In the Spirit of Struggle: A Barrio Pedagogy Compass of Love, Care, and Compassion

Abstract

Scholars show how community cultural wealth exists for students of color in educational institutions where some knowledge is devalued yet serve as a tool to thrive. Although critical pedagogy scholars and criminal justice education independently offer a rich body of work, there has been little connection between criminal justice and pedagogical practices of love, care, and compassion. This article introduces the concept of barrio pedagogy through a trauma stewardship framework which provides a compass of five sacred directions to engage with radical teaching in times of social injustice. The compass guides how to teach within a context of punishment through 1. visualization with intentional love, 2. plans/solutions for the context struggle, 3. change through service and loving carework, 4. bodymindspirit rest, and 5. daily practices for balance. By utilizing this compass, scholars, educators, students, organizers, and practitioners can be informed when facilitating knowledge for the purposes of humanizing and enacting social change in contemporary criminalized spaces.

Keywords:

• Pedagogy
• love
• healing
• social justice education
• carework
• community cultural wealth

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank all the teachers before me, mentors, and my children and students for inspiring me to write this.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1 Ruth Wilson Gilmore argues that a place-based struggle is a liberation struggle, one that is specific to the needs of people where they are. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2CS627aKrJI&t=520s

2 I use “visual” and “visualization” interchangeably to refer to a process of creating a material imagination, one that includes intentions, purpose, people, earth, images, roadmaps, and tools.

3 Eduardo Galeano’s interview in Spanish: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X7lC4Bxojb8

4 loving kindness meditation link: https://www.mindful.org/this-loving-kindness-meditation-is-a-radical-act-of-love/

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Katherine L. Maldonado-Fabela

Katherine Maldonado Fabela is a Chicana mother and scholar-activist from South Central Los Angeles and a PhD candidate at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Her research areas include socio legal studies, medical sociology, inequalities, and visual and feminist methodologies. She examines the mental health impacts of child welfare system involvement for criminalized Chicana/Latina mothers and their families across the life course.