This article considers how students, reflecting on a pedagogy combining academic literacies and critical analysis, emphasised the importance of the learning community it promoted. The pedagogy drew on insights from the work of Theodor Adorno. Through qualitative research, the students confirmed their experience of a vibrant, productive learning community. They wholeheartedly accepted the invitation to be a part of the creation of this community, a community they reported ownership of. They felt responsible for each other, gave and received support and encouragement and developed trust; enough trust to push past their comfort zones and certainties and experiment, drawing on their own knowledges and experience. Their view of the pedagogy highlights the significance of relationships as the key to building strong learning communities that enable effective learning. Significantly they argue, the pedagogy itself was instrumental in fostering these relationships and countering repressive liberal ways of being, which idealise decontextualised, value-neutral knowledge.