ABSTRACT
I have come to know the work of Maxine Greene as a student of education. However, I have come to feel and live the meaningfulness of Maxine’s thoughts as an African-American, a woman, and a teacher. In no certain order, but in no uncertain terms, these are my ever intermingling, interdependent, transforming selves. My ability to understand the complexity of these selves and their corresponding others lies in my struggle to confront the ‘walls’ that have grown in the way of my dreams. Maxine often writes of these ‘walls’ that stand between people and their dreams. They are the same walls that stand between people and their others. Interestingly, Maxine does not propose that we blow up or somehow destroy these walls. Instead, she encourages us to examine them and see who may be on the other side. Freedom, according to Maxine, is a quest, an existential project which means it is a lifetime of confronting walls. In the process of examining one of my biggest, baddest walls, I have come to think about Maxine’s work as it brings new meaning to an old situation.
