Hegel's Schemata of Thesis-Antithesis-Synthesis
The German philosopher F. Hegel posed the schemata of thesis, antithesis, and synthesis which has been used ever since in analyzing social change. There's the one group--the thesis or "the point"--the conservative how things are done way of proceeding and its counterpoint (arguing for another way to do things--the antithesis; and then there's a consensus, reached perhaps through arbitration, the synthesis. But before a consensus is reached, there's argumentation and vigorous debate; and there's chaos, each side pulling for its own point of view--thesis pitted against antithesis, so to speak, when neither the side putting forth the thesis, nor the side rising in opposition, is willing to concede to its logical opposition.
I have termed that phase before the synthesis position is wrought chaos. Indeed, Hegel did not describe the logic of how from thesis and antithesis a synthesis comes about. In the real world of social change, I contend its not a logical step that leads from thesis-antithesis to synthesis, such as the conditional relation ("if...then...") or a conjunctive relation ("...and...") or an exclusive (either...or....") but an existential, catastrophic eruption during which a host of options, some of which neither proponents of thesis nor those of antithesis could ever have imagined would arise from the juxtaposition of thesis to antithesis. A boom!
Over the years, I have used Hegel's scheme with the chaos phase as an addendum to account for movements of social change. And, I make use of the schemata once again to predict the social change in the Middle East that I believe is in progress leading to a synthesis (a societal state I will also describe).
Applying the Thesis-Antithesis-Chaos-Synthesis Analytical Schemata to the Middle-East
It started many years ago. Western nations needed the oil of the Middle East. They had other interests in these lands, too, which could best be served by controlling the entire region. To make things go their way, these nations, acting in consort, set up puppet governments in lands they wished to control, so that their interests were served.
But then came the Arab Spring phenomenon, sweeping across the sand dunes of the Middle East. This phenomenon was made possible by rallying the local citizenry of the region in opposition to the governments that represented Western interests. Western influence and attempts to control particular governments in the region were from this vantage point viewed as instances of interference in the rightful exercise of citizen voice in their own affairs. The West became meddlesome interlopers: The West must be expunged from the Middle-East; They must go! Out with them!!
The country that has most represented the point of view of antithesis against the thesis of Western interference and control in matters of the Middle-East is IRAN! For decades, this country has fought off efforts to take over its government and dictate policies favorable to the West. It even captured American soldiers at one point, initiating President Reagan's attempts at the time to get the soldiers back. Though a pint-sized country, it has nevertheless become a symbol of the antithesis--the insistence that the Middle-East must be held in control by Arabs--that is, by those who live there. And even to this day, the West wants the Iranian government removed and replaced--replaced by one favorable to the West.
So, now we are in the chaos-phase of social change in the Middle-East. It is little wonder that the entire movement of antithesis has taken its thrust toward insisting upon its own self-government without outside the area interference from the uniting theme "We're Islamic!" The radical extremists of ISIS and AlQueda conceive of their Islamic message of unity as stemming from Islamic fundamentalism of the 7th Century! They want no foreign tinge upon their sacred, home-ground. It reminds me of much hatred Pol Pot demonstrated in Cambodia for those who succumbed to French, European influence in his country. These people of the Chaos-phase are loath to continue Western interference in how they conduct their affairs at home.
Nevertheless, there will come a synthesis. The Chaos-phase will crumble and dissolve yet a new stage in the social change evolution will emerge. This will come about as the Arab countries assume leadership and control of their own affairs without looking to the West for direction and succour and money.
Thursday, February 26, 2015
Tuesday, February 3, 2015
University Prof Teaching in a CC
I am thankful for President Obama's ringing endorsement of the community colleges as institutions of higher learning, equal to the university system in stature.
After centuries of university dominance as the only institution of higher learning, it was indeed a marked innovation of the University of Chicago to found this new approach to meld vocational training with the aims of higher learning in the early years of the Twentieth Century in Joliet, Illinois. The university regarded at that time this new fangled learning institution it supported within the university system as providing remedial education that could prepare students who attended it for the University of Chicago main campus in two years, having been acculturated to the basic array of university training at its local "junior college" in Joliet.
Well, the community college movement in higher education has come a long way, since its inception. It has significantly established itself as maintaining institutions of higher learning once it accepted the proposition that learners who enter its doors can benefit business, trade and commerce from the higher education that is proffered, an intentional path carved out by educational leaders in the movement but frequently ignored in the traditional university setting.
I taught some 5 years in the university environment till I switched over to the community college (formerly termed "the junior college") in 1970. I was attracted by the salary scale, considerably higher than for humanity professors in universities. But then I devoted 8 years to make its structure redound as truly institutions of higher learning--in the ambience of a neighborhood setting equipped to provide students with the tools of critical analysis of traditional and present-day technology and for creative designing of manifold conceptual alternatives--localized in situ where its students feel most comfortably at home.
I found that working with professors of universities, I was able to identify many courses in the philosophy curriculum at universities that could be suitable for offering at the community college. Specifically, students who took such courses at The College of DuPage, where I taught, could transfer the credits earned to four-year institutions. No problem.
At the time I taught at DuPage College, instructors (un-ranked status in the community college) found it difficult to get published in the research journals or by distinguished, academic book-publishing houses. That difficulty has been largely overcome, I believe.
The task I had set for myself was to integrate the faculties of the community colleges--some teachers who came from public schools, with those from universities, to get them altogether focused on the tasks of establishing student learning as conducted heretofore in universities only--involving questioning and critical analysis of materials studied. Indeed, the community college setting wherein the training in the methodologies of higher learning takes place should have little relevance to the mission of the community college in promoting the values of higher education in any particular community. Significantly, community college teachers must always benefit from academic freedom, essential to higher education, and defended by every one of its institutions.
After centuries of university dominance as the only institution of higher learning, it was indeed a marked innovation of the University of Chicago to found this new approach to meld vocational training with the aims of higher learning in the early years of the Twentieth Century in Joliet, Illinois. The university regarded at that time this new fangled learning institution it supported within the university system as providing remedial education that could prepare students who attended it for the University of Chicago main campus in two years, having been acculturated to the basic array of university training at its local "junior college" in Joliet.
Well, the community college movement in higher education has come a long way, since its inception. It has significantly established itself as maintaining institutions of higher learning once it accepted the proposition that learners who enter its doors can benefit business, trade and commerce from the higher education that is proffered, an intentional path carved out by educational leaders in the movement but frequently ignored in the traditional university setting.
I taught some 5 years in the university environment till I switched over to the community college (formerly termed "the junior college") in 1970. I was attracted by the salary scale, considerably higher than for humanity professors in universities. But then I devoted 8 years to make its structure redound as truly institutions of higher learning--in the ambience of a neighborhood setting equipped to provide students with the tools of critical analysis of traditional and present-day technology and for creative designing of manifold conceptual alternatives--localized in situ where its students feel most comfortably at home.
I found that working with professors of universities, I was able to identify many courses in the philosophy curriculum at universities that could be suitable for offering at the community college. Specifically, students who took such courses at The College of DuPage, where I taught, could transfer the credits earned to four-year institutions. No problem.
At the time I taught at DuPage College, instructors (un-ranked status in the community college) found it difficult to get published in the research journals or by distinguished, academic book-publishing houses. That difficulty has been largely overcome, I believe.
The task I had set for myself was to integrate the faculties of the community colleges--some teachers who came from public schools, with those from universities, to get them altogether focused on the tasks of establishing student learning as conducted heretofore in universities only--involving questioning and critical analysis of materials studied. Indeed, the community college setting wherein the training in the methodologies of higher learning takes place should have little relevance to the mission of the community college in promoting the values of higher education in any particular community. Significantly, community college teachers must always benefit from academic freedom, essential to higher education, and defended by every one of its institutions.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)