The World Is Split Between Those Who

How Can The Oppressed, As Divided, Unauthentic Beings, Participate In Developing The Pedagogy Of Their Liberation? Only As They Discover Themselves To Be 'hosts' Of The Oppressor Can They Contribute To The Midwifery Of Their Liberating Pedagogy. As Long As They Live In The Duality In Which To Be Is To Be Like And To Be Like Is To Be Like The Oppressor, This Contribution Is Impossible. The Pedagogy Of The Oppressed Is An Instrument For Their Critical Discovery That Both They And Their Oppressors Are Manifestations Of Dehumanization.

Some May Think That To Affirm Dialogue—the Encounter Of Women And Men In The World In Order To Transform The World—is Naively And Subjectively Idealistic. There Is Nothing, However, More Real Or Concrete Than People In The World And With The World, Than Humans With Other Humans.

If I Am A Pure Product Of Genetic, Cultural, Or Class Determination, I Have No Responsibility For My Action In The World And, Therefore, It Is Not Possible For Me To Speak Of Ethics. Of Course, This Assumption Of Responsibility Does Not Mean That We Are Not Conditioned Genetically, Culturally, And Socially. It Means That We Know Ourselves To Be Conditioned But Not Determined.

This Is The Sense In Which I Am Obliged To Be A Listener. To Listen To The Student's Doubts, Fears, And Incompetencies That Are Part Of The Learning Process. It Is In Listening To The Student That I Learn To Speak With Him Or Her.

It's Really Not Possible For Someone To Imagine Himself/herself As A Subject In The Process Of Becoming Without Having At The Same Time A Disposition For Change. And Change Of Which She/he Is Not Merely The Victim But The Subject.