Assignment 1c

1.) The first classmate I decided to learn about for our assignment is Thida. Thida likes to long board and her family owns a large chain of Thai restaurants.

The second classmate’s blog I looked at was Miranda. This will be the second humanities class that she has taken.

2.) I learned from Thida that Paulo Freire decided to forgo his formal education as a lawyer and teach Portuguese to secondary schools. I also discovered that his literacy efforts earned him the position as President of the National Commission on Popular Culture in 1963.

Miranda informed me that despite Freire’s passion for education, he ultimately believed that the public education system was both corrupt and impractical. She also explained how Freire did his best to prevent a “culture of silence”. This is where dominated individuals lose the means by which they critically respond to the culture that is forced on them by a dominant culture. Freire made a point to help out these individuals who were “silenced” and made sure their opinions were voiced and heard by others.

3.) This information will relate to our study of humanities because Freire’s selflessness and literacy campaign is an example of civic engagement and social responsibility. In our class we will be learning about how different ideas have the power to affect the world around us and Freire has done this with his theories of education. His ideas have generated new knowledge about global issues, and this is yet another one of the main goals of humanities.