Educating for Change: Lydia Maria Child’s Nineteenth-Century Critical Pedagogy

Abstract

Focuses on the multi-vocal aspect of Child’s Freedmen’s Book, explaining how it is distinguished from other tracts of the period by avoiding overtly Christian teaching and speaking in voices other than that of a white Northerner. Claims that by offering a panorama of voices and perspectives, a variety of literary genres, and works by both white and black authors, the Freedman’s Book served as a tract that troubled conventional pedagogical practice and enabled submerged and defiant voices to emerge.