Advancing Education's Autonomy Through Looking Educationally at Philosophy

• In Event: Education's Autonomy

Abstract

1. Purposes
First, to offer a general framework for education’s autonomy and to draw some boundaries to the discussion. Second, to develop a strategy for considering education’s autonomy and its implications for the relationship between education and philosophy.

2. Perspectives
The paper draws on the Continental construction of educational studies, through Biesta’s work on the education-philosophy relationship and the work of other scholars who critique the ‘disciplinary approach’ to educational studies according to which education is constructed by contributions of other foundational disciplines.

3. Modes of inquiry
The paper analyzes a recent initiative in Israel, led by prominent scholars and activists, that calls for an autonomous secular public education. The paper also reviews the debate over the relationship between education (as an academic discipline) and philosophy, taking as point of departure the question “whether there are forms of theory and theorizing that are distinctively educational rather than that they are generated through ‘other’ disciplines.” The paper uses Higgins’ work to offer a way out of the dilemma between rigor in philosophical writing and relevance of philosophical reflection for education through philosophical-educational anthropology conversation, and applied his suggestions to education as a the social sphere.
The paper also uses and expands on Biesta’s argument that we need “to treat the question of what it means to be human as a radically open question, a question that can only be answered by engaging in education rather than as a question that needs to be answered before we engage in education.”

4. Materials
The paper uses a real case for claiming education’s autonomy as well as work in philosophy of education, particularly on the status of education as a discipline vis-à-vis philosophy.

5. Conclusions
The paper argues that in order to strengthen education’s autonomy, while theorizing and practicing education, educationalists and educators (if such distinction is even viable) need not just use an “educational ‘filter’” for selecting appropriate material from other disciplines (including philosophy), but also to use an educational ‘generator’ for creating ideas. To enhance the idea of education’s autonomy, education should not be subordinate to philosophy, and the question about being human must be kept open and educational. Specifically, education’s autonomy requires resisting the temptation and rejecting the application of a philosophical framework about being human to education, even if the particular philosopher of education agrees with the philosophical framework. In order to keep the question of what it means to be human as a radically educational open question, any philosophical picture of being human should not constitute a framework for education.

6. Scholarly significance
The paper’s significance stems from expanding the notion of education’s autonomy beyond theory and research, to consider education as a social sphere that encompasses both theory and practice. Moreover, from offering a strategy to keep the question about being human an open educational question, one that is not dictated by philosophical positions. The strategy challenges and exceeds the prevalence (not to say dominance and tyranny) of the structured curriculum as a major guidance for teaching.

Author

• Doron Yosef-Hassidim, Lakehead University