Paulo Freire

1. Paulo Freire

2. BIOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION Freire was born September 19, 1921 to a middle class family in Recife, Brazil Freire became familiar with poverty and hunger during the 1929 Great Depression. These experiences, though brief, would shape his concerns for the poor and would help to construct his particular educational viewpoint. Freire enrolled at Law School at the University of Recife in 1943. He also studied philosophy, more specifically phenomenology, and the psychology of language. Although admitted to the legal bar, he never actually practiced law but instead worked as a teacher in secondary schools teaching Portuguese. In 1944, he married Elza Maia Costa de Oliveira, a fellow teacher. The two worked together for the rest of their lives and had five children. In 1946, Freire was appointed Director of the Department of Education and Culture of the Social Service in the State of Pernambuco, the Brazilian state of which Recife is the capital In 1961, he was appointed director of the Department of Cultural Extension of Recife University, and in 1962 he had the first opportunity for significant application of his theories, when 300 sugarcane workers were taught to read and write in just 45 days. In 1964, a military coup put an end to that effort. Freire was imprisoned as a traitor for 70 days. In 1967, Freire published his first book, Education as the Practice of Freedom. He followed this with his most famous book, Pedagogy of the Oppressed, first published in Portuguese in 1968. After a year in Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA, Freire moved to Geneva, Switzerland to work as a special education advisor to the World Council of Churches. During this time Freire acted as an advisor on education reform in former Portuguese colonies in Africa, particularly Guinea Bissau and Mozambique. In 1979, he was able to return to Brazil, and moved back in 1980. Freire joined the Workers' Party(PT) in the city of São Paulo, and acted as a supervisor for its adult literacy project from 1980 to 1986. When the PT prevailed in the municipal elections in 1988, Freire was appointed Secretary of Education for São Paulo. In 1986, his wife Elza died. Freire married Maria AraújoFreire, who continues with her own educational work. Freire died of heart failure on May 2, 1997.

3. CONTRIBUTIONS He wrote the Pedagogy of the Oppressed which is currently one of the most quoted educational texts Was the first Director of the Department of Cultural Extension of the University of Recife (1961-1964) He is most well known for concepts such as:1) "Banking" Education, in which passive learners have pre-selected knowledge deposited in their minds; 2) "Conscientization", a process by which the learner advances towards critical consciousness;3) the "Culture of Silence", in which dominated individuals lose the means by which to critically respond to the culture that is forced on them by a dominant culture. Other important concepts include: "Dialectic", "Empowerment", "Generative Themes/Words", "Humanization", "Liberatory Education", "Mystification", "Praxis", " Problematization", and "Transformation of the World." Came up with an educational theory that consisted of 8 parts: Theory of Value, Theory of Knowledge, Theory of Human Nature, Theory of Learning, Theory of Transmission, Theory of Society, Theory of Opportunity, and Theory of Consesus