Paulo Freire - Oppressed Quotes

34 Sourced Quotes

View all Paulo Freire Quotes
The behavior of the oppressed is a prescribed behavior, following as it does the guidelines of the oppressor.

Paulo Freire
With the establishment of a relationship of oppression, violence has already begun. Never in history has violence been initiated by the oppressed. How could they be the initiators, if they themselves are the result of violence? How could they be the sponsors of something objective whose objective inauguration called forth their existence as oppressed? There would be no oppressed had there been no prior of violence to establish their subjugation.

Paulo Freire
The behavior and reactions of the oppressed, which lead the oppressor to practice cultural invasion, should evoke from the revolutionary a different theory of action. What distinguishes revolutionary leaders from the dominant elite is not only their objectives, but their procedures.

Paulo Freire
This work deals with a very obvious truth: just as the oppressor, in order to oppress, needs a theory of oppressive action, so the oppressed, in order to become free, also need a theory of action.

Paulo Freire
Certain members of the oppressor class join the oppressed in their struggle for liberation.

Paulo Freire
No pedagogy which is truly liberating can remain distant from the oppressed by treating them as unfortunates and by presenting for their emulation models from among the oppressors. The oppressed must be their own example in the struggle for their redemption.

Paulo Freire
Because love is an act of courage, not of fear, love is a commitment to others. No matter where the oppressed are found, the act of love is commitment to their cause—the cause of liberation.

Paulo Freire
Even revolution, which transforms a concrete situation of oppression by establishing the process of liberation, must confront this phenomenon. Many of the oppressed who directly or indirectly participate in revolution intend - conditioned by the myths of the old order - to make it their private revolution. The shadow of their former oppressor is still cast over them.

Paulo Freire
The correct method lies in dialogue. The conviction of the oppressed that they must fight in their liberation is not a gift bestowed by the revolutionary leadership, but the result of their own conscientização.

Paulo Freire
In order for this struggle to have meaning, the oppressed must not, in seeking to regain their humanity (which is a way to create it), become in turn oppressors of the oppressors, but rather restorers of the humanity of both

Paulo Freire
How can the oppressed, as divided unauthentic beings, participate in the pedagogy of their liberation?

Paulo Freire
Attempting to liberate the oppressed without their reflective participation in the act of liberation is to treat them as objects that must be saved from a burning building.

Paulo Freire
The oppressed, instead of striving for liberation, tend themselves to become oppressors

Paulo Freire
The oppressors, who oppress, exploit, and rape by virtue of their power, cannot find in this power the strength to liberate either the oppressed or themselves.

Paulo Freire
In order for the oppressed to unite they must first cut the umbilical cord of magic and myth which binds them to the world of oppression; the unity which links them to each other must be of a different nature.

Paulo Freire
This pedagogy makes oppression and its causes objects of reflection by the oppressed, and from that reflection will come their necessary engagement in the struggle for their liberation. And in the struggle this pedagogy will be made and remade

Paulo Freire
It is essential for the oppressed to realize that when they accept the struggle for humanization they also accept, from that moment, their total responsibility for the struggle.

Paulo Freire
Welfare programs as instruments of manipulation ultimately serve the end of conquest. They act as an anesthetic, distracting the oppressed from the true causes of their problems and from the concrete solutions of these problems.

Paulo Freire
Indeed, the interests of the oppressors lie in 'changing the consciousness of the oppressed, not the situation which oppresses them';

Paulo Freire
The hope of remaking the world is indispensable in the struggle of oppressed men and women.

Paulo Freire
The oppressed find in the oppressors their model of 'manhood.'

Paulo Freire
It is necessary to trust in the oppressed and in their ability to reason.

Paulo Freire
The oppressed want at any cost to resemble the oppressors.

Paulo Freire
But almost always, during the initial stage of the struggle, the oppressed, instead of striving for liberation, tend themselves to become oppressors, or sub oppressors. The very structure of their thought has been conditioned by the contradiction of the concrete, existential situation by which they were shaped. Their ideal is to be men; but for them to be men is to be oppressors

Paulo Freire
They have no consciousness of themselves as persons or as members of an oppressed class.

Paulo Freire
The former oppressors do not feel liberated. On the contrary, they genuinely consider themselves to be oppressed.

Paulo Freire
Dehumanization, although a concrete historical fact, is not a given destiny but the result of an unjust order that engenders violence in the oppressors, which in turn dehumanizes the oppressed

Paulo Freire
This book will present some aspects of what the writer has termed the pedagogy of the oppressed, a pedagogy which must be forged with, not for, the oppressed (whether individuals or peoples) in the incessant struggle to regain their humanity.

Paulo Freire
Critical and liberating dialogue, which presupposes action, must be carried on with the oppressed at whatever the stage of their struggle for liberation.

Paulo Freire
The oppressed, having internalized the image of the oppressor and adopted his guidelines, are fearful of freedom.

Paulo Freire