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tions and impossible choices, stem in large part from Freire’s conflicting understand-
ings of human hope. Thus, to convert without prescribing; to annunciate a utopian
vision that defies positive representation; to persevere with humble serenity while being
driven by a rage that renders serenity impossible; to wait with patience and yet impa-
tiently refuse to wait; to denounce the ambitions of the irresponsible adventurer while
proclaiming education to be adventure full of risk; to keep oneself focused on a scien-
tific study of concrete reality while acknowledging that a scientific knowledge of reality
is not enough; to restrain oneself to the discourse of the real-Possible and yet declare
that the role of the educator is to make possible the impossible by dreaming it. These
conflicting demands can be traced to the antinomies in Freire’s conceptualisation of
hope. It may be true that ‘without hope there is no way we can even start thinking about
education’ (Freire, 2007a, p. 87). When one’s understanding of hope is full of tensions
and conflicts, however, one’s thinking about education will be infused with the same.
The study of Freire has wider significance in light of the discourse of hope that is
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developing within educational research. This discourse is framed by the notion of
‘complex hope’ first articulated by Gerald Grace (1994). Grace characterized complex
hope as that which ‘recognizes the historical and structural difficulties which have to
be overcome’ (1994, p. 57). Others have subsequently argued that the kind of hope
that educators need to embrace and nurture is one that offers no illusions and is
grounded in a realistic grasp of structural constraints (Carlson, 2005; Thrupp &
Tomlinson, 2005). While inspiring hope is presented as the educator’s duty, it is also
their responsibility to avoid the kind of hope variously derided as simple, naïve, unre-
alistic and ‘hokey’ (Duncan-Andrade, 2009; Halpin, 2001a). For Halpin, hope ‘lives
in the awareness of the world’s limitations’ and should properly be directed toward
‘realistic’ objectives (Halpin, 2001b, p. 401). While emphasizing its critical orientation
toward prevailing circumstances, Halpin speaks for many when he stresses ‘the impor-
tance of grounding one’s aspirations for the future in a comprehensive analysis of those
factors which structurally inhibit reform along particular lines’ (Halpin, 2003, p. 20).
There are obvious parallels between the notion of complex hope and Freire’s
understanding of critical hope – a hope characterized by outrage at the obscenity of
injustice but restrained by a concern with concrete material data that keeps one’s feet
placed firmly on the ground. In terms of its proper objective, too, most contemporary
commentators concur with the Freire who rejects utopian closure in favour of empha-
sizing the open-ended wayfaring character of hope (Webb, 2009). Is it not possible,
however, that the ‘realistic’ discourse of complex and critical hope is rather too
restrained? What one finds in Freire – and what is largely absent from contemporary
discussions – is an awareness that this may be the case. Those following Grace’s lead
reject as simple and naïve the kind of hope that remains uninhibited and unconstrained
by the material conditions of the present. But it was precisely this kind of hope that
Freire (sometimes at least) took as a precondition for transforming and recreating the
world. In the present context, it seems dangerous to dismiss the trail-blazing transfor-
mative hope of the prophetic educator as fanciful and unrealistic. This is a hope full
of risk that takes as its objective a liberating utopia; an adventurous hope grounded in
a profound confidence in the capacity of human beings to construct new ways of orga-
nising life; a romantic hope committed to goal-directed social praxis through which
human beings become the agents of their own destiny and willfully strive to create a
new and better society; a precarious hope which moves beyond open-ended critique
and emphasizes the necessity of transforming society in light of the liberating utopia.
Confronted today with crushing, immobilising material and ideological constraints, if