Critical Pedagogy and the Forgotten Social Work Student: The Return of Radical Practice

Abstract

Radical consciousness in social work has been surrounded and besieged by neo-conservatism for over two decades now. Yet it stubbornly holds on. More than that, as this paper argues, radical consciousness is again in an emergent state. To learn from its past mistakes, radicalism in social work will have to be more responsive to its teaching mission. Within the spirit of that message this paper moves its focus from the street to the classroom. An attempt is made to offer a detailed account of radical social work education in action.