ES3220
Week 2
last updated 10.02.11.
As we saw last week, postmodernity offers strong opposition to the grand narrative and Enlightenment thinking. The search for, and assumption of, universal and eternal truth is no longer accepted and is replaced with scepticism and incredulity towards modernity’s belief in universal reason and knowledge. This week we’ll begin to consider the implications postmodernity holds for higher education.
Rorty
Last week we saw how Rorty argues, in his book Contingency, Irony and Solidarity, that there are two types of theorist now. There are, he says,
‘those who have remained faithful to the Enlightenment and have continued to identify themselves with the cause of science. They see the old struggle between science and religion, reason and unreason, as still going on, having now taken the form of a struggle between reason and all those forces within culture which think of truth as made rather than found. These philosophers take science as the paradigmatic human activity, and they insist that natural science discovers truth rather than makes it…. Other philosophers, realizing that the world as it is described by the physical sciences teaches no moral lesson, offers no spiritual comfort, have concluded that science is no more than the handmaiden of technology. These philosophers have ranged themselves alongside the political utopian and the innovative artist.’ (Rorty, 1993:4).
It became clear last week that Rorty is particularly critical of the former.
Higher Education - Philosophical or not?
In an article that was published in 1990 called ‘The Dangers of over-philosophication – reply to Arcilla and Nicholson’, Rorty tells us,
‘…the function of education… is to break with conventions, to help people get out from under outdated philosophical ideas’ (Rorty, 1990:41).
Instead of holding on to these outdated philosophical ideas in the desire to find ‘…a more comprehensive philosophical outlook which would let us hold self-creation and justice, private perfection and human solidarity, in a single vision’ (Rorty, 1993:xiv) we need to break free of this belief and look for ways to understand ourselves (and the world) which enable us to re-describe and re-create ourselves. In doing this we can remain open to the possibility of hope without remaining tied to the metaphysical desire discover truth.
Hostetler (1992) tells us in an article written in response to Rorty
‘The notion of incommensurabilty remains important [to Rorty], if for no other reason than to make us cautious about claims to have discovered neutral, mutually agreeable ways to resolve a dispute which do not simply side-step it’ (Hostetler, 1992:291).
If the university can no longer base its teaching on the idea of objective (liberal) knowledge, offering the student an open ended relationship with knowledge for its own sake, or the pursuit of truth, (Newman, 1996), what should this be replaced with?
Justification, Truth or Freedom?
In a later book, Philosophy and Social Hope (first published in 1999) Rorty discusses the problems he associates with the pursuit or discovery of truth further when he talks of the distinction that he argues can and should, be made between justification and truth.
Justification = is associated with the actual present
Truth = is always associated with a possible future
In Chapter 2 ‘Truth without Correspondence to Reality’ Rorty argues that traditional thought sees ‘truth as something towards which we are moving, something we get closer to the more justification we have.’ (Rorty, 1999:38). But this view is mistaken because
‘There would only be a ‘higher’ aim of inquiry called ‘truth’ if there were such a thing as ultimate justification – justification before God or before the tribunal of reason, as opposed to any merely finite human audience.’ (Rorty, 1999:38).
In a later chapter called ‘Education as Socialization and Individualization’ Rorty argues that education can generally be taken to have two purposes. Those arguing on the right of the political spectrum associate education with the truth, whilst those on the left associate it with freedom. On both sides of the spectrum education is trapped by Enlightenment ideals.
What, then, is the alternative?
Back to the 1990 article… Rorty makes his concerns about the philosophical foundations of, and philosophy’s influences on, education clear, he says,
‘I am dubious about the relevance of philosophy to education, … Education it seems to me two quite distinct enterprises: lower education is mostly a matter of socialization, of trying to inculcate a sense of citizenship, and higher education is mostly a matter of individuation, of trying to awaken the individual’s imagination in the hope that she will become able to re-create herself.’ (Rorty, 1990:41).
For Rorty the way forward in higher education will not come through philosophy or theory but will come through looking for ‘new concrete alternatives’ (Rorty, 1990:41).
‘A good new way of setting college entrance exams or of licensing teachers is the sort of thing that advances education. The best that us philosophers can do is to develop a suitable rhetoric for the presentation of these new suggestions – making them a bit more palatable’ (Rorty, 1990:41).
The role of philosophy in fields such as education, Rorty says, is merely ‘therapeutic’.
Knowledge
Rorty argues, that we must drop the presupposition that
‘…the nature and structure of knowledge determines the nature and structure of education’ (Rorty, 1990:43).
Such an assumption, he argues, results in the type of education which closes down the possibility of a better, open future. He argues instead for an education that teaches for an open personal future and an open social future because this would be a higher education in which the student can reinvent him/herself. For this he says we should combine historical narrative (to teach about the past without suppressing voices) and imaginative narrative (to keep a space open for the re-describing and re-creating of self).
Whilst traditional higher education, in its teaching of objective knowledge and the pursuit of truth, is problematic for Rorty he argues that higher education (non vocational) does have the possibility to break with traditional views and work for an open future. Rorty argues for an education which through narrative (be it historical or imaginative,) teaches for ‘…a sense of an open future – an open personal future for themselves [students] and an open social future for their society’ (Rorty, 1990:43).
Lyotard
The other theorist we will look at today is the French philosopher Jean-Francois Lyotard (1924-1998) who argues that knowledge claims and suggestions of universal and eternal truth must be met with scepticism and that we must find a way to sustain ourselves amidst the uncertainty that the postmodern moment brings us.
‘…postmodern knowledge is not simply a tool of the authorities; it refines our sensitivity to differences and reinforces our ability to tolerate the incommensurable’ (Lyotard, 1999:xxv).
Lyotard also argues, as many of you will know, that visions of the whole are testament to the arrogance of universalistic pretensions. Again Lyotard’s emphasis is not on unity and resolution but on finding ways to live without the need for it, and to learn to live without the need to see the world ‘correctly’.
In his book The Postmodern Condition, (first published in 1979) he tells us that without the legitimation that metanarratives provide, knowledge is a collection of narratives.
Performativity
Lyotard’s argument is complex because, whilst he is arguing for the postmodern moment, he is not arguing for performativity rather, he is pointing out that the situation in which we find ourselves (the postmodern moment) creates a space for performativity.
We are now in a time says Lyotard, when ‘the decision makers’ try to manage ‘narratives’ by ensuring that they conform to the principle of ‘performativity’, which means ‘optimizing the system’s performance’ or ‘efficiency’. (Lyotard, 1984:xxxiv).
It is not what is known that is important anymore, but the performativity of knowledge, the efficiency of its transmission. In this sense knowledge ‘can become operational only if learning is translated into quantities of information’ (Lyotard, 1984:4). In other words it must be recordable, knowable, translatable into computer data, statistics and so on. He warns that anything that does not conform to this ‘will be abandoned’ (Lyotard, 1984:4).
Higher education then, no longer seeks knowledge for its own sake, but as another commodity that can be bought and sold.
Lyotard outlines his predictions for higher education. It has and will, he says, continue to become part of the system that delivers information. Universities will provide ‘experts’ for the system who will ensure its performativity. Whereas in the past the universities were called upon to provide teachers, doctors, and so on, higher education now needs to produce graduates who fulfil other roles in society.
Lyotard addresses the ‘functional’ ends of higher education, by telling us
‘If the performativity of the supposed social system is taken as the criterion of relevance (that is, when the perspective of systems theory is adopted), higher education becomes a subsystem of the social system, and the same performativity criterion is applied to each of these problems’ (Lyotard, 1999:48).
He goes on to say,
‘The desired goal becomes the optimal contribution of higher education to the best performativity of the social system. Accordingly, it will have to create the skills that are indispensable to that system’ (Lyotard, 1984:48).
These skills take two different forms:-
Firstly, one type of skill is ‘…more specifically designed to tackle world competition. They vary according to which “specialities” the nation-states or major educational institutions can sell on the world market’ (Lyotard, 1984:48). Lyotard predicted that there would be an increase in demand for experts and high and middle management executives who will be the products of this.
Secondly, ‘higher learning will have to continue to supply the social system with the skills fulfilling society’s own needs, which centre on maintaining its internal cohesion’ (Lyotard, 1984:48).
But, in contrast to the past,
‘The transmission of knowledge is no longer designed to train an elite capable of guiding the nation towards its emancipation, but to supply the system with players capable of acceptably fulfilling their roles at the pragmatic posts required by its institutions’ (Lyotard, 1984:48).
When he wrote the Postmodern condition in 1979 he predicted that the form of higher education was changing and would continue to change and to take an increasingly functional form.
Warnings…
‘The moment knowledge ceases to be an end in itself – the realization of the Idea or the emancipation of men – its transmission is no longer the exclusive responsibility of scholars and students’ (Lyotard, 1984:50).
Blake, Smeyers, Smith and Standish (1998) warn us that
‘Under performativity, deliberation over ends is eclipsed… All kinds of business and activity are measured and ranked against each other with ever less concern for the rationale for doing so.’ (Blake, Smeyers, Smith and Standish, 1998:1)
Lyotard predicts that if education is limited to a functionalist form, in which the only issue is its performativity then we can look for different (more efficient) ways to transmit the necessary functional ‘knowledge’.
‘It does not seem absolutely necessary that the medium be a lecture delivered in person by a teacher in front of silent students, with questions reserved for sections or “practical work” sessions run by an assistant…
To the extent that learning is translatable into computer language and the traditional teacher is replaceable by memory banks, didactics can be entrusted to machines linking traditional memory banks (libraries, etc.) and computer data banks to intelligent terminals placed at the students’ disposal’ (Lyotard, 1984:50).
In recent years philosophers of education have argued against performativity arguing that under the guise of accepting difference and diversity the new performative system in fact does just the opposite, and creates what Bearn calls ‘Disney difference’ and ‘Epcot Diversity’ (Bearn, 2000:232).
This is a view shared by Blake, Smeyers, Smith and Standish who say in, Thinking Again, Education after Postmodernism,
‘Thus performativity obscures difference, requiring everything to be commensurable with everything else, so that things can be ranked on the same scale and everyone can be “accountable” against the same standards. This in turn entails the disvaluing, and perhaps the eradication, of what cannot be ranked.’ (Blake, Smeyers, Smith and Standish, 1998:5)
In Lyotard, Just Education, Gordon Bearn says of Lyotard’s critique of performativity,
‘He knew. He knew. In 1979, he knew that the shape of the university in the late twentieth century had already changed had already become an institution, an institute whose central value was no longer knowledge… not even usefulness… but performativity and productivity, efficiency at any price (Lyotard, 1984a:88n30). Universities were becoming machines for the delivery and discovery of information whose value consisted entirely in its contribution to the efficient performance of the system.’ (Bearn, 2000:230).
Ball argues that the effects of performativity also influence the changing nature of social relations
‘It is not that performativity gets in the way of ‘real’ academic work or ‘proper’ learning, it is a vehicle for changing what academic work and learning are!... This involves not simply a different evaluation of knowledge, but fundamental changes in the relationships between the learner, learning and knowledge, resulting in a ‘through exteriorization of knowledge. …Knowledge and knowledge relations, including the relationships between learners, are de-socialized’’ (Ball, 2003:226).
References/Further reading
Ball, S. (2003) The Teacher’s Soul and the Terrors of Performativity Journal of Education Policy, 2003, Vol. 18, No. 2, 215-228
Barnett, R. (1990) The Idea of Higher Education, Buckingham: Open University Press
Bearn, G. (2000) in Dhillon, P. A. and Standish, P. (Eds.) (2000) Lyotard, Just Education, London: Routledge
Blake, N. Smeyers, P. Smith, R. and Standish, P. (1998) Thinking Again, Education After Postmoderism, Westport: Bergin and Garvey
Cowen, R. (1996) Performativity, Post-Modernity and the University, Comparative Education, volume 32 No. 2 1996, pp245-258
Lyotard, J. (1984) The Postmodern Condition, Manchester: Manchester University Press
Newman, J. H. (1955) The Idea of a University, London: Cambridge University Press
Oakeshott, M. (1989) The Voice of Liberal Learning, Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, Inc.
Rorty, R. (1990) The Dangers of Over-Philosophication – Reply to Arcilla and Nicholson Educational Theory, Winter 1990, Vol. 40, No.1
Tubbs, N. (2005) Philosophy of the Teacher, London: Blackwell (particularly pages 195-199)
Tubbs, N. (2004) Philosophy’s Higher Education, London: Kluwer (the Introduction might be particularly useful)
