Published: 2016-11-19

Henry Giroux, cultural studies and film criticism; questions about the border between critical pedagogy and moralisation

Wojciech Kruszelnicki
Pedagogical Forum
Section: Articles and essays
https://doi.org/10.21697/fp.2016.2.41

Abstract

My aim in this paper is to present one of the lesser known, in educational studies and in Polish pedagogy, fields of Henry Giroux’s scholarly work, that is film analysis. Another motivation for writing this critical essay was my growing contention that Giroux’s film criticism constitutes the weakest element within his programme of critical pedagogy. Moreover, I argue here that it can cast a shadow on his scholarly figure, undermining his otherwise well-gained authority as a cultural theorist and ridding his pedagogical thought of gravity through an infantilizing association with moralistic pronouncements, almost impudent social intervention, and conservative, in effect, since it is penetrated by distrustfulness toward artistic culture, the the defence of the idea of the utilitarian dimension of art – a belief that art ought to serve other than artistic/aesthetic functions – above all, educational and political ones.

Keywords:

Henry Giroux, critical pedagogy, film art

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Kruszelnicki, W. (2016). Henry Giroux, cultural studies and film criticism; questions about the border between critical pedagogy and moralisation. Pedagogical Forum, 6(2/2), 243–260. https://doi.org/10.21697/fp.2016.2.41

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