Year: 2016
Type: article
Abstract: IntroductIonCan the concept of Bildung still provide guidance to educational discourse in the "postmodern" world? 1 This question has been asked and answered repeatedly over the last decade in the journals of philosophy of education.Worries about the commodification of knowledge in the knowledge society, the further encroachment of "neoliberal logic" into education, the ubiquity of the mass media, and the apparent "death" of the modernist subject have led most theorists to adopt a highly skeptical, if not wholly dismissive, posture toward the all-too sanguine promises of Bildung.Jan Masschelein and Norbert Ricken's doubts about "whether the idea of Bildung as it is invoked and used in our present situation is really able to provoke the development of an alternative to our actual dominant form of life and dominant form of subjection" are typical.2 If one does indulge in hope for the concept, its formulation is seldom very assuring.For Michael Wimmer, the "ruins" of Bildung in contemporary society are at least an indication that educational discourse can resist utter economic appropriation, and for IIan Gur-Ze'ev, a "pessimistic utopianism" seems the only fruitful critical orientation left to adopt. 3 Theodor Adorno is often referred to as one of the first theorists to express serious reservations about the aptness of the Bildung ideal.
Source: Philosophy of education
DOI: 10.47925/2016.204
Author: Douglas Yacek
Institution: Leibniz University Hannover
Language: English
Subfield: Sociology and Political Science
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
SDG: Quality education
Open Access status: bronze
OpenAlex ID: W2807657794