“Memory is not loaded, intelligence is formed,” writes the philosopher Jacques Rancière in The Ignorant Schoolmaster. The idea, in any case, refers to his main thesis: the idea of ​​education has nothing to do with the teacher’s ability to teach, but the possibility of liberating the student. Education—more than a question of memory— is a question of freedom: not teaching thought, teaching how to think. I seek to educate, to teach how to speak and write in Spanish, but more importantly, to think in Spanish, not as a language, but as a mindset.

How do I achieve this? By integrating students into the Hispanic world. Speaking to them in Spanish, teaching them music, and literature, so that culture is the starting point. This is in classes in which the student plays an important role, not just a passive receiver of information, but capable of generating his own understanding. The role of the teacher is to be a guide in transformation, not the alchemist. The transformation is in each student: the potential is within each learner. This is why, in my classes, we use a communicative approach as a pedagogical methodology. By talking and sharing knowledge, my students will create their own system of communication in Spanish.

Can freedom be taught in a language class? I think so. The possibility of articulating a new system of knowledge through new signs, and new words. The Spanish language can be a form of knowledge that liberates: the language of the subaltern—thinking from the frontiers of knowledge.

The idea of ​​liberation, as Freire and Rancière think, should not be confronted with a fun, enjoyable class, in which the language flows like a river, in which the water is always in motion. How do I bring language closer? Through communication. Talking until generating a form of shared knowledge.

I believe that language classes should expose students to a new world. Spanish classes for foreigners are a window to a world rich in different meanings. My Spanish classes are not just about putting the language at the service of the possibilities of the other’s language. No. My classes are an entrance to a world of wonders: to literature, to music, to art.

Learning Spanish is learning the language of Cervantes, Quevedo, Góngora, and Sor Juana. It is also learning the language of Juan, Pedro, Elena, María, José, and almost 600 million people in the world. A language spread across the globe, but which seems to be relegated, as if Spanish were only spoken in the United States to give directions, to hire workers.

Spanish is more than that: it is the path of resistance, of liberation. Only the language of the subaltern will make us free. And think in that way to make our world wider.