Teaching Critical Thinking: Practical Wisdom

Introduction
1. critical thinking
2. democratic education
3. engaged pedagogy
4. decolonization
5. integrity
6. purpose
7. collaboration (written with Ron Scapp)
8. conversation
9. telling the story
10. sharing the story
11. imagination
12. to lecture or not
13. humor in the classroom
14. crying time
15. conflict
16. feminist revolution
17. black, female and academic
18. learning past the hate
19. honoring teachers
20. teachers against teaching
21. self-esteem
22. the joy of reading
23. intellectual life
24. writing books for children
25. spirituality
26. touch
27. to love again
28. feminist change
29. moving past race and gender
30. talking sex
31. teaching as prophetic vocation
32. practical wisdom

bell hooks is a world-renowned intellectual, cultural critic, and writer who is also Distinguished Professor in Appalachian Studies at Berea College in Kentucky. Among her many books are the feminist classic Ain't I A Woman, the dialogue (with Cornel West) Breaking Bread, the children's books Happy to Be Nappy and Be Boy Buzz, the memoir Bone Black and the general interest titles All About Love, Rock My Soul, and Communion. She has published seven titles with Routledge: Belonging, We Real Cool: Black Men and Masculinity, Where We Stand, Teaching to Transgress, Teaching Community, Outlaw Culture, and Reel to Real.

In Teaching Critical Thinking, renowned cultural critic and progressive educator bell hooks addresses some of the most compelling issues facing teachers in and out of the classroom today.
In a series of short, accessible, and enlightening essays, hooks explores the confounding and sometimes controversial topics that teachers and students have urged her to address since the publication of the previous best-selling volumes in her Teaching series, Teaching to Transgress and Teaching Community. The issues are varied and broad, from whether meaningful teaching can take place in a large classroom setting to confronting issues of self-esteem. One professor, for example, asked how black female professors can maintain positive authority in a classroom without being seen through the lens of negative racist, sexist stereotypes. One teacher asked how to handle tears in the classroom, while another wanted to know how to use humor as a tool for learning.
Addressing questions of race, gender, and class in this work, hooks discusses the complex balance that allows us to teach, value, and learn from works written by racist and sexist authors. Highlighting the importance of reading, she insists on the primacy of free speech, a democratic education of literacy. Throughout these essays, she celebrates the transformative power of critical thinking. This is provocative, powerful, and joyful intellectual work. It is a must read for anyone who is at all interested in education today.