Epistemological Counterhegemonies from Below: Radical Educators in/and the MST and Solidarity Economy Movements

Abstract

To fully understand and evaluate the pedagogical and educational possibilities of counterhegemonic struggle in the Brazilian context, it is not enough to limit our analytic lenses to the realms of education policy and the practices of formal and informal elites. Rather we need to reorientate our analysis to focus on the practices, horizons, and subjects of counterhegemonic educational praxis from below. Thus, in this chapter I focus on the struggles, histories, and pedagogical practices of subaltern actors, including popular educators, communities, and social movements with reference to the pedagogies of the Solidarity Economy Movement (SE) and the development of educação do campo (countryside education) as part of the movimento dos trabalhadores rurais sem terra (Landless Rural Workers’ Movement, MST) practice of social and political change and transformation.