I hope all my readers know how to use the tags at the bottom of my posts. You will get, depending on the subject 5-30 connected articles by clicking on the tags, or using main words or ideas in the search bar.
How interesting that a paper would be published on Gramsci by UNESCO. How did I miss this?
http://www.ibe.unesco.org/fileadmin/user_upload/archive/publications/ThinkersPdf/gramscie.pdf
And a section from the end of this pro-Marxist paper: my boldface.............and I hope you pick up the Marxist vocabulary. "Ideologies" here would include religion.
Education is a field where theory and practice, culture and politics inevitably merge together,
and where intellectual research and achievement combine with social and political action. However, a distinction, if not an opposition, between these two aspects of education is not uncommon and the
ideological use of culture and science often pushes toward both the ‘neutralization’ of the educational and political effects of cultural development and the ‘justification’ of the political power by domesticated theories, which, therefore, can be defined as ‘ideologies’. It is difficult, within the traditional division and separation of disciplines and fields of cultural research, to define all of that ‘education’, since education is consistently related to the growth of children and the schooling of pupils, no matter whether from nursery school or university.
A profile of Gramsci as an ‘educator’, however, is not based on the few pages which can be
found within his writings on school and education in a traditional sense, but rather on the assumption that the core of Gramsci’s message and even the purpose of his writings is profoundly and largely ‘educational’
As far as Gramsci’s general theory of education is concerned, we believe that the new type of
intellectual in modern society can be more easily found within the administrators and managers of industry and services, within the upper echelons of State administration and in central and local bureaucracy, as well as within the teaching profession and the growing sector of vocational and occupational training, rather than among the traditional ‘academic’ intellectual who still, however, seems to be an opinion leader. The latter is, more or less consciously, becoming rather an ideological shade for political and cultural operations, decided and implemented not by him, but through him.
One could disagree with Gramsci’s analysis and educational strategy. But it cannot be denied
that a study on the history of intellectuals, on the history of the organization of culture, has never been attempted. Intellectuals of a traditional type seem to be expert and specialists on all subjects other than themselves. This is rather meaningful and it can be explained by the arrogance (and the illusion) of believing to be the ‘subject’ rather than the ‘object’ of knowledge. However, for the intellectual function in general, and for intellectuals of a new type, the lack of awareness of their real role in society could engender a greater risk for democracy: it could mean that the real decision-making processes, namely those which are related with the cultural and political hegemony within society, are displaced from their ‘natural’, i.e. institutional and constitutional, ground, where popular control could be easily exercised, and are assumed by hidden powers, beyond any democratic control.
Finally, as far as the visible education system is concerned, Gramsci’s approach does not mean that school and university education are irrelevant within the strategy of educating for critical thought.
It suggests rather innovations in methods, contents and organization of study which should be
consistent with the following main points: tighter links between school and work, and between theory and practice; a growing attention to the history of the organization of work and of the organization of culture, and therefore more interest toward the study of the ‘fortune’, i.e. the different interpretations, of classics and theories; and last, but not least, an open debate on the aims of education and the value on which educational action is based in a given society.
Moreover, this new educational strategy and method affects the professional status of teachers,
as far as teachers do not perceive themselves as traditional intellectuals, and therefore independent from both social and political pressures. Education as a process of conformity and hegemony could disturb most teachers, particularly those who work toward helping their pupils or students to achieve more freedom and personal independence. However, the teacher’s awareness of political hegemony as an educational process, for good or bad, could be the starting point for a new professionalism of teachers and educators.
So, the Marxist is the subject of this paper rather than the Catholic Church, which is the only real enemy of ideology.
Scary, as this was written and published in 2000. Catholics have asleep at the wheel. Read the entire paper and my posts on these points.
