In this article I call for adult educators to begin taking consumption seriously as a site of adult learning and education. I provide an overview of various sociological perspectives on consumption, and also discuss several areas where education, learning, and consumption intersect. In doing so, I seek to convince adult educators to more…

Learning to learn is important and increasingly vital for people trying to deal with a rapidly changing world! Or, in the words of the European Union, learning to learn is one of the eight "key competences that citizens require for their personal fulfilment, social inclusion, active citizenship and employability in our knowledge-based…

Many valuable activities and local innovations go on in the field of non-formal adult learning. With the pressures of day-today work it is impossible to have a systematic overview of these, so that they are forgotten and are not continued, developed or passed on to others. More generally, these activities fail to be documented and analysed, even…

Adult learning is now widely seen as a basic human right (the right to learn) and lifelong learning is similarly recognised. Adult learning within a lifelong learning concept has an agenda far wider than just employability skills. Yet educational inequalities between and within nations remain stark, as does the gap between rhetoric and practice in…

This article's starting point is a brief look at the changing political environment in which the preparation of CONFINTEA VI needs to be seen. It seems that the complexity with which people and their organisations have to cope is growing--the world of today is more complex than we had during the last conference in 1997. The UNESCO Institute for…

This paper assumes that contemporary Western society is a consumer society and argues that the need of global capitalism to sell its commodities in the market place is the fundamental force behind consumerism. A model of globalisation is discussed. In it, we see how the control of information technology means that producers have the power to…

In anticipation of CONFINTEA VI, this article critically reflects on the last decade of English adult education policy. The United Kingdom played an important role in 1997's Hamburg conference by putting forward International Adult Learners' Week, and inspiring delegates by its enthusiasm for adult education. However the trajectory of the past ten…

This paper deals with specific characteristics of elders,1 bearing in mind both their cognitive and their non-cognitive aspects. Regarding their way of learning, the paper refers to basic principles for this group of people: active learning, situational analysis, their experience, awareness that they have--and need--specific time and rhythm for…

In this paper, we argue against the over-simplistic accusation that the media "dumb down" the study of history. Instead, we critically examine the contemporary presentation of history on British television within a framework of analysis of commodification and consumption. We argue that central to the debate is the idea that whilst…

In March 2006, Premier Wen Jiabao acknowledged that the situation in the Chinese countryside is desperate and claimed new resources would be devoted to healthcare and education. This announcement should have pleased architects of the Chinese "learning initiative" who are building learning cities and villages. The authors describe why…

This paper represents the text of a presentation given by the author during a panel discussion on "Paving the Way towards CONFINTEA VI: Balance and Challenges on the Side of Civil Society," in Montevideo in June 2006. The author argues that adult learning, instead of inciting general interest and concern, tends to be forgotten in public…

At the invitation of UNESCO in 1997, more than 1,500 representatives of governments and non-governmental organizations attended the Fifth International Conference on Adult Education (CONFINTEA V) in Hamburg, Germany. They laid out a strategy for lifelong learning that omitted rights for lesbians, gay men, bisexuals, transgender, Two Spirit, and…

It is hoped that the opportunity to engage in dialogue with fellow adult learners from different countries will enable adult learners and educators to become more globalised in their perspectives and to actively take their place in a global society. This article describes a study that explores how an asynchronous internet-based forum encourages…

It has long been orthodoxy among adult educators that those who teach adults need to take into account the existing knowledge, practices, perceptions and expectations of the learners. This is true at both central level where curricula and teaching-learning materials are developed and at local level where adult teacher/facilitator meets adult…

Environmental adult education (EAE) is a viable solution to the world's mounting environmental problems. EAE is a new and emerging field that is faced with constant changes and challenges. While this change presents practitioners with options for dynamic research possibilities, EAE is such that theory and practice in the field face a potential for…