Critical Thinking

Critical Theory and Pedagogy

Presentation - 6

Col M. Javeed Khan (R)

Department of EDUCATION 1
Sarhad University of Science and Information Technology, Peshawar
 Course Outline

Detail of Course Outline1

Unit 2: Critical Theory and Pedagogy

• Social Class Theory and Education

Department of EDUCATION 2
Sarhad University of Science and Information Technology, Peshawar
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• Critical thinking is reason oriented, perceptive thinking process,

open minded and strong justifiable arguments.
• It involves rational and insightful thinking centered or based on
making a decision on what to believe or act on.
• It leads the thinker to be very broad minded and receptive to
alternative ways of thought and also very well informed.
• It demands that the thinker examines credibility of information
sources and does not accept things at face value.

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• Why does critical pedagogy matter? Kids matter—that’s

why. Our future matters—that’s why.
• We, in education, are a mirror of society.
• Critical pedagogy challenges our long-held assumptions
and leads us to ask new questions, and the questions we
ask will determine the answers we get.
• Critical pedagogy gives voice to the voiceless; gives
power to the powerless.
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 Critical Theory and Pedagogy
Politics of Education (Marginalization)

• Change is often difficult, and critical pedagogy is all about

change from coercive to collaborative; from transmission
to transformative; from inert to catalytic; from passive to
active.

• Critical pedagogy leads us to advocacy and activism on

behalf of those who are the most vulnerable in
classrooms and in society.
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 Critical Theory and Pedagogy
Politics of Education (Marginalization)

Marginalisation is a global problem that impacts negatively upon

societies across the world.

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 Critical Theory and Pedagogy
Politics of Education (Marginalization)

• Marginalised population face:

• Social exclusion, arising from a lack of equal opportunities

and barriers to learning and participation;

• Social injustice and inequality, seen through the lens of

cultural and social capital;

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 Critical Theory and Pedagogy
Politics of Education (Marginalization)

• Marginalization in education is a form of acute and persistent

disadvantage rooted in underlying social inequalities.
• It represents clear injustice.
• Education is a basic human right.
• It is also a an agent for change in poverty reduction, economic
growth and social mobility.
• Ensuring that all citizens receive a good quality education should be
one of the central priorities of all governments.

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 Critical Theory and Pedagogy
Politics of Education (Marginalization)

• Millions of children are denied human right to education for the

simple reason that their parents cannot afford to keep them in
school.
• Social and cultural barriers to education form another formidable
obstacle.
• In many countries, the education of girls is widely perceived as
being of less value than that of boys, with traditional practices such
as early marriage adding another layer of disadvantage.
• Members of ethnic minorities often face obstacles to equal
opportunity.
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 Critical Theory and Pedagogy
Politics of Education (Marginalization)

• None of these disadvantages operates in isolation.

• Poverty, gender, ethnicity and other characteristics
interact to create overlapping and self-reinforcing layers of
disadvantage that limit opportunity and hamper social
mobility.

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• Poverty and ill health

• Social inequalities.
• Child Labour
• Language and ethnicity
• Poverty
• Stigmatization
• Conflict

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• The inequalities that the marginalized face start in early

childhood and continue through school age years.
• They are deeply engrained and highly resistant to change.
• Yet progress is possible with sustained political
commitment to social justice, equal opportunity and
basic rights.

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• Nor can it ignore the wider consequences of

marginalization in education for social cohesion and
future prosperity.
• There is an urgency of all countries to develop strategies
for more inclusive education linked to wider strategies for
overcoming poverty, social discrimination and extreme
inequality.

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 Social Class Theory and Education

• It explains and evaluates the impact of social class inequalities on

education and its outcomes.
• Sociologists see society as a stratification system that is based on
factors such as; hierarchy of power, privilege and wealth, which
leads into social inequalities. Inequality is about who gets what,
how they get it and why they get it.

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 Social Class Theory and Education

• Social inequality is about class, gender and ethnicity, it is

characterised by the presence of unequal opportunities and rewards
for different social groups.
• There are two main views of social inequalities in education within
sociology; the Functionalists and the Marxists.

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 Social Class Theory and Education

• Karl Marx saw class divisions as the most important source of

social conflict.
• Class is one dimension of the social structure.
• Social status, or "social honor," is another.
• Both are significant contributors of social difference.
• In order to fully understand stratification, we need to be familiar
with a few general concepts:
(i) power
(ii) domination
(iii) communal and societal action 16
 Social Class Theory and Education

Power
• It is defined as the ability of an actor to realize his will in a social
action, even against the will of other actors.
• Power relates to the ability to command resources in a particular
domain.

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 Social Class Theory and Education

Power
• Economic power is the ability to control material resources: to
direct production, to monopolize accumulation, to dictate
consumption.
• Societal power includes economic power, social power, legal or
political power, and so forth.
• Although the control of these domains of resources usually go
together, they represent different mechanisms of power, and are
conceptually distinct.

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 Social Class Theory and Education

Domination

• It is the exercise of authority.

• Possession of power in a sphere results in dominance.
• There are three ideal types of domination: charisma, tradition and
rational-legal. Charismatic domination rests on the character of the
leader.
• Through inspiration, force, communication and leadership, an
individual may succeed in occupying a central role in the planning
and co-ordination of social action.
• Charisma emerges in times of social crisis.
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 Social Class Theory and Education

Domination
• People lose confidence in existing forms of authority, and the
charismatic leader takes advantage of the crisis.
• Because it is a personalized form of authority, it tends to be
unstable.
• It does not normally survive the death of the original leader, and it
often abandons the leader while he or she is alive.
• For charismatic authority to be sustained.
• Traditional authority is based on the belief in the legitimacy of
well-established forms of power.
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 Social Class Theory and Education

Tradition
• Traditional authority is based on loyalty to the leadership.
• Power is exercised by commands issued from the leader or
leadership group.
• Officials are obedient to that person or group, and the lines of
authority are often unstated.
• Traditional authority tends not to distinguish between public and
private affairs.

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 Social Class Theory and Education

Communal & Societal Action

• A communal action is oriented on the basis of a shared belief of
affiliation.
• Actors believe that they belong together in some way.
• Their action are co-ordinated by this sentiment.
• Societal action is oriented to a rational adjustment of interests.
• The motivation is not a sense of shared purpose, but rather, a
recognition of shared interests.

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 Social Class Theory and Education

1. The possession of property defines the main class difference.

• The owners of property have a definite advantage, and in some
cases a monopoly on, action in the market of commodities and,
especially, labor.
• They have privileged access to the sources of wealth creation, by
virtue of ownership and control of the markets.
• The subdivision among property owners based on the means of
their wealth creation.
• Entrepreneurs use wealth in commercial ventures.
• Rentiers profit by interest on their property, through investments or
rent of land.

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 Social Class Theory and Education

2. Both forms of ownership yield advantages resulting from the

ability to convert property to money.
• The property-less class is defined by the kinds of services
individual workers provide in the labor market.
• Workers are classified as skilled, semi-skilled and unskilled.
• These distinctions are based on the value of different kinds of
labor.
• Different wages result in different qualities in terms of the standard
of living.

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 Social Class Theory and Education

3. Class interests do not lead to uniformity in social action.

• Communal or societal action may develop from a common class
situation in certain conditions.

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The End

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