Service-Learning as a Site for Critical Pedagogy: A Case of Collaboration, Caring, and Defamiliarization across Borders

Abstract

Frequently cited among the benefits of service-learning is the potential enhancement of students' ability to critically reflect upon their experiences. It is often questioned as to how critical this reflection process is in practice, noting that service-learning often leaves students' assumptions regarding privilege and equity unexamined. Employing the concept of “defamiliarization” as the subjective process by which students gain the ability to “break with the taken-for-granted and set the familiar aside” (Greene, 1995, p.3), this study explores if, and how, college students came to critically examine their assumptions about self and society during the course of their involvement in an international service-learning program. Findings indicated that students were attentive to the perspectives of local community members whom they came to care for and that this contributed to their raising critical questions concerning issues of privilege and inequity. Implications for the design of critically oriented service-learning programs are discussed.