The 3rd Annual Bergen Educational Conversation: Existentialism and Education

Educational challenges in the light of existentialism will be the central issue of this year’s ‘Bergen Educational Conversation.’ Back to Kierkegaard’s time, and right up to our time, existentialism represents a critique of placing the individual into a system, as we in our day institutionalise students for example. According to an existential thinker, any institutionalisation is a way to deprive the individual’s uniqueness. Thus existential education is something completely different from education as socialisation or cultivation where the individual is supposed to become part of something that is already established. Existential education, on the other hand, deals with issues about attitudes to life, ways of living, freedom, responsibility, meaning, choice, values, and the like. Attention to these existential matters in education is not common. Instead there is a substantial body of educational work on the qualification function of education, where the idea is that students shall qualify for something specific, be it a subject, a profession, or the like. And there is a substantial body of educational work that focuses on the socialisation function of education aiming at the insertion of individuals into existing social, cultural, political and other ‘orders.’ From Kierkegaard, Levinas and others we have been aware of a deep moral betrayal in relation to having responsibility for the other. Even today’s schools strengthen, through specific pedagogical practices, the students’ egocentricity and lack of responsible actions. Often we see that education is largely directed at self-gain, freedom and individual rights, which occurs at the cost of others. Against this perspective, which is about cultivating oneself in a competitive way, we wish to focus on existential matters and existential achievements where one meet one’s fellow human beings with kindness and responsibility. In this way we open for an existential education that stands in opposition to a type of education that undermines the importance of the other. All in all, we hope that this symposium will lead to a renewed appreciation of existential education.   

 

2011 Preliminary Program

 

Wednesday, September 21

 

9:00-10:15am

 

Irony and the Coming into Existence: From Socrates to Kierkegaard and Beyond

Lecturer: Herner Sæverot (University of Bergen)

Respondents: Tom Are Trippestad (Bergen University College) and Gert Biesta (University of Stirling)

Chair: Arild Raaheim (University of Bergen)

 

10:15-10:30am   Break

 

10:30-Noon

 

Formative Justice and the Veil of Meaninglessness

Lecturer: Rene Arcilla (New York University)

Respondents: Erika Goble (University of Alberta) and Nigel Tubbs (The University of Winchester)

Chair: Ingrid Helleve (University of Bergen)

 

Noon-1:00am   Lunch

 

1:00-2:15am

 

From the Underground to the Ridiculous: Dostoevsky, Existentialism and Education

Lecturer: Peter Roberts (University of Canterbury)

Respondents: Frédérique  Brossard  Børhaug (NLA University College) and Herner Sæverot (University of Bergen)

Chair: Rune Krumsvik (University of Bergen)

 

2:15-2:30   Break

 

2:30-3:45am

 

A Pedagogical Epistemology: A Reflection from Reading Kierkegaard

Lecturer: Solveig Reindal (NLA University College)

Respondents: Jan Reinert Karlsen (University of Bergen) and Stein Wivestad (NLA University College) 

Chair: Kariane Westrheim (University of Bergen)

 

 

Thursday, September 22

 

9:00-10:15am

 

Teaching and Transcendence

Lecturer: Gert Biesta (University of Stirling)

Respondents: Tone Sævi (NLA University College) and Rene Arcilla (New York University)

Chair: Eva Sunde (University of Bergen)

 

10:15-10:30am   Break

 

10:30-Noon

 

Upbuilding Examples for Adults Close to Children

Lecturer: Stein Wivestad (NLA University College)

Respondents: Svein Rise (NLA University College) and Solveig Reindal (NLA University College)  

Chair: Elisabeth Norman (University of Bergen)

 

Noon-1:00am   Lunch

 

1:00-2:15am

 

Existentialism and Humanism

Lecturer: Nigel Tubbs (The University of Winchester)

Respondents: Norm Friesen (Thompson Rivers University) and Peter Roberts (University of Canterbury)

Chair: Ove Skarpenes (University of Bergen)

 

2:15-2:45am   Summing up

 

Tone Sævi (NLA University College)