Redesigning the Popular Education Class

As some of you know, i've been teaching a popular education class at the Faculty of Environmental Studies for the past several years. In 2001 and 2002 i co-taught it with Matt Adams of the Catalyst Centre. I then co-taught (in the Winter semestre of 2003) the new second part (focusing on practice) with Christine McKenzie who was a new member of Catalyst at that time (and, like myself a graduate of FES). And i've taught it solo for the past few years. And this coming Fall i'll co-teach it with Deborah Barndt who's been on faculty at FES since 1993 thereabouts. So, it's time to redesign the course. Here's the syllabus from this past season. And for those of you interested in the individual session designs you can download a Word document here (it's 451K) with 11 of the 12 sessions. It's a very popular course that has always attempted to give a critical survey of the field of popular education (broadly interpreted). You can get a sense of this from the syllabus and session designs.

Now, Deb and i are talking about reorienting the course. It will still be survey-like. But we're going to feature three frames of reference: contemporary Latin American popular education, postcolonialism and aboriginal ways of knowing. We're still sorting what the texts will be and, thus far, have agreed to the following:

• Pedagogy of the Oppressed by Paulo Freire
• Colonialism/Postcolonialism by Ania Loomba
• Popular Education and Social Change in Latin America by Liam Kane
• Reclaiming Indigenous Voice and Vision edited by Marie Battiste

And we're looking at choosing one of the following:

• We Real Cool:Black Men and Masculinity by bell hooks
• Freedom Dreams: The Black Radical Imagination by Robin D.G. Kelley

Tough choices. And i'd love to add more. There will be a selection of readings as well, albeit less than in the past since we'll be concentrating on a few texts for a change. Opinions on this course, our text choices and how you think popular education should be taught are most welcome.