kind of oppression in these societies is the gender oppression. This commonly targets women in the society where they are not given equal opportunities with the men. This is commonly seen in the employment sector where women are perceived as not to have the ability to perform some jobs (Freire, 2013). Despite their qualification, this view leaves them outside of the box. Women are seen as inferior object and that they have less or no input even into the development of the county. In addition to all this, women have for a long time been viewed as sexual objects. This is viewing them as objects of fulfilling men sexual desires which has led to violation of their rights even in the working environment. Another form of discrimination is to the young people. These is also very rampart in the western region and requires to be addressed. Many of the structures that are set tend to discriminate the young in diverse ways where they seem to favor the old and them that are learned. They are treated in a manner that is not pleasant despite this category going untouched. This range from deprivation of some basic rights, coercion to some actions of abuse.

Oppression and Injustice in the Western Society

The other type oppression that is common in the western countries is racism and dividing people based on their cultures. These cases have been reported in large numbers especially from African student who have gone to study there. There is a perception that exist that people from the western culture that they are of a superior and them from other places such as Africa are inferior. This has causes many who visits these region to be treated with so much celerity as if they are less human (Pinxten, & Preckler, 2006). They are denied equal opportunities with the residents of these countries. One of the most renowned case that shows the disadvantages of this ill was on the Rwanda genocide in Eastern Africa. In this case one tribe saw itself as mighty than the other and disregarded the other causing a disaster that had not been experienced for a quite a long time in the history (Worell, 2001). All this are indication that this ill needs to9 be addressed with an immediate effect. Freire ideas could therefore be very important in the western setting because they says something concerning all this oppression.

It is evident that the assertion that Freire ideas cannot be helpful to the western setting can only be built on assumption that eventually works not. His ideas are still valid in the western culture most of the things he addresses are still found there in (Eriksen, 2014). If this theory was to be done away with it would be concluding that the countries there are not affected by oppression. This is however a false statement as we have observed above. Doing away with this theory would be an indirect conclusion that the students in the western settings are no affected by any linguistic factors. This study has however made it clear that such cases are found in this region in large numbers. These two regions depict a high level of interconnection making this theory relevant to the western settings. With the globalization and technological advancement, Freire ideas important to the people living on this setting. Some scholars have been seen to say that Freire has much to say only to the Brazilian environment where he came from and to the eastern setting at most (Grinin, Ilyin, & Korotaev, 2015). Research however makes this to be untrue.

 The center of Freire theories are the things that affect a human being in diverse ways such as injustices, lack of proper communication together with the importance of always having a willing heart to learn from others. These effects are evident everywhere in the nowadays societies that are experiencing rapid growth especially in the technological area. This are most commonly the postcolonial nations in the entire globe either in the eastern setting or the western setting. This brings us into a conclusion that all need Freire ideas including them in the western settings. These ideas will make education and community work even more better than their current state.

References

Freire, P., Ramos, M., Macedo, D. & Shor, I. (2018). Pedagogy of the oppressed. New York: Bloomsbury Academic.

Roberts, P. (2016). Paulo Freire in the 21st century : education, dialogue, and transformation. London: Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group.

Irwin, J. (2012). Paulo Freire’s philosophy of education : origins, developments, impacts and legacies. London New York: Continuum International Pub.

McLaren, P. (2016). Life in schools : an introduction to critical pedagogy in the foundations of education. London: Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group.

Worell, J. (2001). Encyclopedia of women and gender : sex similarities and differences and the impact of society on gender. San Diego, Calif: Academic Press.

Gries, S. & Divjak, D. (2012). Frequency effects in language learning and processing. Berlin Boston: De Gruyter Mouton.

Ferguson, C., Heath, S. & Hwang, D. (1981). Language in the USA. Cambridge England New York: Cambridge University Press.

Grinin, L., Ilyin, I. & Korotaev, A. (2015). Globalistics and globalization studies : big history and global history. Volgograd: Uchitel’ Publishing House.

Eriksen, T. (2014). Globalization : the key concepts. London New York: Bloomsbury Academic.

David, E. (2011). Filipino-American postcolonial psychology : oppression, colonial mentality, and decolonization. Bloomington, IN: Authorhouse.

Freire, P. (2013). Education for critical consciousness. London New York: Bloomsbury Academic.

Pinxten, R. & Preckler, E. (2006). Racism in metropolitan areas. New York: Berghahn Books.