EDD 5229

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EDD 5229 Liberal Studies in Knowledge Society
Lecture 3 Understanding the Meaning of
Liberal Studies A Historical Account
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Understanding the Meanings of Liberal Studies in
HKSAR

• The myth of Liberal Studies in language game of
  HKSAR education reform (2004)
• Liberal Studies as the panacea of education in
  knowledge society

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Understanding the Meanings of Liberal Studies in
HKSAR

• The myth of Liberal Studies in language game of
  HKSAR education reform
• Liberal Studies as the panacea of education in
  knowledge society
• Liberal Studies as disaster in HKSAR education
  reform

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• ???
• 2009?02?19? (??)
• ????,?????????????????,??????????????,??? Liberal
  Education,????????????????,?????????????????(
  Education that enlarges and disciplines the mind
  and makes it master of its own powers,
  irrespective of the particular business or
  profession one may follow.)

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Understanding the Meanings of Liberal Studies in
HKSAR

• Confusion of connotations of liberal studies
• Liberal Studies
• Liberal education
• General Education
• Liberal Arts Education

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Ideas of Liberal Education in Historical Context
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Ideas of Liberal Education in Historical Context

• The origins of liberal education can be traced to
  the Ancient Greece in B.C.
• Liberal art (artes liberalis in Greek) was
  understood as an education ideal underlining the
  idea of liberalis in Greek. It means relating to
  freedom or fitted for freedom.
• Accordingly, liberal art education was
  understood as education for free citizens in
  the city-state of Ancient Greece.
• However, in the political context of the Ancient
  Greece, which was built on a social system of
  slavery, liberal art education was in fact simply
  meant education of free citizens with leisure to
  study (Kimball, 1986, p.14)

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Ideas of Liberal Education in Historical Context

• The origins of liberal education can be traced to
  the Ancient Greece in B.C.
• Nevertheless, the idea of liberal arts education
  found in the writings of Plato and Aristotle
  carries a more profound meaning. It signifies the
  educational ideal that it is an education to free
  individuals rather than simply education for
  eligible free individuals.
• Plato, following Socrates' teaching, saw
  "knowledge leads directly to virtue." He viewed
  liberal art education as "an endeavor that
  liberates the mind from chains of its showy cave
  of ignorance." (Kimball, 1986, p. 17)
• While Plato's student Aristotle sees liberal arts
  education as a means to elevate human minds to
  self-reflective level. He underlines that the
  unexamined life is not worth living for human
  being. (Aristotle, quoted in Nussbaum, 1997, p.
  8)

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The Trial of Socrates
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Platos School of Athens
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Plato and Aristotle
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Ideas of Liberal Education in Historical Context

• The idea of trivium and quadrium in 5th and sixth
  century During the Roman Empire in 5th to sixth
  century, liberal arts education indicated a
  curriculum consisted of seven arts. They can
  further be divided into trivium and
  quadrivium
• Trivium was made up of grammar, logic and
  rhetoric. They constituted the lower division of
  university studies in the Middle Age
• Quadrivium composed arithmetic, geometry, music
  and astronomy. They constituted the upper
  division of university studies in the Middle Age.
• Nevertheless, liberal arts education in this
  period was still confined to be education for the
  eligible few, i.e. Roman citizens.

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Ideas of Liberal Education in Historical Context

• After the fall of Roman Empire and the Barbarian
  invasion to Rome, the Romans idea of liberal art
  education of trivium and quadrivium came
  under the domination of Christianity or more
  specifically the Church in the Middle Ages from
  the sixth to sixteenth centuries. (Lawton and
  Gordon) University of Bologna was founded in the
  twelfth century. It was soon followed by such
  place as Paris, Oxford and Cambridge. However,
  these early universities "were developed as a
  response to the need for institutions to educate
  priests and monks." (Lawton and Gordon, 2002, p.
  51-52)

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Ideas of Liberal Education in Historical Context

• The humanist of the Renaissance and the scientist
  of the Scientific Revolution in the sixteenth and
  seventeenth century respectively broke the
  pursuit of knowledge away from the domination of
  the Christianity worldview.
• The movement of Renaissance humanism can be
  represented by Pico della Mirandola famous text
  entitled in which he emphasized the genius of
  man ... the unique and extraordinary ability of
  the human mind.

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Ideas of Liberal Education in Historical Context

• The humanist of the Renaissance and the scientist
  of the Scientific Revolution in the sixteenth and
  seventeenth century respectively broke the
  pursuit of knowledge away from the domination of
  the Christianity worldview.
• The movement of Scientific Revolution can of
  course be signified by Galileo Galilei and Isaac
  Newton and their work. More specifically, it is
  Galilie conflict with the Catholic Church, which
  finally came down to the trial by the Inquisition
  in Rome in 1633. It signifies the liberation of
  scientific mind from the Christian doctrine,
  which subsequently brought about the movement of
  the Enlightenment and the advent of the Modern
  Age.

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Ideas of Liberal Education in Historical Context

• Liberal education in the Enlightenment in the
  18th century
• Liberal education as the Enlightenment
• According to Immanuel Kant definition,
  Enlightenment is mans release from his
  self-incurred tutelage. Tutelage is mans
  inability to make use of his understanding
  without direction from another. Self-incurred is
  this tutelage when its cause lies not in lack of
  reason but in lack of resolution and courage to
  use it without direction from another. Sapere
  aude (Dare to know)! Have courage to use your
  own reason! - that is the motto of
  enlightenment.
• In connection to ideal of the Enlightenment,
  liberal education in the 18th century took on an
  egalitarian meaning. It is the liberating and
  enlightening education for all human being and
  every human being is entitled to the reasoning
  power.

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Ideas of Liberal Education in Historical Context

• Liberal education in the Enlightenment in the
  18th century
• Liberal education as part of the project of
  modernity
• Jürgen Habermas' formulation of the project of
  modernity as collective efforts of human kinds,
  especially those in Europe in the 18th century
  bearing the consequences of
• Differentiating the holistic reason of religion
  and metaphysics of Christianity in Europe before
  the 18th century into autonomous sphere of
  science, morality and art in the Modern Times
• Constituting of separate areas of inquiry
  Knowledge and truth, justice and moral-rightness,
  and taste, authenticity and beauty
• Developing of the cognitive-instrumental,
  moral-practical and aesthetic-expressive
  rationalities
• Institutionalizing of domains of culture
  scientific discourse, theories of moral and
  jurisprudence, and production and criticism of
  art.

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Ideas of Liberal Education in Historical Context

• Liberal education in the Enlightenment in the
  18th century
• Liberal education as part of the project of
  modernity
• It is in the context of modernity that liberal
  education invokes it modern meanings
• To liberate human mind from religion and
  superstition and lead it into scientific
  reasoning and practice
• To liberate human mind from social and political
  tutelage and suppression and lead it into
  democratic reasoning and practice
• To liberate human mind from aesthetic domination
  and hegemony and lead it into free and creative
  expressions of self
• However, the separation and division of human
  reason into separate domains and then
  institutions have sowed the seed of the
  degradation of the liberal education ideal in
  modern schooling system in the twenty century.

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Ideas of Liberal Education in Historical Context

• The debate between general education and
  specialized education
• Max Webers thesis of division of labor and
  specialization of education
• Industrialization and bureaucratization elicit
  complex division of labor in production process
• Fragmentation of skills and knowledge
• System of knowledge was divided into separate
  disciplines
• Constitution of regular curricula and
  standardized examination within each discipline
• As U.S. universities, most notably Harvard,
  re-oriented their missions from the Oxbridge
  tradition of teaching of the Classics to the free
  pursuit of scientific knowledge, the
  single-standard curriculum for undergraduate
  study instituted in liberal art colleges in the
  U.S. was to be compartmentalized into
  specialties, streams and departments.

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Ideas of Liberal Education in Historical Context

• As World War II came to an end, confronted by
  devastating effects of the Nazism of Germany,
  Fascism of Italy, and militarism of Japan,
  educators especially university educators were
  forced to reflect on the appropriateness of the
  education and knowledge that they felt fit to
  inculcate into the young generations. One of such
  reflection was to look hard into the curriculum
  of major-concentrated, specialized,
  professionalized, vocationalized and to some
  extent instrumentalized mode of study in most of
  the undergraduate programs in universities.

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Ideas of Liberal Education in Historical Context

• As World War II came to an end, confronted by
  devastating effects of the Nazism of Germany,
  Fascism of Italy, and militarism of Japan,
  educators especially university educators were
  forced to reflect on the appropriateness of the
  education and knowledge that they felt fit to
  inculcate into the young generations. One of such
  reflection was to look hard into the curriculum
  of major-concentrated, specialized,
  professionalized, vocationalized and to some
  extent instrumentalized mode of study in most of
  the undergraduate programs in universities.

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Ideas of Liberal Education in Historical Context

• The Harvard Committees (HC) idea of General
  Education in a Free Society (1945) (HC Report)
  and its effort to reconcile the emerging conflict
  between disciplinary-knowledge and liberal
  education .
• HC Report defines the general education as the
  modernized version of liberal education and the
  main difference between them is that general
  education attempts to universalize the
  liberal-education ideal to all citizens in a
  democratic society.

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Ideas of Liberal Education in Historical Context

• General Education in a Free Society (1945)
• Clearly, general education has somewhat the
  meaning of liberal education, except that, by
  applying to high school as to college. If one
  cling to the root meaning of liberal as that
  which befits or helps to make free men, then
  general and liberal education have identical
  goals. (HC, 1945, p.52) However, in order to
  universalize the ideal of liberal education in
  modern democratic society, educators are
  confronted by the structural contradiction
  between general and special education.

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Ideas of Liberal Education in Historical Context

• General Education in a Free Society (1945)
• The task of modern democracy is to preserve the
  ancient ideal of liberal education and to extend
  it as far as possible to all members of the
  community. To believe in the equality of human
  beings is to believe that the good life, and the
  education which trains the citizen for the good
  life, are equally the privilege of all. And these
  are the touchstones of the liberated man
• First, is he free that is to say, is able to
  judge and plan for himself, so that he can truly
  govern himself? In order to do this, his must be
  a mind capable of self-criticism he must lead
  that self-examined life which according to
  Socrates is alone worthy of a free man. Thus he
  will possess in inner freedom, as well as social
  freedom.

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Ideas of Liberal Education in Historical Context

• General Education in a Free Society (1945)
• the touchstones of the liberated man
• Second, is he universal in his motives and
  sympathies? For the civilized man is a citizen of
  the entire universe he has overcome
  provincialism, he is objective, and is a
  spectator of all time and all existence. Surely
  these two are the very aims of democracy itself.
  (HC, 1945, p. 53)

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Ideas of Liberal Education in Historical Context

• General Education in a Free Society (1945)
• We are living in an age of specialism.
  Specialism is the means for advancement in our
  mobile social structure yet we must envisage the
  fact that a society controlled wholly by
  specialists is not a wisely ordered society. We
  cannot, however, turn away from specialism. The
  problem is how to save general education and its
  values within a system where specialism is
  necessary. (HC, 1945, p. 53)

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Ideas of Liberal Education in Historical Context

• General Education in a Free Society (1945)
• Specialism enhances the centrifugal forces in
  society. The business of providing for the needs
  of society breeds a great diversity of special
  occupations, and a given specialist does not
  speak the language of the other specialists. In
  order to discharge his duties as a citizen
  adequately, a person must somehow be able to
  grasp the complexities of life as a whole. .
• Our conclusion, then, is that the aim of
  education should be to prepare an individual to
  become an expert both in some particular vocation
  or art and in the general art of the free man and
  the citizen. Thus the two kinds of education once
  given separately to different social class must
  be given together to all alike. (HC, 1945, p.
  53-54)

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Ideas of Liberal Education in Historical Context

• General Education in a Free Society (1945)
• Accordingly, the HC identifies four
  characteristics which they think are essential
  traits for the liberated mind of citizens in
  democratic society (HC, 1945, Pp. 64-87)
• Effective thinking It consists of the ability of
  logical thinking, relational thinking and
  imaginative thinking
• Effective communication The effective
  communication depends on the possession not only
  of skills such as clear thinking and cogent
  expression but of moral qualities as well, such
  as candor. (HC, 1945, p. 68)

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Ideas of Liberal Education in Historical Context

• General Education in a Free Society (1945)
• traits for the liberated mind of citizens
• Making of relevant judgments The aptitude of
  making relevant judgment cannot be developed by
  theoretical teaching being an art, it comes from
  example, practice, and habituation. The teacher
  can do a great deal nonetheless he can relate
  theoretical content to thee students life at
  every feasible point, and he can deliberately
  stimulate in the classroom situations from life.
  Finally, he can bring concrete reports of actual
  cases for discussion with the students. The
  essential thing is that the teacher should be
  constantly aware of the ultimate objectives,
  never letting means obscure ends, and be
  persistent in directing the attention to the
  student from the symbols to the things they
  symbolize. (HC, 1945, p. 71)

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Ideas of Liberal Education in Historical Context

• General Education in a Free Society (1945)
• traits for the liberated mind of citizens
• Discrimination among values The ability to
  discriminate in choosing covers not only
  awareness of different kinds of values but of
  their relations, including a sense of relative
  importance and of the mutual dependence of means
  and ends. (HC, 1945, p. 71)

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Ideas of Liberal Education in Historical Context

• Similarly, two other universities in the US had
  also produced substantive reports on reforms of
  their general education curriculum, namely the
  University of Chicago (1950) The Idea and
  Practice of General Education and Columbia
  University (1966) The Reforming of General
  Education.

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Ideas of Liberal Education in Historical Context

• Similarly, two other universities in the US had
  also produced substantive reports on reforms of
  their general education curriculum, namely the
  University of Chicago (1950) The Idea and
  Practice of General Education and Columbia
  University (1966) The Reforming of General
  Education.

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Ideas of Liberal Education in Historical Context

• The debate on the required course of Western
  civilization in Stanford University in the 1980s
• The issue of the Core Reading List for the
  year-long required course

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Ideas of Liberal Education in Historical Context

• The debate on the required course of Western
  civilization in Stanford University in the 1980s
• The issue of the Core Reading List for the
  year-long required course
• The list was criticized as ethnocentric in
  several terms, i.e. Eurocentric, male-centric and
  Christian-centric.
• The outcome of the debate is the input of
  sensitivity and reflectivity to multiculturalism
  into the curriculum of nurturing liberated minds

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Ideas of Liberal Education in Historical Context

• The debate on the required course of Western
  civilization in Stanford University in the 1980s
• Accordingly, Martha C. Nussbaum (1997) redefined
  the trait of the liberated mind into
• Critical self-examination The capacity for
  critical examination of oneself and ones
  traditions. (p. 9)
• World citizen An ability to see themselves not
  simply as citizens of some local region and group
  but also, and above all, as human being bound to
  all other human beings by ties of recognition and
  concern. (p.10)
• Narrative imagination The ability to think what
  it might be like to be in the shoes of a person
  different from oneself, to be an intelligent
  reader of that persons story, and to understand
  the emotions and wish and desires that someone so
  placed might be. (p. 10-11) In other words, it
  is the ability of sympathetic understand and
  sympathetic imagination.

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Ideas of Liberal Education in Historical Context

• To summarized, the ideas of liberal studies
  embedded three conflicting themes in its
  educational objects, which can be traced to three
  structural changes in human societies
• Elitism vs. universalism Liberating the minds of
  a selected few or those of the general public and
  structural contradiction between slave or federal
  society and free society
• General education vs. specialized education
  Structural contradiction between gentry and
  literati education in agrarian society and
  specialist education in industrial society
• Ethno-cultural and nationalistic education vs.
  multicultural and cosmopolitan education
  Structural contradiction between nationalistic
  ethno-cultural education and global multicultural
  education

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Liberal Education in 21st Century

• As human society enters the new millennium, a
  number of salient social trends have triggered to
  the reinvention of liberal education at
  university and secondary education levels.
• Donald N. Levine in his book Powers of the Mind
  The Reinvention of Liberal Learning in American,
  points to the fallout from the modernity
  revolution and suggests that liberal education
  as educational means to encounter these defaults
  of the project of modernity .

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Liberal Education in 21st Century

• Donald N. Levine in his book Powers of the Mind
  The Reinvention of Liberal Learning in American,
• Modernity revolution and its effects

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Liberal Education in 21st Century

• Donald N. Levine in his book Powers of the Mind
  The Reinvention of Liberal Learning in American,
• Reform agenda of liberal education

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Liberal Education in 21st Century

• Donald N. Levine in his book Powers of the Mind
  The Reinvention of Liberal Learning in American,
• Reform agenda of liberal education

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Liberal Education in Knowledge Society

• Definition of the problem
• Four trend have changed the problem of
  liberal education beyond recognition in recent
  decades
• knowledge is growing so rapidly and
  uncontrollably that the very idea of an
  all-round (or general) education is coming to
  seem unfeasible
• nonetheless, it seems increasingly obvious that
  knowledge skills of some kind are essential in a
  society where knowledge work has become the
  most productive and highly remunerated kind of
  work
• moreover, it seems clear that these knowledge
  skills, whatever they are, cant be confined to
  an elite, but must be imparted to everyone

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Liberal Education in Knowledge Society

• Definition of the problem
• Four trend have changed the problem of
  liberal education beyond recognition in recent
  decades
• in a pluralist society, the old classical model
  of learning knowledge skills (illustrated for
  example by European elite education) is
  challenged by some groups in society who reject
  the culture in which such education has been
  embedded. (Smith, 2002, p. 1)

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Liberal Education in Knowledge Society

• Redefinition of the educated and liberated mind
• Educated mind is perceived as container of
  educational knowledge and liberated mind as
  container of liberating knowledge
• Following the development of cognitive science,
  mind is perceived as network processing
  knowledge, information and data
• Liberal education, especially in the knowledge
  age and/or society, is defined as an effort of
  enculturation into what Karl Popper termed World
  3.

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Liberal Education in Knowledge Society

• Redefinition of the educated and liberated mind
• According to Poppers classification
• World 1 consists of the knowledge of the physical
  world
• World 2 consists of the knowledge of the
  subjective and mental world
• World 3 is the world of ideas. It consists of
  immaterial knowledge objects that can be
  discussed, modified, replaced and so on.
  (Bereiter, 2002, p.27) It consists of the
  discussible proposition or declarative knowledge
  ??theories, conjectures, problem formulations,
  historical accounts, interpretations, proofs,
  criticism, and the like. (Bereiter, 2002, p. 29)
  It basically coincides with the conception of
  meta-cognitive knowledge or knowledge of
  intentional cognition. More generally speaking,
  it is the knowledge of knowledge-building and
  knowledgability.

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Lecture 4 Understanding the Meaning of Liberal
Studies A Historical Account End