Education as a Horizon of Freedom: Hermeneutic Commitment to Thinking

general courses

Fluency English B2

Classroom

In the hermeneutic spirit of commitment to cultivating lifelong habits of critical thinking, we will focus on understanding of education as a commitment to thinking. A close reading of Martin Heidegger’s Discourse on Thinking should help us to understand the vocation of human being as the call to “piety of thinking” (Frömmigkeit des Denkens).

We will offer careful reading of voices that illuminate rich cultural diversity with the profound hope of nurturing the full flourishing of human beings. As dynamic participants in our education, we are the primary subjects and the integral part of the learning process. Through the long history of dealing with questions of ultimate meaning, we arrive with an unforced certitude at the conclusion that we desperately need a corrective for a system of education which has become fragmented and overly specialized. As educators, we have a mission to serve human beings.

We discover that being a human being, we ask questions. Questioning is the art of mastering (and not domesticating) idiosyncrasies of description and the interpretation of life. The more analytic steps we undertake and the more possibilities of understanding we entertain, the more adequately we address what we see on our horizon. What we discover might be fascinating, rambling, and gripping, but also disturbing and discouraging. It can disclose an insight into a world, which we might never like to see. To understand a human being means to understand the idiosyncratic meanings, and the specific contexts of one’s lives, while taking into consideration one’s interrelatedness, solidarity, and commitment. Our undertaking is to discover the meaning of everything, especially when this meaning is hidden beyond an apparent lack of sense, intelligibility, and faith in life and in one’s active powers.

Hans-Georg Gadamer, Hans-Georg Gadamer on Education, Poetry, and History: Applied Hermeneutics, ed. Dieter Misgeld and Graeme Nicholson, trans. Lawrence Schmidt and Monica Reuss (Albany, NY: SUNY Press, 1992).

Martin Heidegger, Discourse on Thinking, trans. John M. Anderson and E. Hans Freund (New York: Harper & Row, 1966).

Andrzej Wiercinski, Hermeneutics of Education: Exploring and Experiencing the Unpredictability of Education (Zurich: LIT, 2019).

Learning outcomes

Knowledge:

o student is familiar with new literature on the literature as indicated in bibliography

o is familiar with Heidegger’s, Gadamer’s, and Riceour’s philosophy of education

o knows the state of research in the hermeneutics of education and is able to design an innovative research project

Skills:

o can identify philosophical aspects of education

o can address the importance of feelings (curiosity, patience, courage, uncertainty, self-esteem) and validates them in the process of learning

o has skills in presenting aspects of philosophical hermeneutics in discussing issues in contemporary education in an international setting

o can effectively communicate with other scholars in hermeneutic philosophy and education

o as a creative and insightful student shows depth in thinking and elaborating of original and novel ideas

Social competences:

o appreciates the need to learn to understand one’s life

o can set measurable, achievable, realistic, and timely goals and ways to achieve them in the context of academic, professional, and social activity

o sees the need of dialogue between different academic disciplines and schools of thought

Assessment criteria

Students must attend classes, actively participate in discussions, and write a research paper of ca. 2500 words. The grade will be based on the paper 50%. Students should clear their topic with the instructor before writing. Final revised paper due Friday, June 19, 2020. Attendance/ Active in-class participation (50%). Along with the final paper students are required to submit a detailed report about their attendance and self-evaluation of their activity in the class.