Paulo Freire’s role and influence on the praxis of popular communication in Brazil

Introduction

Despite recent controversies in Brazil involving Paulo Freire’s body of work – namely, the criticism from President Jair Bolsonaro in 2018 and 2019 – one cannot erase Freire’s legacy, nor the freshness of his contributions. These contentious attacks are largely unfolded by Silvio Waisbord (this issue). Therefore, I jump to identifying the role and the potential influences of Paulo Freire on popular communication, that is, the degree to which aspects from Freire’s thoughts dialogue with key concepts and practices seen in popular, community, and alternative communication research in Brazil. The study draws on literature reviews of Freire’s work. The references found herein are based on case studies relating to the following social movements, that I have been studying in the last years: The Union of Borborema (Borborema region, state of Paraíba), the União da Vitória Agricultural Production Cooperative (COPAVI – a settlement of the Landless Rural Workers Movement based on the state of Paraná), and the Community Movement of Heliópolis (UNAS), in the city of São Paulo. In spite of being based in Brazil, the scope of these mobilizations could apply to movements elsewhere.

Paulo Freire did not dedicate proper efforts to study communication, but his ideas have resonated in it, especially in the framework of social movements and affiliated collectives. Even if indirectly, it is possible to assume that his views have inspired the creation of communicative concepts and practices. Freire did not research the field, but he has approached communicational problems. He has put communication at the heart of the so-called teaching-learning process. That is, the existing dialogue that underscores his method of knowledge generation. This factor is crucial for the relationship between the teacher and the student, being relevant to human relations in general. For example, between who owns the technical knowledge to lead and those with whom one interacts at the level of institutions and social movements. For Freire, communication means interaction, exchange, reciprocity, dialogue. It does not mean unilateral acts of transmitting information or knowledge.

What is the purpose of education?

The dominant elements from Freire’s influence over popular communication begin from his ideas on the pedagogy that surrounds the education for liberation. The pedagogy of liberation counterposes what he defines as the ‘banking’ concept of education, that of the traditional educational systems.

According to the banking concept of education:

Education thus becomes the act of making deposits, in which the students are the depositories cash, and the teacher is the depositor. Instead of communicating, the teacher issues communiqués, and ‘make deposits’ which the students patiently receive, memorise, and repeat. This is the ‘banking’ concept of education (…) In this conception, knowledge is a gift bestowed by those who consider themselves knowledgeable upon those whom they consider knowing nothing. Projecting an absolute ignorance onto others, a characteristic of the ideology of oppression, negates education and knowledge as processes of enquiry. (Freire, 1979: 79)

Freire (1979) sheds light on this educational perspective – which exists both inside and outside the school – he conceives it as a critical entity, which recognises people as beings to become; they are unfinished, incomplete individuals. He also sees them as conscious of their incompleteness, and as such, they are able to mobilise as subjects and develop in wisdom. This conception of education appears in the Brazilian context of the 1950s and 1960s, which continued in the following years. It has inequality and social injustice (poverty, illiteracy, and the rule of political oligarchies, disinformation, etc.) as a backdrop. As he grows unhappy with this situation, Freire proposes a kind of social transformation that begins with the democratisation of society and culture, alongside education. On the other hand, he does not promote any model of formal education, but ‘education as the practice of freedom’ (Freire, 1981), as one of his book’s titles state.

In 1964, the political environment found itself in turmoil with the establishment of the military dictatorship (1964-1985). At the time, the social contradictions grow strong, as though the state increases the control of politics and ideology while repressing its citizens. At first glance, all forces of resistance were silenced. After a decade, civil society starts to re-organise. It is in this milieu that Freire’s ideas begin to flourish again. It is fair to say that Freire has first developed his methods with eyes to improving literacy rates among adults. It initiates with the production of keywords, or ‘generative themes’, which are part of students’ reality. It is through them that one problematises reality. It is more than teaching them how to read and write words but improving one’s ability of reading the world. In his own terms:

The process involves the critical understanding of reading. Reading does not consist merely of decoding the written word or language; rather, it is preceded by and intertwined with knowledge of the world. The reading of the world precedes the reading of the word (…). (Freire, 1982: 11)

Regarding his inputs in the field of Education, that is, the pedagogy of the relationship between teacher-student, his literacy method, etc, he discusses the dialogical communication; the democratisation of culture (i.e. the recognition of people as producers of culture); the necessity of social change; the critical consciousness (to know how to read the world as a personal discovery of one’s knowledge). This condition demands that one stops thinking with somebody else’s head, that is, no longer being a shadow and becoming a subject). The education of the masses (the necessity to reach those who are out of school in a way to make them subjects and leading them out of disinformation and ignorance), among other assertions. These assumptions seem to guide many of Freire’s concepts of the education for liberation.

On the one hand, Brazil’s official and formal educational system has never incorporated Freire’s literacy methods. In reality, the country has only adopted a few of these imperatives along with those of other thinkers, such as Jean Piaget, Maria Montessori and Célestin Freinet. His thoughts transcend both the formal education policies, as much as they escape the social practices that compose non-formal ¹ and informal ² education guidelines. In the latter type, it is where forms of social intervention championed by civil society occur. I set my interest in this environment of communities and social movements, observing the subtle resonance of Freire’s thoughts. It is an understated form of influence because it takes place during the period of exception in Brazil’s history. In other words, not to mention Freire was to be cautious. Over time, some of his ideas have become naturalised.

Paulo Freire was concerned with those who had no conditions to attend a literacy school. To that purpose, he has developed the ‘Circles of Culture’ – centres for the adult literacy – to promote the increase of rates. The military regime has interrupted his project. However, his ideas continued to influence many levels of citizens’ organisation and mobilisation. This brief perspective has sought to inform how I identify the principles of the education for liberation in the praxis of popular communication.

The communication for transformation

In advance of the fall and ultimate end of the military dictatorship that ruled the country from 1964 to 1985, social movements and other civic actors re-assembled. Both of which were deeply engaged with the struggle for democracy and search for solving social issues. In their processes of consciousness-organisation-action, these actors have included the need for communication. This concern becomes a stepping-stone for the processes of resistance above. These efforts have given shape to what I call popular communication – or the people’s communication. Subaltern classes are those that have joined these segments. They have organised in resistance and become protagonists of their forms of communication.

Therefore, popular communication can also configure ways to participatory, dialogic, community, group, horizontal, alternative, and educative communication, as well as communication for social change. It thrives in a broader scene of social mobilisation in which it aims to claim rights to existence and primary conditions of life. These causes include granting rights to the land, labour rights, respect for the environment, human rights, and participatory politics.

As Gohn says, social movements are collective organisations that:

present a socio-political character. They allow for distinct ways through which people can organise and express their demands. (…) According to history, movements have always existed, and we believe they always will. This faith stems from their representation of organised social groups; because they amalgamate with people but not to count them in as numbers, but as part of a social experiment and these activities generate creativity and socio-cultural innovations (…) Movements have got their view about social reality to build their proposals. As they act within networks, they forge collective actions that resist exclusion and fight for social belonging. (Gohn, 2011: 335–336)

Since a long time ago, popular communication articulates through accessible ways. It follows the means of the groups it relates to and their communicational needs. Whether by incorporating face-to-face, interpersonal, group communication or via approximative or artisanal outlets, such as banners, theatre, poetry, bulletins, they engage with printing technologies, electromagnetic and the digital tools of the Internet age. On the other hand, one should consider that the expression found in popular communication does not happen in unison. It forays a series of communicational processes. Besides these phenomena, it represents other manifestations, as though it has interfaces with folklore and other cultural expressions, the so-called popular ones. And yet, popular communication can highlight specific aspects of mass media programmes, such as those of bizarre or sensationalist attractions, which bear massive audiences. And yet, they might align with the poorly educated populace and far from the said ‘high culture.’

Otherwise, the principles of Freire’s education for liberation analysed herein do not apply to every popular communication initiative. It belongs only in those projects to follow a praxis that contributes to transforming the social and civic fabric. It is in this kind of practice observed in social movements, and conceived as ‘counter-communicative’, that I focus my reflection regarding intersections with Freire’s principles. It is necessary to find other parameters than those that judge popular culture and the mainstream media, e.g. entertainment and sensationalist journalism. The popular communication, that I approach here, is the one in which social movements and communities design critical contents from the margins of society, taking themselves as source, highlighting their life stories, claims, and proposals, according to their world vision.

The intersections between the principles of the education for liberation and popular communication

There are five principles from the pedagogy of the education for liberation, which have appeared more clearly in the concepts and practices of popular communication (see also Peruzzo, 2017). I highlight them in the following sections.

Final considerations

This article has sought to bring the education for liberation closer to concepts of popular, community and alternative communication. I have focused on the study of communicative practices that combine with those of social movements that intervene in society through socio-communal activities. I have argued that the principles of the education for liberation have contributed for a model of emancipatory communication because it motivates action, creation, and transformation in favour of the subalternised segments of the population. One can develop a better grasp of this process by taking into account the values of education for liberation. Freire’s ideas convey values such as those of dialogue, critical consciousness, the ability to be a subject, education as a practice for freedom, critical connection to the reality, and social transformation. All of which are essential to weave the main lines between social movements and popular communication. Whether directly or indirectly, I have sought to gather concepts that unite both theory and practices of popular communication.

This kind of reasoning – in which every action is political – comes from raising the consciousness of the local mediating leadership. These actors are the ones which learn at the heart of social struggles, often rising from CEBs and other progressive social or political movements. Thus, it is not about employing Freire’s literacy method on its entirety, but some of its philosophical and educative principles. These thoughts inspire successful communicative concepts, and the practices staged in community and social movements. Eventually, after four decades, one can see meaningful advances in citizens’ rights in Brazil, which arise directly from social and civic participation.

Since January 2019, the arrival of conservative forces led by Bolsonaro government has suggested a severe setback for these developments. The examples are already visible. The intervention from this government over public policies that ensured citizens’ representation at the councils that oversaw the management of public departments is one of the examples. Others include the promotion of state violence to fight crime; the tolerance of racism and homophobia; the weakening of policies that protected the indigenous and the environment and so forth. These positions, among many others that taint social advances, also touch on the permission for the use of forbidden pesticides, the break-up of democratic rules to elect Vice Chancellors for public universities, the budget cuts for education and scientific research, and the moral criteria associated with the ministers chosen to run the country’s cultural policy. These are not accidental measures. These facts constitute the government vision, which unmakes many of Paulo Freire’s ideas, at least at the level of those in power.

The President’s statements confirm his aversion to Freire since the 2018 electoral campaigning. His government agenda ended up reverberating with his allies and voters. In a way, there is a shared sensation that we are living again a remarkable moment of Brazilian history. Last century’s dictatorship had already suppressed thoughts that favoured equality, popular sovereignty and democracy and had their accusers arrested, banished, or executed. Paulo Freire had himself to seek asylum abroad. Nowadays, as we start the second decade of the 21st century, such ideas are back to bother us, as far as some political groups still keep their resistance to them.

Some questions pertain to this scenario. One could perhaps respond by citing the freshness of Paulo Freire’s work and its potential to lead to change once again. Like in his time, today’s problems seem unresolvable, the class contradictions persist, despite recent advances in income distribution, public policies implementation, and the right to citizenship sponsored by last governments. To the degree that civil society is strong enough and new mechanisms of participation exist today, it is no surprise that some might want to undermine such democratic gains and progressive ideas. Back then, to achieve an upheaval in the historical background that saw the majority of the population excluded from social development, one had to bet on raising the consciousness through successful Freirean strategies. To that matter, these changes are not welcome for the politics committed to conservatism, which seeks political and ideological control founded on outdated traditions. Likewise, that also represents the extremes of economic liberalism which these groups project for Brazil. Here, a fairer and more democratic society is something to fear.

In any case, history has its dynamics and is plenty with processes of affirmation and negation of the old and the new. Often, at the same time. Segments of society who identify with the struggle for equality, the respect to human rights, and the protection of other forms of life in the planet remain active. The dictatorship has silenced many voices. In spite of this, pro-democracy echoes have endured, and a sequence of mobilisations have achieved the re-establishment of reasonable democratic levels in Brazil. A similar trend continues to this day. While one sees a loud clash between conservative and progressive forces, between advances and setbacks, part of society goes on fighting for civility ideals and rights for all. Social movements and civic actors carry on their combative and purposeful trajectory by amplifying the perception that one needs citizens’ rights and civic culture. At many levels, there is a strong antagonism but not enough to stop social movements and progressive members. These individuals can generally see further ahead, pointing to a better future. They are entrepreneurs of change that work towards specific segments of society but in benefit of all humanity.