Paulo Friere “The Banking Concept of Education”, Essay Example

Friere’s account of the education process is a radically critical approach that is informed by a contention that the contemporary version of education is consistent with an economic model that resembles free market capitalism. Friere abstracts the current education in terms of his notion of the “banking concept”, in which the student-teacher relationship is conceived according to a governing notion of exchange, in which the teacher is viewed as possessing something of value, that of knowledge, while the student is to acquire this knowledge in the form of a certain transaction that is isomorphic to a business transaction. As Friere maintains, “in the banking concept of education, knowledge is a gift bestowed by those who consider themselves knowledgeable upon those whom they consider to know nothing.” (6) Accordingly, there is an immediate inequality that is constitutive of this relationship, insofar as one member of the relation is given a value, whereas the other is construed as essentially valueless. Friere characterizes such a relation as radically ideological, since it is an oppressive form of relation that “negates education and knowledge as processes of inquiry.” (6) As Miller describes Friere’s account of the banking concept, “ideas remain inert”. (64) Knowledge becomes a lifeless object that is merely transferred from the one who holds this object, and is thus the “valuable” member of this relation, to the one who lacks this object. This objectification of knowledge is oppressive to the extent that it is essentially monologic, as opposed to dialogic. This is reflected in the “narrative character” of the educational process that Friere delimits, a character that exposits knowledge “as if it were motionless, static, compartmentalized, and predictable.” (2) This mechanization presupposes that knowledge has no transformative power, and is merely a lifeless and atrophied collection of facts. The metaphor of depositing Friere utilizes repeats the banking concept of education, as such knowledge is only transferred to the students. No autonomous or critical thought is appreciated, as there is rather a vulgar exchange of a lifeless object that is at the heart of the educational relationship.

In contrast to this prevalent contemporary approach to education, Friere offers a more dynamic variant of education that is fitting to the essence of knowledge itself, while alleviating the oppressive and ideological core of the banking concept of education through a certain dialectic model of the student-teacher relationship. Friere contends that the student and the teacher immediately reside in a relationship of contradiction, insofar as their statuses as teacher and as student respectively are clearly delineated: “The raison d’etre of libertarian education…lies in its drive towards reconciliation.” (7) This reconciliation is found in the crucial notion of a partnership between the student and the educator. What is central to the educational process is a “quest for mutual humanization”, (Friere, 15)  a mutual humanization insofar as it is both a humanization of the educator and the student. The antagonistic roles of educator and student are mediated through the realization that the student exists as student and educator exists as educator only through their relation: they are both necessary to the possibility of education itself. Accordingly, through the inherent value of both the educator and the student, they become “humanized” instead of merely depositories and instruments of exchange. This humanization concomitantly corresponds to the consciousness of knowledge not as lifeless artifact, but as a transformative living thing, one that is consistent with critical thinking. The educator-student relation reflects the fundamental communicative essence of existence itself, as Friere maintains, “only through communication can human life hold meaning.” (21) The communicative act is the essence of human life, insofar as human beings live together and not without relation. As Redmond writes, “for Friere, education represented a powerful liberating force.” (Redmond, 18) Education becomes this force for Friere, as it is precisely communicative, and moreover, that the knowledge central to education shapes the world itself.  Friere thus provides a dynamic, vitalist account of education grounded in a relationality that is constitutive of human existence.

Hence, Friere offers a radical critique of current educational practice, while also proposing a cursory solution to this same practice. The key is to negate the banking role of education, which degrades the student and suspends the radical possibility for change inherent to knowledge through an objectification of the latter. Education must be rather conceived as a dynamic form of relation, one that is consistent with the relational essence of a purely human life.

Works Cited

Friere, Paulo. “The Banking Concept of Education.” Pedagogy of the Oppressed. Trans. Myra Bergman Ramos. New York: Continuum, 1993.

Miller, George David. Negotiating Toward Truth: The Extinction of Teachers and Students. London: Rodopi, 1998.

Redmond, Bairbre. Reflection in Action: Developing Reflective Practice in Health and Social Services. Redmond, CA: Ashgate Publishing, 2006.