ABSTRACT
Critical pedagogy is about interrupting in the classroom the work accomplished by dominant ideologies, helping students learn and unlearn. By the time students arrive at the typical neoliberal university classroom, most have been socialized into racialized and classed tales disguised as fundamental social truths. They’ve come to imagine capitalism as the norm, and a sensible economic system, with the freedom to buy as a fundamental mark of democracy. Many have bought into notions of meritocracy – each person will land a place in the socioeconomic order based on their talents and ability, according to how hard they work. People at the bottom rungs of the economy are there due to their lack of capacity or effort investment. Many have learned to distrust labor unions and have a vague sense of the politics of labor. This chapter draws from my classroom experiences teaching about Latinx work in the United States, to first, explore how students think about race/ethnicity, class, and labor, and the connections and disconnections between them, and second, to discuss some strategies to get students to think critically about their own lives as racialized, gendered, and classed, connections between different types of work, and the importance of labor activism.
