This paper explores the mystical structure of education as Bildung in medieval theologian and Dominican friar Meister Eckhart's work and the 2010 French film "Of Gods and Men" ("Des Hommes et Des Dieux"). I start this paper with a short introductory sketch of the "Bildung" tradition, in order to situate my discussion…

In this paper I try to 'rethink' consistency as an educational quality for the 3rd millennium, following Italo Calvino's choice to take it up in his lecture series Memos for the Next Millennium, and despite the fact that the (final) lecture devoted to this quality remained unwritten. After reflecting on how consistency already plays a certain role…

This paper mobilises the psychoanalytic concepts of desire and enjoyment to better understand how processes of education aimed at extending and defending democratic life might respond to and engage with populist politics. I approach this task by engaging with a particular vector of Mouffe and Laclau's political philosophy, moving from a critique…

This essay begins with the premise that Italo Calvino's Memos serve as a fundamentally educational proposition. Each of his lectures can be regarded as a substantive proposal, encouraging a revaluation of our contemporary world through unconventional forms of knowledge, especially considering the challenges posed by the new millennium. The essay's…

This article argues that curriculum work can benefit from signifiers of Bildung to promote democracy in public education. The argument is built on the premise that cultural and intellectual traditions that value Bildung presume a link between the inner cultivation of the individual and the development of better societies (Horlacher 2017). I start…

This study examines the challenges of humanism and education in the 21st century as addressed by the German philosopher Peter Sloterdijk in his Elmau Speech (1999). In this lecture, titled "Rules for the Human Zoo", Sloterdijk argues that the traditional notion of humanism, specifically "humanism as a literary society," has…

This paper extends well-established arguments for the liberal potential of vocational education by advocating for the "necessity" of craft learning in a liberal education curriculum. The case for the necessity of craft learning in liberal education is established in two parts, the first looking toward Aristotle and the second toward…

In a post-Trump, post-COVID-19 world, it is clear that truth is contested by fake news outlets and misinformation. Less clear is how to navigate the vicissitudes of intersectional discourse without devolving into a Richard Rortyan relativism that denies truth altogether. This paper considers the epistemic commitments of foundationalism and…

We propose a semiotic framework to underpin a posthumanist philosophy of education, as contrasted to technological determinism. A recent approach to educational processes as semiotic phenomena lends itself as a philosophy to understand the current interplay between education and technology. This view is aligned with the transhumanist movement to…

In recent decades, deliberation about public issues has become a central theme in citizenship education. In line with an increasing philosophical and political appreciation of the importance of deliberation within democracy, schools, as training grounds for democratic citizenship, should foster high-level deliberative skills. However, when this…

Many modern discussions on Vocational education and Training (VET) only consider it's goals in terms of the labor market or social inclusion. This article argues that vocations are an important contribution to the common good of society as whole, and not only a method of securing laborers. In order to acknowledge this contribution there needs to…

This paper argues that the dominant modes of academic address, the conference paper, the journal article, and the monograph, reinforce problematic and exclusionary assumptions concerning what counts as legitimate research, whilst also restricting academic enquiry and impoverishing intellectual life. It makes its case by exploring in some detail…

Michel De Certeau's scholars have rarely explored the pedagogical potential of the French thinker's thought. This paper aims at reconstructing the question of the teaching practice in De Certeau's works and, building on such reconstruction, it proposes a possible 'heterological' comprehension of teaching. Moving from an early writing dealing…

This paper is a discussion of the concept 'student active forms of learning'. It aims not at conclusions, but at a perspicuous representation--a map for future navigation and understanding of the concept. From the perspective of philosophy of education, I characterize and discuss issues relating to student active learning in the paper. The context…

In this article I wish to defend hope by arguing that it is a child-like predisposition and that its strength and uniqueness stem exactly from its naïve, infantilizing character. To discuss the concepts of hope and of childhood and the relationship between them, I read in Kazuo Ishiguro's latest book -- "Klara and the Sun" (2021), using…