[lbo-talk] Myth of Education and Its Political Implications

[Carrol Cox]

In this and subsequent posts I am going to try to develop a series of points
in reference to the terrible human damage which results from thinking and
practice which presuppose that "Education" is other than a meaningless and
vicious ideological construct. Their coherence or potential coherence will
depend partly on the ebb and flow of my physical energy each day, and how
that ebb & flow affects my mental presence. 

.1) It is a loose enough practice that for over a centiry people have found
ways to 'get along' and 'get something' out of it. It incorporates a strong
endoctrinating force but not  an all-powerful one. Hence we  can take it as
point of departure as something to defend. 

.1a I am aware of the academic 'movement' in a few universities a century
ago (e.g. Dewey) to theorize the practice(s) characterizing this schooling.
At the time the theorizing was harmless and even useful because of the
political context. That, in the case of schooling was almost entirely
local. Hence there was no possibility of compelling individual tearchers or
localities to adapt their practice to an abstract theory  . It wasn't a
theory actually, for severala reasons, the main being my concern here: There
was no OBJECT for the theory, since education is an ideological entirty, not
an activity with an essence. (Most statements about Education are mere
babble. 

Thus schools or departments could send young people out to teach after
having tried to indoctrinate them with the superstition called "Theory of
Education," but when they went to work in a given warehouse they remained
free to fit the loosely required activity to their own conditions. And it
makes no sense to say that any one of them was a "good teacher" or a "bad
teacher," because that implies that "Teaching" has an essence. It does not.
One can not and definitely should not try to define "Good Teaching." The
question, "What is good Teaching?"  is literal nonsense. 

.1b. Note, the phrase "The education of Sam" names something real, but if
you try to relate that to the schooling, and refer to the education of
children, you have again fallen into destructive babbling. If you saya "I
got a good education in X at University U, you may well be saying something.
If You say University U provides a good or a bad education in x, again you
are drifting into  destructive nonsense. I don't think clear thinking about
u.s. universities is possible without first getting rid of the Ideology of
Education.

More to come, I hope.

There is more to .1 than given here, but I will state the naked point .2

.2 This enforced schooling also employs millions of us. Under current
conditions, the main question is one of class solidarity with these
millions.

Carrol