CRITICAL EDUCATION THEORY

PART 1: EDUCATION AND STATE

©
2006
Tony Ward

No part of this document may be published or reproduced without the written

permission of the author
 INTRODUCTION
Speaking truth to power is something that the mainstream education process discourages and teaches us not to do. From
the time we are born, we are on a massive learning-curve. Nobody teaches us how to crawl, how to walk, how run, to talk,
or to do the myriad kinds of everyday activities and skills that we take for granted. We learn these things through a
combination of innate programming, coupled with a keen sense of observation and a built-in capacity for imitation and
mimicry. We do this from the day we are born until, sometime around our fifth or sixth birthday, we go to school.
Immediately, the rules change. We are no longer credited with an innate capacity to learn. Our trusted ability to imitate and
mimic is branded “copying”. Punishment is instituted as a means of making sure that we adhere to the (new) rules and
“copying is inaugurated as the most punishable offense. Our previous interests in co-operative creative play and invention
are frowned upon, and we are instructed to keep to ourselves, to share none of our knowledge. All of the means that we
have thus far employed to reach this remarkable stage of our personal development are now suddenly outlawed, and we
are thrust into a brand new and unfathomable world in which we must bow to the will of the “teacher” who wields
absolute power. Sometimes, in the early stages, this process assumes a benign face. Children are encouraged to “share”
their personal space and toys, and sometimes their knowledge. As time progresses, however, the rules become more rigid,
the penalties more draconian and the authority of the teacher more absolute. So intimidating is this system, that we are
afraid to tell our parents of our experiences, our terror, our misdemeanors, for fear that they, too will side with the voice of
authority against us.

As we “progress” we become less boisterous, less inquisitive, more intimidated, more fearful, Finally, we emerge into the
world of “adulthood” as “well-adjusted” citizens, ready to take our place in society, to accept its rules and morés and to
never again question the basis of the authority upon which we have been transformed.

This is what we call Education. It masquerades as education, but in reality, it is a system of imposed social, cultural,
political and economic control which curbs the enthusiasm of the creative impulse and which has as its ultimate goal the
maintenance and continuation of the existing structures and processes of power exercised by a very few powerful
individuals in society. Critical Education Theory challenges and interrogates how Education operates in support of this
system, and poses alternative models of learning premised upon the realisation of personal and cultural potential in the
creation of a more just and equitable society.
.
 CRITICAL THEORY
Critical Education Theory is part of a broader theory called
Critical Theory. Critical Theory is socio-political theory
developed in Germany in the 1930s in response to the rise of
Fascism. It sought to explain the failure of Marxism to bring
about a social revolution, It challenges received notions of
reality, seeking to demonstrate the ways in which our
conceptions are socially constructed. Critical Theory is
reflexive that is, it is aware that the “reality” that we
experience “out there” does not exist independently of
ideology, but that it is shaped (along with our perceptions of
it) by forces of power and hegemony that have a human
agency. These forces continually try to control all the means
of shaping society and its belief system - Education, the
Media, Religion, the Law, The Church, Planning
Regulations, the Economy etc. They do so to reproduce their
own version of reality, their own economic, social and
cultural supremacy - their hegemony. Critical Theory views
all beliefs, realities, values etc. in their social and economic
context and asks, “who stands to gain from society seeing
things this way? It then looks to discover how the
beneficiaries of the system have created the system to benefit
themselves at the expense of others
 CRITICAL
EDUCATION
Critical Education Theory evolves from the wider discipline
of Critical (Social) Theory, and looks at the ways in which
political ideology shapes Education as a way of maintaining
existing regimes of privilege and social control. It casts a
critical eye upon the history, the development and practice of
education and educational theorising. It holds that education
in the modern western world is shaped by the ideologies and
power structures that devolve from Capitalism, and that it’s
purpose is to reproduce these conditions in ways which
benefit the already-powerful. Instead, Critical Education
Theory promotes an ideology of education as an instrument of
social transformation and as a means of attaining social,
cultural, and economic equity. Initially, it did this from an
orthodox (economic) Marxist point of view, but increasingly
has adopted many of the tenets and theories of Cultural
Studies to demonstrate how cultural codes play a fundamental
part in both curriculum construction and classroom practice.
 CULTURAL STUDIES
Marx had based all of his theorising on issues of Class difference, which tended to overlook or negate important class
differences that occurred on the basis of or alongside of issues of Race or Gender, with all of the multiple layerings of
meaning and experience with which these are associated. Culture was always understood to mean those particularly
cultured ways of being associated with upper class tastes - Opera, Ballet, Art, etc. The class basis of this conception was
first demystified in the 1960s at the University of Birmingham in England, British/West Indian Professor Stuart Hall and a
group of Critical Theorists established the Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies. The mission of the Centre was to
analyse all of the instruments or agencies of cultural production - the Media, the Schools, The Legal System, the
Churches, the Parliamentary system etc., operate to reproduce the power relations in society through the reproduction of
dominant cultural views and values. At that time, the socially constructed notion of Culture held that there were “the
cultured” and the “uncultured” - clearly a classist and racist understanding. Hall‘s work took place in the context of a
Cultural Revolution that was emerging in Britain, where the irreverent pronouncements and music of the working class
Beatles and images of Coronation Street were beginning to challenge middle class norms, images and values. Since then
we always speak of Cultures - in the plural. There are many different Cultures, each competing to have a voice, to be
heard, and to ensure their own survival.
 CULTURAL
DOMINANCE
Each of the cultures in society struggles to
maintain itself as an identifiable entity, and does so
in competition with other cultures. Cultural Theory
has it that within the context of Capitalist society,
one particular group - the one in ownership of or
power over the means of material and mental
production - will predominate. We can therefore
speak of a Dominant culture and Subordinated
cultures. Briefly, the “haves” and the “have-nots”.

Within the context of this cultural dominance, it is

in the interests of the dominant culture to exercise
its power and control over resources to sustain its
position of dominance.

In order to do this it must (being only a small

group) gain the cooperation of the masses - of the
“have nots” It accomplishes this feat of
pacification through control of all the media of
Civil Society - Education, the Media, the
Legislature, the Church and (ultimately when all
else fails) the police and the army. This process of
getting the oppressed to cooperate in their
oppression is called hegemony.
 HEGEMONY
By controlling everyday public assumptions about the
meaning of key concepts, it becomes possible to shape that
everyday reality itself to specific ends. The public belief in
an essential “human nature” renders attempts to achieve a
peaceful and just society, obsolete by definition. The
predominance of the ideology of a “human nature” is
aimed precisely at the prevention of social change by
suggesting that real change is impossible - all the
unacceptable things that exist - greed, cruelty etc are just
part of “human nature” and can’t be changed. So we may
as well not try. The purpose of this is to maintain those
existing power relationships that are exactly the cause of
the problem in the first place. The ideology of “human
nature” is diametrically opposed to the ideology of social
change. In this world of competing ideologies, those
people or groups that have the most power are also the
ones who are best able to influence
. public opinion. This is
called hegemony.
Hegemony is the process by which the disempowered are persuaded to participate in their own disempowerment. From
Gramsci's point of view, the armed repression of the state represented the failure of the dominant culture to achieve
hegemony. Hegemony, in this sense, he defined as the process embodied in the ability of the State to create in its citizens
a particular moral and ethical attitude corresponding to that espoused by the ruling elite, and thereby to have the mass of
the population acquiesce to their own domination. In today’s world, this serves the interests of Global Capitalism
through the creation of a “Free Market” the purpose of which is to create an unlimited supply of cheap labour to support
industrial development by large multi-national companies. Although they are not elected, these companies hold
enormous power over national economies and over the lives of ordinary workers, forcing governments to ease labour
laws, reduce wages, suppress unions, reduce taxes and provide infrastructure services.
 CULTURAL CAPITAL
In the struggle for hegemony between cultures, some cultures
have values that are more highly valued than others in society
in general. In most western societies, for instance, ballet,
opera and fine art have high status, while rap, tagging and
break-dancing have less. The high-status cultural values are
said to have high cultural capital. Cultural capital works just
like economic capital: the more wealth you have, the easier it
is to make even more. Similarly, those who have high cultural
capital have automatic access to levels of social intercourse
that will augment their status. In addition, the high value of
high cultural capital activities (like art) is created and
maintained through a system of socially-created scarcity.
Based on the laws of supply and demand, the scarcer a
commodity, the more valuable it is.
The high cultural capital values associated with dominant
culture activities (like fine art) operate through a system of
scarcity which is built upon cultural codes. It is important to
maintain the value of a particular kind of knowledge by
making access to its codes difficult. In order to break or read
the codes of fine art, it is necessary to understand the
language system in which the codes exist. These esoteric
language systems are jealously guarded, and form part of the
training of elite education systems which are inaccessible to
most people.
 CULTURAL CODES
Pierre Bourdieu makes the point that:
"The definition of cultural nobility is the stake in a struggle which has gone
on unceasingly, from the seventeenth century to the present day, between
groups differing in their ideas of culture and of the legitimate relation to
culture and to works of art, and therefore differing in the conditions of
acquisitions of which these dispositions are the product... The logic of
what is sometimes called... the "reading" of a work of art, offers basis for
this opposition. Consumption is, in this case, a stage in the process of
communication, that is, an act of deciphering, decoding, which
presupposes practical or explicit mastery of a cipher or code. In a sense
one can say that the capacity to see (voir) is a function of the knowledge
(savoir), or concepts, that is, the words, that are available to name visible
things, and which are, as it were, programmes for perception. A work of
art has meaning and interest only for someone who possesses the cultural
competence, that is, the code into which it is encoded. The conscious or
unconscious of explicit or implicit schemes of perception and appreciation
which constitutes pictorial or musical culture is the hidden condition for
recognizing the styles characteristic of a period, a school or an author, and,
more generally for the familiarity with the internal logic of works that
aesthetic enjoyment presupposes... Thus the encounter with a work of art is
not "love at first sight" as is generally supposed, and the act of empathy,
Einfühlung which is the art-lover's pleasure, presupposes an act of
cognition, a decoding operation, which implies the implementation of a
cognitive acquirement, a cultural code."
 SYMBOLIC CAPITAL

According to Bourdieu, status in society is determined by three kinds of capital:

• Economic - having large amounts of money and economic resources
• Social - having large numbers of influential friends
• Cultural - having high level skills and understanding of the codes used to describe objects of high aesthetic value. It
is usually passed down within families as a set of understandings of the world - a habitus.
All three tend to reinforce each other making it easier for someone with high capital to increase it in any or all areas.
Symbolic Capital is really a subset of Cultural Capital and refers to the outward manifestations of power, influence and
status. It is expressed in the possession of fine objects - art, cars, dress, living and working environment.etc. The two
pictures above were taken in San Francisco on the same day two hundred yards apart. The one on the left shows an ex-
Vietnam veteran trying to lie down on a seat which the City Council have modified with arm rests to discourage homeless
vagrants. The barriers and the litter define his world. The one on the right shows a lunchtime seating area for office
workers in the Financial District, bedecked with flowers used to create areas of privacy and personal space. Note the man
lying down in the left foreground. A display of high personal symbolic capital is clearly more highly rewarded. The
manipulation and decorative use of Nature carries very high symbolic capital, symbolising at the same time, control and
sensitivity.
 CIVIL SOCIETY The Media
Hegemony is achieved through the control of all of the agencies of
human communication and interaction operated by what is called • The Press
Civil Society. Civil Society is made up of those private and public
institutions which exist alongside the forces of power and
• Television
(ultimate) authority - such as the military, which mediate between The Law
the political and the civil domains. They are the main agents for
hegemony - packaging the political and legal imperatives of the
• Parliament
dominant culture for broader social consumption. • The Courts
The Media, controls the form and content of what constitutes • Local Bodies
NEWS - leaving out or down-playing stories that might threaten
social change, encouraging passivity by explaining controversial
• Regional Authorities
issues in socially acceptable terms and uniformly presenting the Education
dominant culture view of reality.
• The Curriculum
Education controls the curriculum to determine what version of
the social and political reality counts as knowledge, and modifies • The Hidden Curriculum
and conditions behaviour to conform to the social norm. •Hierarchy
Parliament and the Courts have the responsibility of developing •Individualism
legal structures, systems and meanings that are consistent with the
normative (dominant) view of private ownership, property rights •Competition
and acceptable forms of social protest. The Church
The Church ensures that the hegemony and values of the
dominant culture have spiritual legitimacy.
 THE MEDIA
The Media invariably portrays the cultural prejudices of the
dominant culture - portraying prominent members of the
subordinate culture as mean, dishonest, evil or unprincipled.
These two cartoons - one (below) from the signing of a
Waitangi Treaty Settlemen in New Zealand, the other (right)
from the day after Donna Awatere’s legal appeal appeared in
the New Zealand Herald on page 7, the page that also contains
the Letters to the Editor and the one most frequently read by
the members of the general public. This has the result of
engendering/and/or confirming widespread social suspicion
and racist stereotypes about (in this case) Maori. The caption
(below) reads “Quick, make more smoke, I think one of them Above, we see allusions to Donna Awatere
spotted my Rolex” using Pipi Fundation Trust funds for her
stomach-stapling surgery. Such stereotyping
serves to confirm and augment the cultural
capital and values of the dominant culture since
they appear to occupy the moral high ground in
their depictions. The clue to their hegemony is
that they are not reflexive -that is, they do not
take into account the moral reprehensibility of
their own depictions. All of this passes over the
heads of even the average Maori reader, who
instead of feeling outrage, simply feels the
increased shame in the face of the stereotypical
public gaze.
 THE LAW:CONSTRUCTING
(IL)LEGALITY
Order and Power (Control) are established and maintained as a culturally-
defined legality through the Law. Like all other Indigenous peoples the
colonisation of Maori had a profound impact upon their space and place, and
the imposed Justice System (what an oxymoron!) played a crucial role in
their dispossession. Beginning with the duplicity in the English version of
the Treaty, through the illegal confiscations of the 1860s and 1880s, the
appalling role of the Maori Land Court in the privatisation of Maori Land
Titles and the role of the Public Works Act in numerous further thefts - the
record of the alienation and appropriation of Maori land tells a sorry tale
(Land Confiscation map, top right)and has been continuously protested by
Måori like the late Eva Rickard (bottom right)

The law is written and created by the already-powerful to maintain and

consolidate their power. (Mt. Albert graffiti above)
 ONGOING COLONIALISM
The dominant culture promotes the notion of Postcolonialism - that Colonisation is a thing of the past, no longer
affecting the colonised. But Postcolonialism is a myth designed to prevent and discourage dissent and rebellion and to
allow for the continuing appropriation of indigenous land and rights by means of legal subterfuge. Now that the
(imposed) legal system is overarching it is used to accomplish that which was originally achieved by military might, In
countries like New Zealand, the United States, Canada and Australia, for instance, the process of colonisation continues,
Recently, in Aotearoa-New Zealand there has been a prime example of this continuing colonialism - the Foreshore and
Seabed Legislation. For several years, up to 2004, a group of N. Z. South Island tribes from the Marlborough Sounds
area had been petitioning their Local Governments for a say in the development and distribution of commercial mussel-
farming operations in their area. They were continuously ignored, and so took their case for Customary Ownership to
the High Court. When, in 2004, the Court of Appeal found that the Iwi may have a case for customary ownership, and
that they could if they wished, pursue their case to the Maori Land Court, Helen Clark, Prime Minister of New Zealand
(attempting to stem the tide of pakeha racism then sweeping the country) announced that her Government would
introduce legislation to prevent this from happening. For Maori, who had helped to vote Clark into office, this was the
kind of betrayal that they head experienced for 150 years.
Maori, who had been encouraged for 150 years to seek redress
through the legal system now looked like they might have
some measure of success. At that precise moment, the
Government decided to change the legal basis of the Maori
claim against the State. In other words, they moved the goal
posts. So Maori organised a Hikoi (Land March) from the top
of the North Island to Parliament in the South. Some 40,000
arrived at Parliament to deliver an unmistakable message to the
Government, and the Maori Party was born. Right, the Whare
Wananga o Awanuiarangi component of the Hikoi.
 HEGEMONY REVEALED
Even the Waitangi Tribunal (which is an advisory agency for the
Government regarding treaty Claims and which is portrayed in the
Media as a pro-Maori institutions but which actually comprises
some very conservative pakeha members) attempted to have the
Government pause for further discussion and consultation.
Inevitably, the Tribunal - which is the Government’s own agency -
was ignored. Fake consultation took place (the Crown telling
rather than listening with the Deputy P. M. saying that
consultation “would not have worked” (right). and the legislation
was rammed through. The Prime Minister, Helen Clark refused to
meet with the members of the Hikoi, labeling them “Haters and
Wreckers”
Not surprisingly, the unwillingness of the Government to heed
either the unanimous voice of Maori or the voice of international
opinion pushed ahead, and in the process precipitated the
emergence of the Maori Party - the first truly representative voice
of the Maori community in the history of New Zealand politics.
What was at stake, of course, was cold hard cash. The Government
had been holding off granting thousands of lucrative licenses of
aquaculture developments until the foreshore and seabed
ownership could be established legally as well outside of Måori
reach.
 MAORI PLANNING
In the face of such political duplicity, it is ironic that Maori are at
the same time being also encouraged by that other arm of the State
- Local Government - to take a greater role in the planning process
by Local Authorities such as the Auckland City Council (left).

It can only be noted that this attempt is an extension of the policies

of assimilation which have been in evidence for 100 years or
more. What is being asked, is that Maori participate in a non-
Maori planning process, driven by Capitalist ethic and greed - a
process which runs absolutely counter to the cultural conceptions
of space that Maori and most other indigenous peoples hold. They
have instead had to accept the legalities of Western concepts of
ownership since they were first colonised and in order to survive.

It is pertinent, perhaps, to ask what the alternatives might be?

Certainly, it could be possible, given the will, to devise a dual and
separate planning process which honours the cultural experiences
and histories of both partners to the Treaty. But then of course,
this runs counter to the actual ideology of control and cultural
imperialism that the State exemplifies. But the State, even in
places like New Zealand, does not act in isolation. It is the arm of
the dominant culture, and that culture is increasingly international
and global.
Governments now vie for investments and for access to export markets and the price of this access is increasingly the
suppression of Unions and wages, the confiscation of indigenous land and the privatisation of State assets.
 GLOBALISATION
The promotion of a Global (Free Market) Economy continues the
process of colonisation down to the present. It is aimed at
providing multi-national companies with the conditions for
increased profit creation. It is theorised that by reducing corporate
or business taxes, investment will be stimulated, thus creating jobs
and improving the economic well-being of the general public. The
major question for minorities or indigenous peoples is precisely
what kinds of jobs are created? For them, the answer is usually
jobs at the lower end of the economic scale. Furthermore, in order
to increase profits, it is important to have cheaper labour, so that
workers are paid less. For workers to accept this, there has to be a
large surplus of available labour, so that demand for work exceeds
supply. This requires a large pool of unemployed as a prerequisite
for higher profits. It also requires massive investments in roads,
electricity generation etc, which requires major overseas
borrowing - placing the country in debt and requiring increased
personal taxation. Multi-national companies threaten to take their
business elsewhere unless governments comply with their needs.
The imposition of “Democracy” in today’s American Empire
closely parallels the imposition of Christianity in the past. Its From space there is no “up”, “down”, North,
purpose is not, as stated, to free the people from tyranny, but to South. Colonisation requires an ongoing
open up new markets that have accepted Western values and tastes process of containment and growth, and can
for the further accumulation of Western capital, and the imposition never succeed in the long term, simply because
of western-style economies at a Global level. of the finite nature of our home.
 MILITARY / SOCIAL SPENDING
Globalised markets require increased degrees of domestic control and overseas military spending. The State is
required to spend much more on its global hegemony, to ensure the safety and property interests of its own multi-
nationals overseas, and to also ensure the continuing availability of cheap natural resources and labour for its
industries. The most typical recent example has been the United States invasion of Iraq and its threatened military
intervention in Iran, to ensure continuing US access and ownership of Middle East oil resources.
The chart on the right shows the changes (inversion) in Human Resource and military spending in the USA under
Ronald Reagan. This was a time of unprecedented unemployment and homelessness, with more than 10 million
homeless people living on the streets of the wealthiest nation on the planet.

Just as unemployment increases in the private sector, so do employment opportunities become increasingly available in
the military and the police forces. So it is, that once again, it is predominantly the poor, the colonised and working class
are sent into armed conflict with their counterparts both at home and abroad. The sons of the wealthy are rarely the
victims of Empire’s global hegemony.
 THE FREE MARKET
The promotion of a Global (Free Market) Economy continues
the process of colonisation down to the present. It is aimed at
providing multi-national companies with the conditions for
increased profit creation. It is theorised that by reducing
corporate or business taxes, investment will be stimulated, thus
creating jobs and improving the economic well-being of the
general public. The major question for minorities or indigenous
peoples is precisely what kinds of jobs are created? For them,
the answer is usually jobs at the lower end of the economic
scale. Furthermore, in order to increase profits, it is important to
have cheaper labour, so that workers are paid less. For workers
to accept this, there has to be a large surplus of available labour,
so that demand for work exceeds supply. This requires a large
pool of unemployed as a prerequisite for higher profits. It also
requires massive investments in roads, electricity generation etc,
which requires major overseas borrowing - placing the country
in debt and requiring increased personal taxation. Multi-national
companies threaten to take their business elsewhere unless
governments comply with their needs.The imposition of
Democracy in today’s American Empire closely parallels the
imposition of Christianity in the past. Its purpose is not, as
stated, to free the people from tyranny, but to open up new
markets that have accepted Western values and tastes for the
further accumulation of Western capital, and the imposition of
western-style economies at a Global level.
 TRICKLE
DOWN
THEORY
The myth of the free-market global economy
is that this profits will eventually “trickle
down” to the poor. But because the multi-
national companies are based elsewhere, and
have the power to insist on reduced taxation,
lower wages and so on, they actually bleed
the local economy of its economic resources,
making the rich richer (relatively) and the
poor poorer. Major demonstrations have
taken place at all of the G7 meetings of the
world economic leaders who are promoting
the free market. Most adversely affected by
the free market are indigenous peoples
because their property rights (real and
intellectual) have not been protected by
Treaties from appropriation by others. Nor
do they usually have a strong voice to
prevent their governments buying into the
market
 BLAMING THE VICTIM
All of this boils down to what sociologist William Ryan has called blaming the victim. If the victims of oppression
can be convinced that it is their own fault, then their resistance to further oppression can be cut off at the source. The
victims are doubly victimised by being made to feel inadequate in their inability to maintain their health and
independence in the face of overwhelming oppression. This was particularly so with the confiscations, which
deprived Maori of their productive capacity and reduced them to abject dependency on the State - for which they are
now accused of being dole bludgers, lazy, incompetent, lacking in entrepreneurial skills and/or industry.
One has to ask the question of where Maori
might now stand, economically, socially and
politically, had the confiscations never
occurred, and if the wealth that their
confiscated land has since produced had
flowed instead into the Maori economy.
Blaming the victim is a way of trying to
make the victim feel responsible for their
own plight, their victimisation. If they feel
responsible for their situation the oppressed
are less likely to recognise the true role of
the oppressor.
But, of course, the Media, once again,
ridicule the victims, leading them to doubt
the veracity of their feelings of
victimisation, engendering layerings of
shame coupled compounded with a sense of
inadequacy and ultimately, inferiority.
 NEUTRAL STATE?

The prevailing belief is that the State operates in the interests of the whole of society, acting as a neutral referee between
competing social and cultural groups. This belief is not backed up by a critical look at history. It is a socially constructed
myth. Rather, the State is not a neutral entity, but is the arm and instrument of the dominant culture. It’s role is to
maintain dominant cultural power by maintaining the myth of neutrality. The myth serves to delude the people into
compliance with the constitutional framework (the Law) which has been initiated and shaped by the dominant culture
itself. Its agencies are headed by the elite, its values are the values of the elite and its practices most benefit the elite.
This is most evident in countries that have been colonised, like New Zealand, Australia, Canada and the Americas,
where the dominant culture equates most closely with the elite colonising culture., and where the original inhabitants are
the most marginalised and excluded. Here, constitutional forms have been designed specifically to strip the indigenous
of their productive capacity and their ability to resist.

The State acts as agent of the dominant culture in maintaining its power. The poor don’t stand a
chance!
EDUCATION AND COLONISATION
A belief in the inherent superiority in a particular set of cultural
codes has always been the basis for Colonisation and
Colonialism. The American colonisation of the West, and the
dispossession of its indigenous peoples was carried out under the
ideology of Manifest Destiny. Europeans believed that they had a
superior culture, and that it was their God-given destiny to
occupy the land and to extinguish the culture of its original
inhabitants. In this illustration, we see Liberty leading the settlers
across the prairie, Bible in hand, stringing telegraph wires with
the other, while the “savages” flee ahead. This White
Supremacist belief system, coupled with its spiritual justification
- Christianity - was the basis of every genocidal act in the
Americas from the discovery by Columbus in 1494 down to the
present.
Its purpose was the acquisition of resources, (land, precious metals and slaves) to fuel emerging capitalist production and
capital accumulation. Christianity became the main vehicle by which European values were imposed upon indigenous
peoples. Its imposition - through Education was both subtle and devastating. Linda Tuhiwai Smith, a Maori scholar
suggests that schools were placed in Maori communities like Trojan Horses - to destroy the less visible aspects of Maori
life, through the imposition their cosmologies and ideologies. In other words, the semantic structures of the colonisers
have infiltrated into and replaced over time those of the colonised. The consequence for the colonised, as Fanon suggested,
has been the most odious form of colonisation, and that which has brought with it the greatest pain for the colonised - the
colonisation of the mind - so that they have come to disbelieve and reject the most sacred precepts of their own traditional
cultures and therefore their identities. The late African American writer James Baldwin summed up this experience
succinctly, when he said that he "despised" black people, "possibly because they failed to produce Rembrandt."
 CRITICAL
Critical Education Theory involves the application of
Critical Theory to educational theorizing. It interrogates
the composition of what is taught and the way in which

EDUCATION
it is taught, viewing both as a medium of social control.
It includes:
Critical Pedagogy – the critical analysis and practice of
classroom practices, demonstrating how they are shaped
by, model and hence reproduce existing structures of
power (class, race, gender etc.).
Hidden Curriculum - the way in which informal
behaviours and structures in the classroom bring about
subliminal learning of patterns of social control
(passivity, fear of authority, competition, hierarchy,
control of body functions etc.)
Curriculum Studies (what is able to be taught and who
controls the process by which this particular form of
knowledge is chosen amongst all others (legitimation), It
views the imposition of a National Curriculum, for
instance, as a means of erasing cultural difference and
silencing minority voices. The power to determine what
is valid knowledge corresponds closely with differences
in cultural power and class. The Universities play a
major role in the naming of legitimate forms of
knowledge and are key instruments in ensuring that the
beliefs and ideology of the elite in society hold sway.