Theorising Creative Critical Pedagogy: the art of politicised agency

Radical educators in Ireland considered adult education as the Cinderella of the education world, cleaning up in the basement, away from public domain of privilege and pleasure. In many ways, the metaphor remains appropriate with a slight lens shift; adult education is flourishing in small, local arenas, where it is easier to adhere to the ethos and principles of emancipatory adult and community education out of the glare of public scrutiny. The metaphor is also appropriate, at a stretch, in terms of the feminist saturation of critical pedagogy, and the reflexivity required connecting the personal and political. Further, the underpinning rationale also includes the task of interrogating the academic, with an eye to the role of furthering emancipatory education, rather than bolstering the status quo. This article will look at critical practice, developed not just in adult education but in community development, and at all levels of popular education, in particular praxis that stems from the arts. I will look at the thinking that underpins praxis, and explore micro-macro integration, in order to comprehend the development of agency, maintaining structural analyses. I suggest that creativity is an essential element of critical pedagogy, to equip educators and students with the resources needed to counteract myriad forces against equality and justice and the imagination to create an alternative. Finally, I will argue that we need to develop our own creativity, to extend our repertoires of organic intellectual engagement