This article charts the progression of my critical teaching practice as it examines how the emancipatory critical pedagogy of the visual culture of marketing used in my master's thesis study evolved into the critical-democratic pedagogy of the visual culture of marketing used in my dissertation study. It explores how my use of these two distinct critical pedagogies influenced the development of my students' critical awareness of marketing in general, and the marketing practice of coolhunting specifically, upon their visual cultural consumption and production practices.