Quotations from Paulo Freire's work
These are just a selection of quotations from Paulo Freire's work, which we have grouped into themes to enable you to see the key threads running through his thinking. A lot of the most recognizable quotes are from Pedagogy of the Oppressed , but we would encourage readers to look at other works by Freire, and have included some of the more significant quotations from those works below.
Critical consciousness and liberation
"Washing one's hands of the conflict between the powerful and the powerless means to side with the powerful, not to be neutral." — The Politics of Education "Education either functions as an instrument which is used to facilitate the integration of the younger generation into the logic of the present system and therefore bring about conformity to it, or it becomes the practice of freedom, the means by which men and women deal critically and creatively with reality and discover how to participate in the transformation of their world." — Pedagogy of the Oppressed "The oppressed, having internalized the image of the oppressor and adopted his guidelines, are fearful of freedom." — Pedagogy of...
Dialogue and humanization
"No one can be authentically human while he prevents others from being so." — Pedagogy of the Oppressed "Dialogue requires an intense faith in humankind, faith in their power to make and remake, to create and re-create, faith in their vocation to be more fully human." — Pedagogy of the Oppressed "To speak a true word is to transform the world." — Pedagogy of the Oppressed "Leaders who do not act dialogically, but insist on imposing their decisions, do not organize the people—they manipulate them. They do not liberate, nor are they liberated: they oppress." — Pedagogy of the Oppressed "Because love is an act of courage, not of fear, love is a commitment to others." — Pedagogy of the...
Education as transformation
"To study is not to consume ideas, but to create and re-create them." — Education for Critical Consciousness "Problem-posing education affirms men and women as beings in the process of becoming." — Pedagogy of the Oppressed "Education makes sense because women and men learn that through learning they can make and remake themselves." — Pedagogy of Freedom "Reading the world always precedes reading the word, and reading the word implies continually reading the world." — Pedagogy of the Oppressed "Implicit in the banking concept is the assumption of a dichotomy between human beings and the world: a person is merely in the world, not with the world or with others; the individual is spectator,...
Social justice and cultural action
"True generosity consists precisely in fighting to destroy the causes which nourish false charity." — Pedagogy of the Oppressed "It is not the unloved who initiate disaffection, but those who cannot love because they love only themselves." — Pedagogy of the Oppressed "Cultural action is always a systematic and deliberate form of action which operates upon the social structure." — Cultural Action for Freedom "Respect for the autonomy and dignity of every person is an ethical imperative and not a favor that we can bestow on others or withhold." — Pedagogy of Freedom "It's no sin to make a critical study of Brazil's reality. A small percentage own land. Most people don't." — Education for...
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