Maxine Greene

"We must learn to think dialectically—to hold tensions in mind without resolving them too quickly."

"Art calls us to participation; it will not let us remain passive observers."

"The future is not given; it is something we must imagine and work to create."

"Authenticity in relationships means being willing to be surprised by the other."

"To educate is to offer people the tools to understand and change their social reality."

"We must refuse comfortable narratives that tell us how things have always been and must always be."

"Imagination is transgressive; it violates the boundaries of the possible."

"The primary function of schools should be the liberation of the human spirit."

"In art, we find the freedom to be otherwise, to imagine ourselves differently."

"Consciousness expanding requires that we put brackets around the world and examine it afresh."

"Justice begins when we develop the capacity to imagine the world from the perspective of the oppressed."

"We are all in the process of becoming more fully alive, more fully human."

"The arts teach us that meaning is not fixed but created in the encounter between work and viewer."

"True dialogue requires that we risk ourselves, that we be willing to be changed."

"Education must help people develop the imagination to conceive of a different social reality."

"Freedom is terrifying because it means we are responsible for our choices."

"The imagination is the key that unlocks the door between what is and what might be."

"We must learn to hold multiple truths in mind, to see from many perspectives."

"Art is a way of knowing the world that is irreducible to instrumental or technical rationality."

"Injustice flourishes when people stop imagining that things could be different."

"To be conscious is to be aware of contingency, of the ways that what is could have been otherwise."

"The teacher's role is to awaken consciousness to possibility, to kindle the fires of imagination."

"We must practice what I call 'wide-awakeness'—a state of full consciousness and engagement."

"Art reminds us that we are always in the process of meaning-making, always interpreting the world."

"Freedom is not individual; it is something we must create together, in community."

"The future belongs to those who can imagine it and are willing to work for it."

"Dialogue is the space where we recognize each other's humanity and discover our own."

"To teach is to profess faith in the capacity of human beings to imagine and create better worlds."

"We must question the narratives that have been handed to us and imagine new ones."

"In the presence of beauty, we are reminded of the depth and richness of human experience."