Pedagogy Of The Oppressed By Paulo Freire

Teachers are the subject in that they have knowledge that they then infer knowledge onto students. Students, in turn, are objects that receive, memorize, and repeat. The concept of banking prevents students from using their full intellectual capacity.

In “Pedagogy of the Oppressed,” Paulo Freire tells of the complex relationships that contrast narrative versus instructive teachers and compliant versus existentially aware students, in regards to the various methods of instructing and acquiring knowledge. Although this reading is only a particular excerpt from Chapter 2 of Pedagogy of the Oppressed, Freire does an exceptional job by capturing the immense reality of certain educational methods. He explains the “banking” system of teaching, which portrays the teachers as “oppressors” who enforce themselves with an authoritative, commanding position upon the “oppressed” students. By introducing scholars to this “banking” concept of education, the teacher has no regard for the student, inhibiting further questioning and analyses, which only “negates education and knowledge as processes of inquiry.” (Pedagogy) Freire applies negative connotations to help better demonstrate the contents in which these teachers apply towards their students, stressing that this simply is not well defined enough when the time arrives to properly educate the students.

In Plato’s The Allegory of the Cave and Freire’s The“Banking” Concept of Education, the idea of education and restrictions is discussed and pondered on. In The Allegory of the Cave, Plato tells us his ideas and beliefs through a story that involves three prisoners who are chained up in a cave. Their backs are towards the entrance, and they are only exposed to shadows and echoes. When one of the prisoners is released he enters a world filled with confusion and disbelief. In Freire’s The “Banking” Concept of Education, he addresses his notions of today’s education system by setting the scene of students in a classroom who are only given a teacher and the teacher’s knowledge. Although Plato’s The Allegory of the Cave shows that people are restricted in knowing the truth because they are chained up and Freire thinks that students can release themselves from their restrictions by questioning the higher power , I claim that both Plato and Freire make similar arguments because both claim that the reason to why we are restricted is because our perception of truth comes from only one source that is given to us.

Freire talks about the “banking concept of education”, explaining that students in this system are receptacles that are to be filled with the “content of the teachers narration”.(Freire, 1) These receptacles are expected to regurgitate information given in class, on tests, quizzes, and anything that requires an answer that is “word for word” what the teacher says. In a banking classroom, the teacher is the authority and the students are oppressed. Freire writes, “The more students work at storing deposits entrusted to them, the less they develop the critical consciousness which would result from their intervention in the world as transformers of that world.” (Freire, 2).

“Education thus becomes an act of depositing, in which the students are the depositories and the teacher is the depositor. Instead of communicating, the teacher issues communiqués and makes deposits which the students patiently receive, memorize, and repeat. This is the “banking” concept of education, in which the scope of action

When Tarek gets detained by the NYPD in the subway station, and Walter tries to intervene on his behalf, Walter is told that all he can do is make a statement in the station. Walter Vale does everything in his power to help Tarek get free. Even though Walter never had any contact with the immigrant population before, he feels very connected to Tarek over the bond that they share in music, and he helps him despite his ethnicity and race. Walter hires a lawyer to try and get Tarek released, and he visits him frequently. When Walter visits Tarek, he sees how the people are discriminated against and even with all his influence, Walter feels powerless in this situation. Walter was a man of privilege living in America and he never experienced the feeling of such powerlessness in a situation before. This feeling of powerlessness makes Walter fight for what he believes in and he tries everything in his power to help Tarek and set him free.

Education is a topic that can be explored in many ways. Education is looked at in depth by both Richard Rodriguez in his essay, “The Achievement of Desire”, and by Paulo Freire in his essay, “The ‘Banking’ Concept of Education.” After reading both essays, one can make some assumptions about different methods of education and exactly by which method Rodriguez was taught. The types of relationships Rodriguez had with his teachers, family and in life were affected by specific styles of education.

Plato’s “Allegory of The Cave” and Paulo Freire’s “The ‘Banking’ Concept of Education” both contend that education is a process of freeing the chains of deception and false images that make us prisoners in the cave of ignorance. I agree with both Plato and Freire in saying that without education, like the prisoners, our perception of reality is distorted by our lack of knowledge.

Freire has made valid points as to why the banking concept of education can be poor at times. Freire expresses the attitudes and practices of society within the banking concept of education and lists that the teachers know everything and the students know nothing (319). When my teacher messed up halfway through solving the equation and I caught the mistake should I have not said anything because teachers know everything, right? In reality people make mistakes as do teachers.

The greatest thing about humans is that they have the ability to think. Thinking is what differs people from each other and makes people who they are. Freire understands the importance of thinking and wants to start a discussion on the school systems attempt to restrict thinking. This is what he tries to do in his article, something that he does pretty well. He believes the school system solely cares about facts and numbers. The teachers feed their students information and expect them to memorize it, and spit it back on paper. “The reason the banking system continues to thrive is to serve the purpose of the authority, whose peace of mind rests on how well the oppressed fit in the world created by the oppressors, and how little they question it (Freire, page 219). Educators have to understand that the classroom is a leveled playing field, teaching and learning simultaneously through discussions with each other.

In “The Banking Concept of Education”, written by Paulo Freire, the author analyzes the modern day education system by comparing students to “containers” or waste receptacles that are meant to be “filled” by the teacher, or the depositor. The idea that teachers are meant to teach and students are only to listen is the main problem is today’s society. The concept is that a teacher is deemed more reputable “the more she fills the receptacles” while students are better the more they “permit themselves to be filled” (Freire 1). In turn, the “banking” concept of education is born suggesting that education becomes only an act of depositing instead of communication between both students and teachers. When students are denied their creative freedom,

In Pedagogy of the Oppressed Paulo Freire mentions the teacher-student contradiction. The contradiction is when students are controlled by teachers. The teachers have the authority over the students, which puts the students in a position that lacks freedom to experience their identity as humans. This contradiction exists due to the banking concept of education. Freire states that the banking concept encourages the contradiction between teachers and students. The banking concept rejects students as individuals and sees them as objects. As a result of the rejection as individuals, students are unable to speak or act upon their own

In order to make sense of what we are doing in our lives as individuals we must examine the history and institutions of society at large. This is what the sociological imagination does; it helps us define our purpose in society. For example, the education system today is “suffering from narration sickness”(Friere 71) meaning that students passively listen while the teachers narrate content. It is obvious to anyone that has gone through the formal education that there seems to be no real purpose to what we do in schools. There is less learning taking place, but rather depositing. The students are empty vesicles to which the teacher deposits information for the student to receive, memorize and repeat. Paulo Freire calls this type of learning the “banking” concept of education in his book “Pedagogy of the Oppressed”. In this banking system, oppression is a main characteristic of the

The reason for the name “banking” concept is because this concept is similar to the banking system of banks. One of the reason why Freire was against this because he felt, “The teacher present himself to his students as their necessary opposite; by considering their ignorance absolute, he justifies his own experience” (319). Freire talks about the misinterpretation of looking at the education system like a bank, a large depository where students come to withdraw the knowledge. Knowledge is not an (output) that is transferred from the teachers to the students. Students must build knowledge from the knowledge they already (have or own). Teachers must learn how the students understand the (life) and then the teacher will understand how to teach the student. Freire asserts that teaching process cannot be a process of transference of knowledge from the teacher to the

The chapter will provide the rationale for banking and its supervision. A brief mention has been made of the high level segmentation of banking, which will be explored further in the next chapters. The chapter ends with the description of typical financial statements in a bank. The description of the terms in a financial statement have been kept to a level suitable for an introductory course.