Paulo Freire quote: “The greatest humanistic and historical task of the oppressed: to liberate themselves…”

“We want one class of persons to have a liberal education, and we want another class of persons, a very much larger class, of necessity, in every society, to forego the privileges of a liberal education and fit themselves to perform specific difficult manual tasks.”

Woodrow Wilson (1856–1924) American politician, 28th president of the United States (in office from 1913 to 1921)

“The Meaning of a Liberal Education”, Address to the New York City High School Teachers Association (9 January 1909)
1900s

“As early as World War I, American historians offered themselves to President Woodrow Wilson to carry out a task they called "historical engineering," by which they meant designing the facts of history so that they would serve state policy.”

Noam Chomsky (1928) american linguist, philosopher and activist

Quotes 1960s-1980s, 1980s
Source: Wendy McElroy, ‎Carl Watner (1987) The Voluntaryist, Nr. 23-41 (1987), p. 120; Republished in: " Propaganda Review, 1987 http://www.zpub.com/un/chomsky.html," at zpub.com, accessed May 23, 2014.
Context: Pointing to the massive amounts of propaganda spewed by government and institutions around the world, observers have called our era the age of Orwell. But the fact is that Orwell was a latecomer on the scene. As early as World War I, American historians offered themselves to President Woodrow Wilson to carry out a task they called "historical engineering," by which they meant designing the facts of history so that they would serve state policy. In this instance, the U. S. government wanted to silence opposition to the war. This represents a version of Orwell's 1984, even before Orwell was writing.

“At the present stage, the historic function of the Soviet Armed Forces is not restricted merely to their function in defending our motherland and the other socialist countries. In its foreign policy activity the Soviet state actively and purposefully opposes the export of counter-revolution and the policy of oppression, supports the national liberation struggle, and resolutely resists imperialist aggression in whatever distant region of our planet it may appear. The party and Soviet Government rely on the country's economic and defense might in fulfilling these tasks…The development of the external functions of the socialist armies is a natural process. It will continue.”

Andrei Grechko (1903–1976) Soviet military commander

Quoted in "National Security Affairs: Theoretical Perspectives and Contemporary Issues" - Page 111 - by B. Thomas Trout, James E. Harf - Political Science - 1982

“The task of revolutionary leaders is to pose as problems not only this myth, but all the other myths used by the oppressor elites to oppress.”

Paulo Freire (1921–1997) educator and philosopher

Pedagogia do oprimido (Pedagogy of the Oppressed) (1968, English trans. 1970)

“Creation, formation of personnel for the liberation struggle - this is the most important, the main task of the whole revolutionary process.”

Stepan Bandera (1909–1959) Ukrainian anti-communist

"On the Question of the Main Cadres of the National Liberation Revolution" (1953)

“Western civilization presents one of the most difficult tasks for historical analysis, because it is not yet finished, because we are a part of it and lack perspective, and because it presents considerable variation from our pattern of historical change.”

Carroll Quigley (1910–1977) American historian

Source: The Evolution of Civilizations (1961) (Second Edition 1979), Chapter 10, Western Civilization, p. 333-334

“The greatest task before civilization at present is to make machines what they ought to be, the slaves, instead of the masters of men.”

H. Havelock Ellis (1859–1939) British physician, writer, and social reformer

Source: Little Essays of Love and Virtue http://www.gutenberg.org/files/15687/15687-h/15687-h.htm (1922), Ch. 7

“All the tasks are in themselves small, but each one has to be carried out at its proper hour, and the day has far more tasks than hours.”

Hermann Hesse book The Glass Bead Game

The Glass Bead Game (1943)
Context: It is a pity that you students aren't fully aware of the luxury and abundance in which you live. But I was exactly the same when I was still a student. We study and work, don't waste much time, and think we may rightly call ourselves industrious — but we are scarcely conscious of all we could do, all that we might make of our freedom. Then we suddenly receive a call from the hierarchy, we are needed, are given a teaching assignment, a mission, a post, and from then on move up to a higher one, and unexpectedly find ourselves caught in a network of duties that tightens the more we try to move inside it. All the tasks are in themselves small, but each one has to be carried out at its proper hour, and the day has far more tasks than hours. That is well; one would not want it to be different. But if we ever think, between classroom, archives, secretariat, consulting room, meetings, and official journeys — if we ever think of the freedom we possessed and have lost, the freedom for self-chosen tasks, for unlimited, far-flung studies, we may well feel the greatest yearning for those days, and imagine that if we ever had such freedom again we would fully enjoy its pleasures and potentialities.

“The developing world to which we belong, above all, needs peace, because it is engaged in a historic task – the task of rectifying the imbalances created by colonialism; the task of clearing the debris of departing empires. It is, therefore, necessary to work towards a world order that is democratic and truly multilateral and based upon equity and justice.”

R. Venkataraman (1910–2009) seventh Vice-President of India and the 8th President of India

Source: Commissions and Omissions by Indian Presidents and Their Conflicts with the Prime Ministers Under the Constitution: 1977-2001, P.194.

“That member is then capable of the greatest variety of motions; it can compel the most varied instruments to execute the most diverse tasks.”

Hermann von Helmholtz (1821–1894) physicist and physiologist

"On the Conservation of Force" (1862), p. 280
Popular Lectures on Scientific Subjects (1881)
Context: The external work of man is of the most varied kind as regards the force or ease, the form and rapidity, of the motions used on it, and the kind of work produced. But both the arm of the blacksmith who delivers his powerful blows with the heavy hammer, and that of the violinist who produces the most delicate variations in sound, and the hand of the lacemaker who works with threads so fine that they are on the verge of the invisible, all these acquire the force which moves them in the same manner and by the same organs, namely, the muscles of the arm. An arm the muscles of which are lamed is incapable of doing any work; the moving force of the muscle must be at work in it, and these must obey the nerves, which bring to them orders from the brain. That member is then capable of the greatest variety of motions; it can compel the most varied instruments to execute the most diverse tasks.

“The greatest humanistic and historical task of the oppressed: to liberate themselves…”

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