Great Throughts Treasury

"Revolution is born as a social entity within the oppressor society."

"Right thinking is right doing."

"The basic thing, starting from the initial perception of these nuclei of contradictions (which include the principal contradiction of society as a larger epochal unit) is to study the inhabitants' awareness of these contradictions."

"The behavior and reactions of the oppressed, which lead the oppressor to practice cultural invasion, should evoke from the revolutionary a different theory of action. What distinguishes revolutionary leaders from the dominant elite is not only their objectives, but their procedures."

"The behavior of the oppressed is a prescribed behavior, following as it does the guidelines of the oppressor."

"Some may think that to affirm dialogue--the encounter of women and men in the world in order to transform the world--is naively and subjectively idealistic. There is nothing, however, more real or concrete than people in the world and with the world, than humans with other humans."

"Someone who cannot acknowledge himself to be as mortal as everyone else still has a long way to go before he can reach the point of encounter."

"Scientific and humanist revolutionary leaders, on the other hand, cannot believe in the myth of the ignorance of the people."

"Teacher preparation should go beyond the technical preparation of teachers and be rooted in the ethical formation both of selves and of history."

"Sometimes a simple, almost insignificant gesture on the part of a teacher can have a profound formative effect on the life of a student."

"Teachers who do not take their own education seriously, who do not study, who make little effort to keep abreast of events have no moral authority to coordinate the activities of the classroom."

"The atmosphere of the home is prolonged in school, where students soon discover that (as in the home) in order to achieve some satisfaction they must adapt to the precepts which have been set from above. One of these precepts is not to think."

"The correct method lies in dialogue. The conviction of the oppressed that they must fight in their liberation is not a gift bestowed by the revolutionary leadership, but the result of their own conscience."

"The culture of the dominant class hinders the affirmation of men as beings of decision."

"The dialogical character of education as the practice of freedom does not begin when the teacher-student meets with the students-teachers in pedagogical situation, but rather when the former first asks herself or himself what she or he will dialogue with the latter about."

"The educator with a democratic vision or posture cannot avoid in his teaching praxis insisting on the critical capacity, curiosity, and autonomy of the learner."

"The exercise of my teaching activity does not leave me untouched. No more than I could be out in the rain with no protection and expect not to get wet."

"The former oppressors do not feel liberated. On the contrary, they genuinely consider themselves to be oppressed."

"The gesture of the teacher affirmed in me a self-confidence that obviously still had much room to grow, but it inspired in me a belief that I too had value and could work and produce results?results that clearly had their limits but that were a demonstration of my capacity, which up until that moment I would have been inclined to hide or not fully believe in."

"The exercise of the art and practice of teaching (a specifically human art), is of itself profoundly formational and, for that reason, ethical. True, those who exercise this art and practice do not have to be saints or angels. But they ought to have integrity and a clear sense of what is right and just."

"The good teacher is the one who manages to draw the student into the intimacy of his or her thought process while speaking. The class then becomes a challenge and not simply a nest where people gather. In the environment of challenge, the students become tired but they do not fall asleep. They get tired because they accompany the comings and goings of the teacher's thought and open their eyes in wonder at his or her pauses, doubts, uncertainties."

"The humanist revolutionary educator's efforts must be imbued with a profound trust in people and their creative power."

"The more we sit in front of [the television] . . . the more we risk being confused about the real nature of the facts."

"The oppressed want at any cost to resemble the oppressors."

"The object of a dialogical-libertarian action is not to 'dislodge' the oppressed from a mythological reality in order to 'bind' them to another reality. On the contrary, the object of dialogical action is to make it possible for the oppressed, by perceiving their adhesion, to opt to transform an unjust reality."

"The oppressed find in the oppressors their model of 'manhood.'"

"the oppressed must not in seeking to regain their humanity (which is a way to create it), become in turn oppressors of the oppressors, but rather restorers of the humanity of both."

"The more educators and the people investigate the people's thinking, and are thus jointly educated, the more they continue to investigate."

"The more I give of myself to the experience of living with what is different without fear and without prejudice, the more I come to know the self I am shaping and that is being shaped as I travel the road of life."

"The oppressor, who is himself dehumanized because he dehumanizes others, is unable to lead this struggle."

"The oppressed, having internalized the image of the oppressor and adopted his guidelines, are fearful of freedom."

"The oppressed, instead of striving for liberation, tend themselves to become oppressors."

"The participants begin to realize that if their analysis of the situation goes any deeper they will either have to divest themselves of their myths, or reaffirm them. Divesting themselves of and renouncing their myths represents, at that moment, an act of self-violence. On the other hand, to reaffirm those myths is to reveal themselves."

"The oppressors develop a series of methods precluding any presentation of the world as a problem and showing it rather as a fixed entity, as something given--something to which people, as mere spectators, must adapt."

"The perception the student has of my teaching is not exclusively the result of how I act but also of how the student understands my action."

"The revolutionary's role is to liberate, and to be liberated, with the people--not to win them over."

"The person who thinks "correctly," even if at times she/he thinks wrongly, is the only capable of teaching "correct" thinking. For one of the necessary requirements for correct thinking is a capacity for not being overly convinced of one's own certitudes."

"The role of the educator is one of a tranquil possession of certitude in regard to the teaching not only of contents but also of "correct thinking.""

"The road to revolution involves openness to the people, not imperviousness to them; it involves communion with the people, not mistrust."

"The struggle to bring dignity to the practice of teaching is as much a part of the activity of teaching as is the respect that the teacher should have for the identity of the student, for the student himself or herself, and his or her right to be."

"The task of revolutionary leaders is to pose as problems not only this myth, but all the other myths used by the oppressor elites to oppress."

"The unfinished character of human beings and the transformational character of reality necessitate that education be an ongoing activity."

"The thematics which have come from the people return to them--not as contents to be deposited, but as problems to be solved."

"The teacher who thinks critically cannot afford to imagine that the course or seminar that she/he is conducting is going to transform the whole country."

"The trust of the people in the leaders reflects the confidence of the leaders in the people."

"There is no such thing as teaching without research and research without teaching."

"The teacher presents the material to the students for their consideration, and re-considers her earlier considerations as the students express their own."

"Thematic investigation thus becomes a common striving towards awareness of reality and towards self-awareness, which makes this investigation a starting point for the educational process or for cultural action of a liberating character."

"There are innumerable well-intentioned bank-clerk teachers who do not realize that they are serving only to dehumanize."

"There is no valid teaching from which there does not emerge something learned and through which the learner does not become capable of recreating and remaking what has been taught."