What are culture circles?
Culture circles are a participatory educational and research methodology developed by the educator Paulo Freire, author of Pedagogy of the Oppressed (2005). Freire saw that low literacy rates in Latin America were not simply about individual ability, but about an education system disconnected from learners’ lived realities.
In response, he developed culture circles – spaces where learning is rooted in dialogue and collective reflection. Rather than treating students as passive recipients of knowledge, culture circles position them as co-investigators, drawing on their own experiences to examine social and political structures. Participants analyse their realities, uncover how systems of power shape their lives, and develop the critical consciousness needed to challenge inequalities.
Critical consciousness is the evolving capacity for a critical awareness of the relationship between the self and society by a reflexive questioning of one’s own assumptions as grounded in social contexts (Jemal, 2017). We, as Kim (2024) suggests, seek to move away from thinking of international students in deficit terms (e.g. giving too much emphasis to their challenges: language, acculturative stress, and so on) and, instead, embrace students’ agency and capacity for critique, working towards social justice.
The development of critical consciousness has been placed as a key factor in promoting diversity and inclusion in university campuses in ways that go beyond ‘multicultural competence’ (Linder & Cooper, 2016). Therefore, critical consciousness helps students to comprehend diverse others, develop an understanding through multiple perspectives, become more reflexive, be non-conformists with unfair social dynamics and actively work towards a more just society (Bosio, 2023).
In this project, we adapted culture circles to move beyond conventional diversity training and to create a space where students could engage with race, identity, and learning in ways that felt personally meaningful. We sent out an open call to all students in the University to participate as co-investigators. We had 12 students engaging with what we called interracial culture circles, which involved 8 two-hour sessions spanning across March to May 2025.
Principles of the dialogical approach:
At the heart of Paulo Freire’s pedagogy lies the dialogical approach – an approach grounded in mutual respect and shared inquiry. Freire (2005) contrasts this with what he calls the “banking model of education,” in which students are treated as passive recipients of knowledge rather than as active co-creators of meaning.
The Banking Model of Education:
In the banking model of education, “education thus becomes an act of depositing, in which the students are the depositories and the teacher is the depositor. Instead of communicating, the teacher issues communiqués and makes deposits which the students patiently receive, memorize, and repeat” (p. 72). In this model, students’ role “extends only as far as receiving, filing, and storing the deposits” (p. 72). The teacher narrates or transmits information, denying the agency and creativity of learners, and reinforcing systems of domination rather than challenging them. Students are thus not invited to question or transform their world. Such education reinforces domination by denying students their capacity to think critically and transform their reality. Rather than engaging with knowledge as a living, dynamic process, learners are positioned as objects of instruction.
Dialogue:
In response to this model, Freire proposes dialogue as the foundation of liberatory education. Dialogue is not mere conversation – it is a mutual act of creation through which teachers and learners name and understand the world together. It demands reciprocity, respect, and a commitment to transformation. The following are key elements of the dialogical approach:
Right to Speak:
Dialogue presupposes the right to speak – the right of every person to “name the world.” Dialogue cannot exist between those who deny others their voice and those whose voices have been silenced. Those who have been denied their right to speak must first reclaim it as an act of resistance.
Love:
Dialogue must further be grounded in love – a love for people and for the world. This love is a radical act of commitment to human dignity and transformation. In revolutionary struggle, love remains central, affirming life and possibility in the face of oppression.
“Because dialogue is an encounter among women and men who name the world, it must not be a situation where some name on behalf of others. It is an act of creation; it must not serve as a crafty instrument for the domination of one person by another. […] Dialogue cannot exist, however, in the absence of a profound love for the world and for people.” (p. 89)
“The distortion imposed on the word “love” by the capitalist world cannot prevent the revolution from being essentially loving in character, nor can it prevent the revolutionaries from affirming their love of life.” (p. 89)
Humility:
Dialogue also requires humility. Entering into dialogue means recognizing that no one possesses all knowledge and that everyone has something to contribute. It is important to ask: “How can I enter into dialogue if I always project ignorance onto others and never perceive my own? […] How can I enter into dialogue if I am closed to – and even offended by – the contribution of others? How can I dialogue if I am afraid of being displaced, the mere possibility causing me torment and weakness?” (p. 90)
“At the point of encounter there are neither yet ignoramuses nor perfect sages; there are only people who are attempting, together, to learn more than they now know.” (p. 90)
Faith:
The dialogical approach rests on faith in humankind – a belief in the capacity of all people to create, recreate, and become more fully human. This faith grounded in an understanding of people as agents of history and transformation, not as objects of domination. Freire further notes that the capacity to be more fully human “is not the privilege of an elite, but the birthright of all” (p. 90).
Hope:
Dialogue cannot exist without hope. Hope is what sustains the search for meaning and justice during difficult experiences. Hopelessness leads to silence while hope calls people into action.
“Nor yet can dialogue exist without hope. Hope is rooted in men’s incompletion, from which they move out in constant search—a search which can be carried out only in communion with others. Hopelessness is a form of silence, of denying the world and fleeing from it. […] Hope, however, does not consist in crossing one’s arms and waiting. As long as I fight, I am moved by hope; and if I fight with hope, then I can wait. As the encounter of women and men seeking to be more fully human, dialogue cannot be carried on in a climate of hopelessness. If the dialoguers expect nothing to come of their efforts, their encounter will be empty and sterile, bureaucratic and tedious.” (p. 92)
Critical Thinking:
Finally, dialogue demands critical thinking – thinking that perceives reality as dynamic and transformable, not static or given. Critical thinking unites reflection and action, recognising that thought cannot be separate from practice.
“[…] true dialogue cannot exist unless the dialoguers engage in critical thinking—thinking which discerns an indivisible solidarity between the world and the people and admits of no dichotomy between them—thinking which perceives reality as process, as transformation, rather than as a static entity—thinking which does not separate itself from action, but constantly immerses itself in temporality without fear of the risks involved.” (p. 92)
Central to Freire’s dialogical approach is the development of conscientização, or critical consciousness. Through dialogue, individuals learn to “perceive social, political, and economic contradictions, and to take action against the oppressive elements of reality” (Freire, 2005, p. 35). Conscientização is therefore both a process and a goal: it unfolds as learners move from fragmented awareness toward a more whole understanding of how their personal experiences are shaped by broader structures of power.
Dialogue thus is not simple a method of communication but rather a practice of liberation. As participants engage in reflection and collective inquiry, they begin to recognise themselves as subjects of history, capable of transforming their conditions rather than simply adapting to them. Conscientização links the ethical principles of love, humility, faith, hope, and critical thinking with praxis, bringing together reflection and action. It is through this process that education becomes truly transformative, enabling both personal awakening and collective social change.
Therefore, the dialogical approach is not an abstract philosophy but a lived practice. It is a way of pedagogy that begins with experience, unfolds through reflection and deep encounter (of oneself and another), and returns to action in the world.
References:
