It is the argument of this essay that such "exceptionalism" as potent myth, which I link with the pragmatic philosophical tradition, is a critical component of any American reform ethos stemming from Deweyan energies. However naive from premises grounded in the Frankfort School of Social Research and postmodern, pluralistic sensibilities which partially inform Giroux's cultural politics, such American exceptionalism as Dewey supported cannot be lightly ignored as a praxeological taproot into progressive change within this culture. Giroux's critical pedagogy might be incorporated into such a reformist, pragmatic framework and by doing so, make it more radical as a twentieth century version of a Jeffersonian democracy that Dewey sought to reconstruct for the industrial era of his time. Yet it is exceedingly unlikely that critical pedagogy can "transcend" the pragmatic, reform ethos and sustain significant praxeological force particularly in the mainstream institutions and social systems Giroux seeks to change. Giroux needs to more forcefully acknowledge this limitation even while contributing toward a deepening of the democratic ethos, but within capitalism through a critical pedagogy that comes to terms with the limits of change and a deeper appreciation of American pragmatism as a significant methodological engine of reform.

...[M]aking the political more pedagogical means utilizing forms of pedagogy that treat students as critical agents, problemitizes knowledge, utilizes dialogue, and makes knowledge meaningful, critical, and ultimately emancipatory. In part, this suggests that transformative intellectuals take seriously the need to give students an active voice in their learning experiences. It means developing a critical vernacular that is attentive to problems experienced at the level of everyday life, particularly as these are related to pedagogical experiences connected to classroom practice. As such, the starting point pedagogically for such intellectuals is not with the isolated student but with collective actors in their various cultural, class, racial, historical, and gendered settings, along with the particularity of their diverse problems, hopes, and dreams. It is at this point that the language of critique unites with the language of possibility. That is, transformative intellectuals must take seriously the need to come to grips with those ideological and material aspects of the dominant society that attempt to separate the issues of power and knowledge. Which means working to create the ideological and material conditions in both schools and the larger society that give students the opportunity to become agents of civic courage, and therefore citizens who have the knowledge and courage to take seriously the need to make despair unconvincing and hope practical (Aronwoitz and Giroux, 1985, pp. 36-37).