NEW
Library Project
Volume 4, Number 1 - Fall 2005
On the
Bookshelf
by Scott Feifer
Teaching
Toward Freedom: Moral Commitment and Ethical Action in the Classroom, by William Ayers.
Boston: Beacon Press, 2004.
Well into Teaching
Toward Freedom, William Ayers names a chapter “Lifting the Weight of
the World: What Are My Choices?” Here Ayers champions the People and
Stories—Gente y Cuentos philosophy when he calls for a commitment to
“...create a republic of many voices, an environment and a pedagogy that
honors the humanity of each and that orchestrates a meeting place for
all.”
Ayers, educator
and activist, is Distinguished Professor of Education at the University of
Illinois at Chicago. He is
the author Teaching the Personal and
Political and a powerful work on the juvenile justice system titled A Kind and Just Parent. In this latest collection of essays, Ayers
draws lavishly upon popular culture, film, and literature not only to
address classroom teachers and professional educators, but to embrace all
of us who are simultaneously teachers and students seeking meaning from
and in the world in which we live. And we do this side by side with others
who are in earnest pursuit of the “full measure of their humanity.”
Like
People and Stories—Gente y Cuentos, these essays celebrate a liberatory
practice that encourages dialogue, empathy, and imagination. They inspire
us to see ourselves and others with compassion. These essays call us to
create communities that aspire to the democratic belief that people
“speak with the possibility of being heard, listen with the possibility
of being changed.”