Critical pedagogy as a modality of teaching for social justice: perspectives of Australian teacher educators

Critical Pedagogy (CP) has proven to be a valuable teaching approach to strengthening democracy and social justice towards a more just education. CP challenges the status quo, amplifies students’ voices and agency and calls for socially-controversial topics to be critiqued. This pedagogical approach encourages educators to rethink embedding CP in education to harness its democratic political goals. Yet, critical pedagogical practices have become dissuaded in higher education classrooms under the forces of neoliberalism. This qualitative case study involving semi-structured interviews and direct classroom observations with six university-based Australian teacher educators revealed a range of affordances, tensions, and lingering questions concerning their understandings of CP in varied academic disciplines. They contend that applying CP in their practice is a challenging yet worthwhile intellectual endeavour, given its potential to expose and address social injustices within and beyond education in their work with future teachers. This paper explores how a CP approach can strengthen both individual and collective capacity in preparing teachers for social justice-informed teaching. The findings offer insights for international teacher educators considering CP as a modality for advancing social justice in education.