Asking for the essence of education with and against Arendt

Philosophical perspectives on education, non-instrumentality and educational responsibility

Abstract

We here aim to formulate the importance of a philosophical perspective on education, as a particular way of proceeding in educational theory. We view educational theory more generally as a way of making explicit concepts and commitments that are (implicitly) present in educational practices and exploring these argumentatively. The philosophical approach is characterized by reflecting on education as such, rather than exploring specific educational practices and reflecting on specific concepts and commitments within education. Hannah Arendt provides a fruitful philosophical approach to education by defining its ‘essence’ in terms of natality: the new that each person brings into a pre-existing world. At the same time Arendt’s position on education, which relies on political theory, needs to be transformed in order to fully live up to her own views on natality. We describe specifically educational responsibility as a further development in a philosophical approach to education.