Lance's Reviews > Teaching to Transgress: Education as the Practice of Freedom

Though this is an important book for teachers to consider, I found myself somewhat disappointed. hooks definition of transgressive teaching, and critical pedagogy for that matter, are just too different from mine. Her critical work seems more what Alastair Pennycook calls "emancipatory modernism," which comes dangerously close to the missionary mindset so often criticized by critical pedagogues. I have nothing against hooks pedagogy, but my goal as a critical scholar is to question the systems of thought that produce differences . . . and preferably find new ways of thinking. There must always be an element of renewal and generation within transgressive approaches to theory and pedagogy.

That being said, the last few chapters are useful to get teacher's thinking about how to transgress the assumptions behind the universal, liberal subject (which is bodiless, classless, and speaks a perfect English). hooks deliberately transgress these assumptions by bringing the body, class, and diverse languages back into the classroom.