Pop Culture & Pedagogy: The Danger in Seminary Curriculum

When we speak of spiritual disciplines we must be a bit more rigorous in our theoretical understanding of such a term. In this sense, what I am directly responding is the over-simplification (i.e., if you somehow practice each of the fruits of the spirit it will make you a better ‘Christian’ and etc.) of a much larger idea that the spiritual disciplines fit within, which is more appropriately known as pedagogy.

Well known pedagogical theorist, Paulo Freire once said this of education: “Education either functions as an instrument which is used to facilitate integration of the younger generation into the logic of the present system and bring about conformity 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.”[1]

“The Practice of Freedom?”

Has this not become the place of the seminary today? A place of theological conformity? Are not the bricks and mortar symbols of the very ideology that structures and inhibits the student from thinking outside of its walls? So, would not the role of the professor be to break down such barriers?

To form a new radical space of interactive engagement between student and teacher, I want us to venture through three elements of Paulo Freire’s approach to pedagogy to better implicate and define the relationship between teacher and student. In doing so, this will open up for us a new way in which to converse about the spiritual disciplines not as some magical set of rules that will forever change the ontology of the student and their experience. But, and here’s the important point to be said, that the relationship exists beyond some sterile classroom, and that both the educator and educated become learners together.

To solidify this exact point, we need to give this investigation contextual landscapes from which to draw from, namely, pop culture. Why? Because historically the Church has had a tendency to demonize culture at large, and more specifically pop culture. This departure has always been a detriment to the progress of the Christian as well as the student. Meaning, we must now circumvent our own historical prejudices and see pop culture as that which can help form a better student, so then the student can then learn to better form new kinds of pop culture. Also, the subject of pop culture also demands that the student not be afraid of culture or deconstruct it only as some theological enemy, but rather to interact with objects within pop culture (television, movies, theatre, entertainment, symbols and etc.) as elements that can better form her own personal progress as a human, not just a Christian. To do so, the professor must also be willing to disregard some of his own scholastic ideology (i.e., as a teacher I must maintain my own professional distance).

Element #1:  Mutual Respect

This Socratic Method, although not new, has been tried and tested as a better model than the convenient worn-out models handed down through patriarchy. Part of Paulo Freire’s pedagogical approach is the replacement of curriculum with dialogue. “To enter into dialogue presupposes equality amongst participants.  Each must trust the others; there must be mutual respect and love (care and commitment).  Each one must question what he or she knows and realizes that through dialogue existing thoughts will change and new knowledge will be created.” Here we have the very seedbed for the development of a reflexivity that is not defined by an asymmetrical relationship (i.e., student vs teacher) but rather a new model for mutual respect and understanding. It removes the patriarchal over-spiritualization of a typical-power relationship seen and experienced in our seminaries today.

If mutuality is the basis for an educational relationship then the context of pop-culture becomes something that frames the spiritual development of both practitioners (referring to the student and the teacher) in such a way that the direct outcome is that both interact and are changed by the process of dialogical discovery. Let’s go deeper into this example to flesh this out a bit more. If teacher and student dialogue about the nature of television and how it effects themselves, their world, theological development, ethics, art and everything in between then the relationship surpasses the drive toward imposing some sort of value-based contingency (i.e., if you write good papers then I will give you a good grade). Through dialogue one encounters truth, and truth and education aren’t always one in the same.

Element #2:  Praxis

As Paulo Freire said earlier on in this article, education can be used to facilitate conformity, and we all know this is true as educators. Beyond the transition from curriculum-based relationship to a more fluid dialogical one lies even something more radical for Freire and this leads to our second element within his pedagogical approach which is simply entitled as: praxis. “It is not enough for people to come together in dialogue in order to gain knowledge of their social reality.  They must act together upon their environment in order critically to reflect upon their reality and so transform it through further action and critical reflection.” Here in this quote we hear the sigh of many professors and pastors reading this! Mainly due to the fact that this falls beyond the postmodern caricature of: just think, don’t do. There has to be an active tactile component the educational experience. Far too many schools (in the USA and UK) rely upon theoretical curriculum to somehow engage the whole person and yet it doesn’t, if anything it disengages them into mechanical machines who simply repeat information.

For Freire, the dialogical is an initial object that inaugurates a new way for the student and teacher to relate through theory, but then the theory itself develops into praxis. This is where the aspect of pop culture becoming a spiritual discipline really shines, in that the spiritual disciplines are designed to develop the inner aspect of the human thereby developing the outer person. These material acts then transform the local world of those who engage with it.

Element #3:  Conscientization

The third and final element is one that is related directly to praxis and is complementary in defining the components of praxis, which is known as:  conscientization—”the process of developing a critical awareness of one’s social reality through reflection and action.”  Action is fundamental because it is the process of changing the reality.  Paulo Freire says that we all acquire social myths which have a dominant tendency, and so learning is a critical process which depends upon uncovering real problems and actual needs”. If we think of these three as partners in a dance, they each take a step and willingly let the other invade their own personal space to enact the beauty of the dance itself.

Conscientization is itself tied to an exterior, an outside if you will. Meaning that this new form of spiritual discipline is one that develops the outside of the world, not just focuses on the interior development of the student or teacher but that through these three components a new world is possible.  Richard Foster is known as one of the guru’s in the field of spiritual discipline, in his more well-known book Celebration of Discipline he exhausts the development of the subject (you and I), and yes there are moments when he moves beyond the personal aspect of spiritual development but mostly stays on the fringes of the interior.

Agape Required

This is what many Church/Seminary programs miss—these elements go beyond the institutional education. They both are void of love, agape love that is. For me, this is what is implied in the notion of agape. The Greek word elicits something quite revolutionary, a death to the ego toward the benefit for the community. This is what Freire is implying that praxis has to be outward looking, that it cannot be narcissistic.

Most theory that is taught in seminaries today, due to the top-down power model of teaching necessitates theory to develop inward looking people. Maybe this can change through this new form of pedagogical relationship. Maybe, just maybe. What this then mean is that the teacher is in a position where dying to themselves is then taught through the act of doing it. We can talk about it and theorize about it, but it doesn’t become real until it happens.

The pedagogical relationship is not an easy one, but it is worth it when it doesn’t fall victim to archaic models of the past. This is meant as a challenge to fellows teachers, educators and the like, that even the cost is much, the relationships gained and the world that is changed far outweigh the sacrifice.

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