Hopeful Practices: Activating and Enacting the Pedagogical and Political Potential in Crisis

Abstract

This chapter explores the theoretical potential for education to provide learners with structures and processes that mitigate crisis and support “hope grounded in practice” (Freire P, Pedagogy of hope. Continuum, New York, 2008, p. 2). Instead of advocating for a definitive educational response to crisis, I examine the possibilities and challenges crises, when recognized as pedagogical, offer education. With a focus on public rather than private crises, I first situate my analysis within emergent matters of concern and care (Latour B, Crit Inq 30:225–248, 2004; Puig de la Bellacasa M, Soc Stud Sci 41(1):85–106, 2011) to practitioners and theorists of Science, Technology, and Society Education (STSE) studies. Second, I define “crisis” and examine how it is pedagogical. Next, I consider the challenges and barriers to learning through crisis. Fourth, I develop the opportunities crises offer education and finally, I conclude with suggestions that might support the potential for transformative learning from and through crises and considerations of why such learning is desirable.

…climate crisis • environmental crisis • AIDS crisis • food crisis • humanitarian crises • refugee crisis • crisis of the subject • crisis of truth • crisis of representation • crisis of evidence • inner-city crisis • rural crisis • personal crisis • currency crisis • constitutional crisis • energy crisis • mid-life crisis • crisis of faith • civilization crisis • urban crisis • financial crisis • intelligibility crisis • housing crisis • cultural crisis • education crisis…

Ring the bells that still can ring/Forget your perfect offering/There is a crack in everything/That’s how the Light gets in. ~ Leonard Cohen