To Be As Not To Be: In Search of an Alternative Humanism in the Light of Early Daoism and Deconstruction

Humanism and humanistic education have been recognised as an issue of the utmost importance, whether in the East or in the West. Underpinning the Eastern and Western humanism is a common belief that there is an essence or essences of humanness. In the Confucian tradition, the core of humanity lies in the idea of ‘ren’; in the Platonic tradition, ‘rationality’. For some critics, this belief may lead to violence as much as justice. One way to be aware of the danger is not to follow the line of traditional humanism without question. The strategy that the early Daoists and the contemporary philosopher Derrida use is to challenge, question, rethink, re‐examine, and reposition the meaning of self. In this article, I will first argue that the idea of non‐I (or non‐self) in early Daoism is indeed a ‘question of the self’ as well as a doubt cast upon the ‘junzi’ (君子) or sage (聖賢) in Confucian orthodoxy. Then, I explore the concept of human subject in Derrida. The consonance between the Daoist undoing of the self and Derrida's deconstructing subject sheds new light on our understanding of humanistic education.     

From the Philosophy of Consciousness to the Philosophy of Difference: The subject for education after humanism

Abstract

Biesta has suggested that education after humanism should be interested in existence, not essence, in what the subject can do, not in what the subject is—the truth about the subject—and this is the way inspired by Foucault and Levinas. In this article, I analyze Foucault’s alleged deconstruction and reconfiguration of the subject and Levinas’ approach to human subjectivity and suggest that Foucault’s early and later works have already implied certain concepts of the subject and that Levinas’ approach to human subjectivity does not, as has often been perceived in educational circles, avoid theorizing about human subjectivity. Drawing on the French philosophy of difference, particularly Levinas’ ideas of alterity and subjectivity, I propose a post-humanist subject as a singular existence that ‘announces, promises, and at the same time conceals’, that cannot be exhausted, totalized, and replicated. The singular and unique subject, open and responsible to the world and beyond, is indispensible to the educational mission of subjectification.     

‘To Catch at and Let Go’: David Bakhurst,Phenomenology and Post‐phenomenology

This paper examines David Bakhurst's attempt to provide a picture of ‘the kinds of beings we are’ that is ‘more realistic’ than rationalism. I argue that there is much that is rich and compelling in Bakhurst's account. Yet I also question whether there are ways in which it could be taken further. I introduce the discussion by exploring Bakhurst's engagement with phenomenology and, more specifically, Hubert Dreyfus—who enters Bakhurst's horizon on account of his inheritance of the philosophy of John McDowell. Whilst I recognise that Bakhurst's encounter with Dreyfus demonstrates his achievements—over rationalism and over Dreyfus—I also suggest that it opens up certain questions that remain to be asked of his position on account of its conceptualism. These questions originate, not from a Dreyfusian phenomenological perspective, but from the post‐phenomenological perspective of Jacques Derrida. Through appealing to key Derridean tropes, I aim to show why the conceptual idiom Bakhurst retains may hold us back from understanding the open nature of human thought. I end by considering what therefore needs to come—and what needs to be let go—in order to best do justice to the ‘kinds of beings we are’.     

Beyond the Humanism/Posthumanism Debate: The Educational Implications of Said's Critical,Humane Praxis

The late Edward Said sought to place critique and, indeed, self‐critique at the heart of humanism. While the posthuman critiques surrounding the (im)possibility of humanism in postmodern times tend to focus on human autonomy, rationality, and essentialism, Stephen Chatelier here explores the idea that Said's writing on humanism could help us shift the focus from issues of ontology towards those of practice. Such a move, he argues, prioritizes the ethico‐political aspect of human engagement. Rather than making an attempt to defend Enlightenment or Eurocentric forms of humanism, Chatelier probes two distinct possibilities that arise from Said's democratic humanism. First, he considers to what extent a construction of humanism as practice can enable us to see critical posthumanism as a form of Saidian humanism. Second, he explores how (post)humanist discourse might continue to be of use in precipitating thinking among educators about ethico‐political imperatives of education in an era shaped by complex cultural and political relations and a dominant neoliberal rationality.     

Ong and Derrida on Presence: A case study in the conflict of traditions

Ong and Derrida are concerned with presence—for Ong the presence of the other; for Derrida the presence of the signified. These seemingly disparate epistemological meanings of ‘presence’ actually share some striking similarities, but differ about how reason should be figured, that is, what metaphors should be used to conceptualize reason. This disagreement is fundamentally about what Ong called ‘analogues for intellect.’ After describing the history of Ong's and Derrida's concept of presence, we indicate how the ethical and religious implications Ong and Derrida draw from ‘presence’ proceed logically from the analogues for intellect that each assumes. We will conclude, first, that these implications reveal a conflict of traditions—philosophy and rhetoric—but we also indicate how Ong's own rhetoric may permit dialogue between traditions     

The ‘subject of ethics’ and educational research OR Ethics or politics? Yes please!

This paper outlines a theoretical context for research into ‘the subject of ethics’ in terms of how students come to see themselves as self-reflective actors. I maintain that the ‘subject of ethics’, or ethical subjectivity, has been overlooked as a necessary aspect of creating politically transformative spaces in education. At the heart of egalitarian politics lies a fundamental tension between the equality of voices (or ways of being) and the notion that one way of being or one voice may be deemed more legitimate than another; which in turn puts the equality of beings into question. Building from Michel Foucault’s work regarding ethics and subjectivity, I suggest that a ‘subject of ethics’ can be viewed, in part, as a series of relations of self that form the horizon upon which a subject comes to work on themselves relative to moral codes and power relations. Ethical relations of self can be a useful concept for those interested in educational research that furthers social and ecological justice. In the conclusion of this paper I also discuss the limitations of locating ethics entirely within a constituted human subject.     

Rethinking the Subject: (de)constructing human agency in environmental education research

In this article I critically analyse some of the ways in which human subjectivity and agency are constructed in contemporary discourses of environmental education research, with particular reference to conceptual change discourses such as those borrowed from ‘misconceptions’ research in science education. I argue that the methods of constructivist science education research are not necessarily applicable to either the (human) ‘subjects’ or subject‐matters (in an epistemological sense) of environmental education, and that poststructuralist methodologies may provide useful frames for rethinking the ways in which understandings of human subjectivity and agency are deployed in environmental education research.     

Inadequacies in the concept of neutrality 1

While the need for humanising education is pressing in neoliberal societies, the conditions for its possibility in formal institutions have become particularly cramped. A constellation of factors – the strength of neoliberal ideologies, the corporatisation of universities, the conflation of human freedom with consumer satisfaction and a wider crisis of hope in the possibility or desirability of social change – make it difficult to apply classical theories of subject-transformation to new work in critical pedagogy. In particular, the growth of interest in pedagogies of comfort (as illustrated in certain forms of ‘therapeutic’ education and concerns about student ‘satisfaction’ in universities) and resistance to critical pedagogies suggest that subjectivty has become a primary site of political struggle in education. However, it can no longer be assumed that educators can (or should) liberate students' repressed desires for humanisation by politicising curricula, pedagogy or institutions. Rather, we must work to understand the new meanings and affective conditions of critical subjectivity itself. Bringing critical theories of subject transformation together with new work on ‘pedagogies of discomfort’, I suggest we can create new ways of opening up possibilities for critical education that respond to neoliberal subjectivities without corresponding to or affirming them.     

The Significance of Myth for Environmental Education

Philosophers of education have argued that in order for Environmental Education's goals to succeed, students must form bonds and place attachments with nature. Some argue that immersive experiences in nature will be sufficient to form such attachments. However, this may not be enough, requiring other means of motivating them for environmental stewardship. Here, I explore the role the imagination could play for helping (re)enchant students’ perception of themselves‐in‐relationship‐with nature which could support the work these educators are already doing. I explore philosophical, psychological, and pedagogical domains to begin developing a holistic vision of what imagination could contribute for human‐environmental flourishing. Philosophically, I build from Martha Nussbaum's work that stories imaginatively shape our understanding of ourselves and the world, arguing that story—namely, myth—may have a unique power to enchant student's moral and ethical imaginations. I attempt to synthesise Michael Bonnett's rich ‘primordial’ phenomenology with what some mythologists identify as ‘implicit myth’—both of which are drawing attention to the human‐environmental interrelationship. Psychologically, I posit that if myth of this kind can develop a human‐environmental imagination in students, it may serve to create conditions to motivate students to act for environmental stewardship. Pedagogically, I close by identifying authors who seem to embody this primordial and mythic way of being in the world, arguing that studying their writings may help educators and students cultivate this human‐environmental imagination. I draw particular attention to Gerard Manley Hopkins’ poetry for exemplary inspiration and guidance.     

Towards a renewed flourishing of humanistic education?

Humanism has always been constructed out of an historical context. Despite the differences in the notions of humanism mediated by historical particularity, there has nevertheless been continuity in the tradition. This article argues that an orientation towards the ‘good life’ animates the various humanisms in modern Western history, and that a similarly oriented humanistic education is desirable today. After briefly introducing some of Said's thoughts regarding humanism, I provide a short account of humanistic education in the modern era. Here, I provide necessarily brief interpretations on the classical humanism of Plato and Kant before considering the naturalistic approaches of Rousseau and Dewey. Next, I will explore the focus on the development of ‘self’ and ‘other’ in existentialist approaches and the political critique of society through critical-radicals pedagogues such as Freire. Arising from the argument that the critical nature of Said's democratic humanism provides an ethically desirable basis for contemporary education, the paper will conclude by posing questions around how humanism and humanistic education might be imagined in the future.     

What Does It Mean to Be an Educated Person?

Winner of the Philosophy of Education Society of Great Britain Student Essay Competition 2009 ¹ 1. The Philosophy of Education Society of Great Britain Student Essay Competition takes place each year. The winner receives a prize and is offered free attendance at the subsequent Annual Conference of the Society, held at New College Oxford. For details see: http://www.philosophy‐of‐education.org/students/default.asp .
The competition question ‘What Does It Mean To Be An Educated Person?’ is associated with a powerful and influential line of thought in the philosophy of R. S. Peters. It is a question that needs always to be asked again. I respond by asking what it means, now, to be an educated person—that is, how the value of being an educated person is currently understood, and, further, how it might be understood differently. The starting point of this paper then is not exactly the question of how we should best conceive of education, or of the educated person, in terms, for example, of initiation or of moral development. Instead I am concerned with who the supposedly educated person is today, according to the particular discourses and practices to which we are subject. I begin, then, by outlining the notion of the entrepreneurial self from the perspective of governmentality, with particular reference to questions of economy and the way in which the economic imperative is present in current policy. I then reconsider the idea of the educated person with reference to notions of economy and visibility as these relate to ideas of education and the self in Plato's The Republic. Discussion of readings of The Republic and of other texts of Plato by Stanley Cavell and Michel Foucault indicates how prevailing constructions of knowledge, practice, and subjectivity might be resisted. The question of what it means to be an educated person is thereby released from a particular mode of accounting for the self.     

Don't Fence Me In: the Liberation of Undomesticated Critique

In response to Helmut Heid's critique of domesticated philosophical critique, I focus on the metaphor of domestication, which is central to his article. Drawing on the work of Jacques Derrida, I offer a deconstructive critique of the opposition between domesticated and undomesticated critique, arguing that a clear conceptual demarcation between the two is impossible, and that ‘domesticated’ and ‘undomesticated’ critique always carry each other's traces. I explore connections between the undomesticated and das Unheimliche (Freud's ‘Uncanny’), as well as differences between Helmut Heid's and Paulo Freire's interpretation and use of the concepts of ‘domestication’ and ‘liberation’. Lastly, I examine how educators might go about a pedagogy of critique. I argue that critique can and should be understood and taught as a tradition, but one that is heterogeneous rather than monolithic. A careful reception of this translated and metonymic tradition of critique will enable students to see the spaces in which new critique—and critique of critique— is possible.     

The Subject of Post-structuralism: A reply to Alison Jones

ABSTRACT Alison Jones finds in the writing of her students who take up post-structuralism, a confused humanism, an illegitimate appearance of a prediscursive self. She attributes this to some aspects of my writing and to the students' failure to understand the structuralist base of post-structuralism. Jones argues that I and her students are guilty of humanism when we use active verbs such as 'positioning' or 'forced choice', or when we try to imagine what agency might be in a post-structuralist framework. In this reply I produce a detailed reading of Jones'. In doing so, I attempt to find how she produced her reading of my writing, and at the same time to extend my understanding of what the 'post-structuralist subject' might be. I attend to this in the dual sense of human beings as subjects, and the subject of post-structuralism as we teach it to our students.     

The Essential Uncertainty of Thinking: Education and Subject in John Dewey

In this paper, I analyse the Deweyan account of thinking and subject and discuss the educational consequences that follow from such an account. I argue that despite the grouping of thinking and reflective thought that has largely appeared in the interpretation of Deweyan work, Dewey discloses an inescapable uncertainty at the core of human thinking. This move is even more challenging given Dewey's firm faith in the power of intelligent action, and in education as the means by which human beings grow and create meaningful existence. I argue that throughout his work, Dewey dismantled the understanding of the subject as a detached and self‐assured centre of agency. In Deweyan understanding, on one hand, the subject is empowered to reflect on experience and to use this reflection to evolve new ways of acting, thus pushing experience forward. On the other hand, by acting, the subject can create new points of interaction within experience. This understanding of thinking and subject has far‐reaching consequences for education, which must be conceived not so much as the attempt to master and control experience but as the means to create new, unpredictable experience by putting new points of interactions into our relationship with the environment, changing our being‐embedded‐in‐the‐world. Dewey repositions educational, intentional agency away from control and mastery and in the direction of growth and openness.     

Pedagogy Without Humanism: Foucault and the Subject of Education

Education is commonly understood as an interaction between subjects; an interaction between the educator, who already is a subject, and the child, who has to become a subject by means of the pedagogical activities of the educator. Postmodernism has seriously challenged the common (modern) understanding of human subjectivity. The question therefore is what his challenge entails for our understanding of the process of education.In this paper this question is taken up in the context of a distinction between two conceptions of education: education as manipulation and education as communication. It is argued that the manipulative conception is closely related to the modern understanding of human subjectivity, as is the critique leveled against the communicative conception. In order to find out whether the postmodern "deconstruction" of the modern understanding of human subjectivity opens up new possibilities for a communicative understanding of education, Foucault's analysis of the emergence and subversion of the modern conception of man is presented and discussed.Although Foucault's work points into the direction of the recognition of the primacy of the intersubjective - and in this sense supports a communicative understanding of education - his deconstruction also makes clear that intersubjectivity cannot be understood as a new deep truth about man. This means that pedagogy has to do without humanism. The paper concludes with some reflections on such a pedagogy without humanism.     

The ruins of neo-liberalism and the construction of a new (scientific) subjectivity

Given my long-time interests in neoliberalism and questions of subjectivity, I am pleased to respond to Jesse Bazzul’s paper, “Neoliberal Ideology, global capitalism, and science education: Engaging the question of subjectivity.” In what follows, I first summarize what I see as Bazzul’s contributions to pushing science education in ‘post’ directions. I next introduce the concept of “post-neoliberalism” as a tool in this endeavor. Finally, I address what all of this might have to do with subjectivity in the context of science education. I speak as a much-involved veteran of a version of the science wars fought out in education research for the last decade (NRC 2002). My interest is to use this “battle” to think politics and science anew toward an engaged social science, without certainty, rethinking subjectivity, the unconscious and bodies where I ask “what kind of science for what kind of politics?”     

Preservice teachers respond to And Tango Makes Three: deconstructing disciplinary power and the heteronormative in teacher education

This study employs Foucualdian concepts to analyse macro and micro contexts of publicly spoken and silent discourses describing ‘homosexuality,’ ‘education’ and ‘teacher’ in order to identify teacher subject positions available to preservice teachers. The macro context is analysed by tracing heteronormative discourses found in newspaper stories involving teachers and public schools that address conflicting views of homosexuality. The macro context analysis indicates two binary teacher subject positions: martyred (unemployed) teacher/silent (employed) teacher and sophisticated teacher/unsophisticated teacher. The micro context analysis is of preservice teachers' responses to And Tango Makes Three, a picture book by Richardson and Parnell. This analysis demonstrates how preservice teachers take up and negotiate teacher subject positions found in the macro analysis. Combined, the analyses allow the researchers to consider how preservice teachers' performances of teacher subjectivity open up possibilities for re-imagining new teacher subject positions and what this might mean for the practice of teacher educators.     

How to Desire Differently: Home Education as a Heterotopia

This article explores the co‐existence of, and relationship between, alternative education in the form of home education and mainstream schooling. Home education is conceptually subordinate to schooling, relying on schooling for its status as alternative, but also being tied to schooling through the dominant discourse that forms our understandings of education. Practitioners and other defenders frequently justify home education by running an implicit or explicit comparison with school; a comparison which expresses the desire to do ‘better’ than school whilst simultaneously encompassing the desire to do things differently. These twin aims, however, are not easy to reconcile, meaning that the challenge to schooling and the submission to norms and beliefs that underlie schooling are frequently inseparable. This article explores the trajectories of ‘better than’ and ‘different from’ school as representing ideas of utopia and heterotopia respectively. In particular I consider Foucault's notion of the heterotopia as a means of approaching the relationship between school and other forms of education. Whilst it will be argued that, according to Derrida's ideas of discursive deconstruction, alternative education has to be expressed through (and is therefore limited by) the dominant educational discourse, it will also be suggested that employing the idea of the heterotopia is a strategy which can help us explore the alternative in education.     

An Act of Methodology: A document in madness—writing Ophelia

This paper is an attempt to stage some questions concerning methodology and education, inspired by Ophelia in Shakespeare's Hamlet and by Jacques Derrida's poetic philosophical oeuvres. What are at stake are the long traditions of preferences of sanity over madness, friend over enemy, male over female and of clean, unambiguous univocal language over the poetic. I will argue that educators will have an extra responsibility towards challenging the ancient tradition of phallogocentrism, both in our teaching and in our research.     

Transhuman Education? Sloterdijk's Reading of Heidegger's Letter on Humanism

Peter Sloterdijk presented a reading of Heidegger's Letter on Humanism at a conference held at Elmau in 1999. Reinterpreting the meaning of humanism in the light of Heidegger's Letter, Sloterdijk focused his presentation on the need to redefine education as a form of genetic ‘taming’ and proposed what seemed to be support for positive eugenics. Although Sloterdijk claimed that he only wanted to open a debate on the issue, he could not have been surprised at the level of opposition this suggestion aroused. In the weeks following, he blamed Habermas for raising this opposition and for refusing to engage with him openly. Although Luis Arenas has chronicled the aftermath of Sloterdijk's paper, it may be of interest to educators to examine how Heidegger's text is presented. What is this new humanism? If Heidegger's new humanism was based on a mystical attitude towards Being, so Sloterdijk's new humanism was to be based on the materialist principles of a biotechnological age. Unlike Heidegger who rejected technology as yet one further example of the forgetfulness of Being, Sloterdijk seems to embrace technology and the enhancement of the human body and mind as the next great step forward in educational theory. Could he possibly be right? Is education in these times a partner or an opponent of the technological enhancement of the human being? This article tries to identify Sloterdijk's disagreements with Heidegger on the question of the human.