Join bell hooks, William Germano, Dean of the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences at Cooper Union and former vice-president and publishing director at Routledge, and Stephanie Browner, Dean of Eugene Lang College The New School for Liberal Arts, for a discussion, reception, and celebration of the twentieth anniversary of Teaching to Transgress.
Since the publication of Ain't I a Woman?, in 1981 bell hooks has become eminent as a leftist and postmodern political thinker and cultural critic.
In her book Teaching to Transgress: Education as the Practice of Freedom, hooks investigated the classroom as a source of constraint but also a potential source of liberation. She argued that teachers' use of control and power over students dulls the students' enthusiasm and teaches obedience to authority, "confin[ing] each pupil to a rote, assembly-line approach to learning." She advocated that universities encourage students and teachers to transgress, and sought ways to use collaboration to make learning more relaxing and exciting. She described teaching as "a catalyst that calls everyone to become more and more engaged"
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