Teaching to empower: Women and literacy

It has always seemed a pity that Paulo Freire's pedagogical ideas have remained largely the prerogative of university departments of education and that there appears to have been little transposition of his ideas and practices outside of academia. When he visited Sydney in the early seventies his work came into prominence for a time and then faded. Perhaps this was because teachers questioned the relevance in Australia of a pedagogy aimed at Third World peasants and couched in spiritual and political language.