Education, how, what and for whom?
Education has been at the centre of some of the most important debates in recent years. Words and expressions such as burnout; students’ mental health pathologies; workers’ “blackout” and inadequate training; teacher shortages; digital “teaching”; have spread to the “common sense” lexicon. In parallel, a new wave of strikes, from Chicago to South Africa, from Amsterdam to Lisbon, has since 2008 put teachers’ struggles i.a. for public education in the forefront of social movements, in what seems to be a trend toward a global response to the degradation of public services in the era of declining capitalism.
in this edition…
Capital versus public education defended by the working classes
Developing an antisystemic strategy by the world working class against capitalist totalising offensive over the education of peoples is an urgent and non-deferrable task. To this end, a correct diagnosis of the correlation of forces in worldwide education is essential and is an effective contribution that can be made nationally and internationally by research collectives committed to the emancipation of workers from the capitalist order. It is undeniable that, at some point, such efforts—combined with persistent struggles against attacks on public education—may coalesce into a “party,” as occurred with the International Workingmen’s Association in the second half of the nineteenth century.
Vygotsky and the Pedagogy of Contents: Deconstructing the Sacralisation of Processes.
Description
In the context of contemporary education, characterised by the emptying of disciplinary content in favor of active methodologies and competencies (as proposed in the Brazilian National Common Curricular Base, or BNCC), Lev Vygotsky emerges as a key critical interlocutor. Although he did not explicitly defend a “pedagogy of content,” his cultural-historical theory demonstrates that effective, educational processes necessarily depend on the mediation of systematised knowledge, especially scientific concepts and language. Vygotsky overcomes the false dichotomy between content and process by showing that cognitive development occurs when content knowledge is actively and mediately appropriated, rejecting both content- based traditionalism and empty activism. Thus, his work provides the basis for a pedagogy that, without denying the importance of innovative methodologies, reintroduces content as the structuring axis of teaching practice and emphasizes the irreplaceable role of the professor in the intentional mediation of knowledge.
“Teaching is a relationship, and children and young people have been convinced not to learn.”
We interviewed Carlos Fernández Liria1, one of the most original and thought-provoking thinkers in education. In this interview, he attacks the notion of competencies, presented with a leftist veneer that he considers “delusional,” questions a school emptied of sci- entific subjects, and recalls how all this aims to disqualify students (depriving them of the possibility of a profession) to serve as a precarious, flexible, and alienated workforce that characterizes present capitalist society. He argues that school is not for feeding moral preachings, whether of citizenship or entrepreneurship, as the intellectuals of capital want. He advocates that teachers return to fighting for their academic and teaching freedom, affirming their status as intellectual organizers of science, art, and culture at all levels – against governments, corporations, the OECD, the World Bank, and UNESCO, which turn schools into laboratories for adapt- ing young people to the market, destroying the teaching profession. He is a staunch advocate for a transformative, egalitarian, and democratic school system that is public, free, and universal, truly committed to the systematic rigor of teaching and learning pro- cesses capable of ensuring the historical and critical education of new generations.