Since the middle of the twentieth century, educators at all levels have struggled with this concept of education. Parents, communities, government agencies, and business leaders now demand that schools teach practical skills that will lead to good jobs for graduates and a strong economy for everybody. As schools have become more and more driven by standardized tests and accountability scorecards, it has become more and more difficult for them to justify the kind of abstract knowledge that Newman saw as the cornerstone of a good education. This, in turn, has lead to a definition of "educated" that is roughly the same as the definition of "employable." But this has not always been the case. This chapter examines the various ways that people in different eras and cultures have defined what it means to be educated.
The discussion begins with two ancient treatises on learning. From China, Hsun Tzu's "Encouraging Learning," working in the Confucian tradition, argues that education is necessary to shape an inherently evil human nature. From ancient Rome, Seneca's "On Liberal and Vocational Studies" highlights connections between education and the moral development necessary for a citizen. These readings are followed by one of the most striking classroom scenes ever painted: Laurentius de Voltolina's fourteenth-century illustration Lecture of Henricus de Alemania, which depicts a classroom lecture at a medieval university that in many ways looks like a lecture you might attend today.
The chapter also presents a series of modern and contemporary texts that give divergent perspectives on the function of education. Two of these readings come from theorists and philosophers. Newman's "Knowledge Its Own End" argues that the attainment of knowledge is an independent good needing no further utilitarian justification. Richard Feynman's "O Americano Outra Vez" relates a famous scientist's experience with the Brazilian educational system.
A second group of readings come from the margins of society. Virginia Woolf's "Shakespeare's Sister" takes the form of an elaborate thought experiment, imagining the life of a woman during Shakespeare's time if she were equipped with the playwright's intelligence and creativity. A selection from Frederick Douglass's autobiography describes how he, while enslaved, learned to read and write in violation of the law and, in the process, discovered the value of freedom. A speech by the Indian writer Rabindranath Tagore compares early twentieth-century schools to factories and advocates for an approach to education that honors children's natural curiosity.
The final reading in the chapter, "Education for Profit, Education for Democracy" by Martha Nussbaum, builds on Tagore's ideas. Nussbaum argues that democratic nations have a responsibility to train their citizens to become critical thinkers so that they can take part in the task of self-government that democracy requires.
hsOn tzu
Encouraging Learning
[CIRCA 250 BCE]
THE GREAT CHINESE PHILOSOPHER Confucius (551-479 bce) taught his disciples that human beings must always strive for perfection through strict attention to duty, order, and ritual. He did not, however, clearly state his opinions on human nature. Some time after Confucius's death, his disciples split into two camps. The majority of Confucians followed the teachings of Mencius, who believed that the rites that Confucius advocated could produce virtue and rectitude only because humans inherently possessed these qualities. A second group of Confucians believed exactly the reverse: that the Confucian program of rites and observances was necessary because humans were inherently evil. The most famous advocate of this position was the scholar Hsun Tzu.
Hsun Tzu (circa 300-230 bce) believed that becoming virtuous meant altering human nature, and was therefore one of the ancient world's strongest advocates of education. He believed that only rigorous training and devoted study could produce virtue. He compared the process of educating a child to the process of straightening a piece of wood against a board or sharpening a piece of metal with a stone. If done correctly, each process permanently transforms the nature of the thing: the wood becomes straight, the metal becomes sharp, and the child becomes a "gentleman," as Confucius termed a person of moral character.
Confucius's ideas have come down to us only as epigrams recorded by his disciples; Lao Tzu wrote poems and prose pieces marked by paradox; Mencius wrote dialogues, parables, and indirect narratives. Hsun Tzu, the most systematic of the classical Chinese philosophers, developed brief essays that introduce and support clearly labeled, easy-to-follow arguments. In "Encouraging Learning," he employs his straightforward style on a series of metaphors and object lessons, drawn from the natural world, to illustrate his principal point: that education can compensate for natural human defects and make people good.
Long after Hsun Tzu's death, Confucianism became the official state philosophy of China. However, the later, official versions of Confucian doctrine rejected Hsun Tzu's arguments about human nature and instead accepted Mencius's more optimistic theories. Nonetheless, Hsun Tzu, as the first philosopher to turn Confucius's aphorisms into a complete system of thought, remains an important figure in the development of Chinese philosophy. Unlike his views on human nature, his views on the importance of education became part of the Confucian mainstream and have influenced many people throughout Chinese history to devote their lives to scholarly pursuits.
Hsun Tzu's primary method of supporting his arguments in this selection is to give examples, either from the natural world or from figures in Chinese history. Pay close attention to these examples and to the claims that they support.
The gentleman1 says: Learning should never cease. Blue comes from the indigo plant but is bluer than the plant itself. Ice is made of water but is colder than water ever is. A piece of wood as straight as a plumb line may be bent into a circle as true as any drawn with a compass and, even after the wood has dried, it will not straighten out again. The bending process has made it that way. Thus, if wood is pressed against a straightening board, it can be made straight; if metal is put to the grindstone, it can be sharpened; and if the gentleman studies widely and each day examines himself, his wisdom will become clear and his conduct be without fault. If you do not climb a high mountain, you will not comprehend the highness of the heavens; if you do not look down into a deep valley, you will not know the depth of the earth; and if you do not hear the words handed down from the ancient kings, you will not understand the greatness of learning. Children born among the Han or Yueh people of the south and among the Mo barbarians of the north cry with the same voice at birth, but as they grow older they follow different customs. Education causes them to differ. The Odes2 says:
Oh, you gentlemen, Do not be constantly at ease and rest! Quietly respectful in your posts, Love those who are correct and upright And the gods will hearken to you And aid you with great blessing.
There is no greater godliness than to transform yourself with the Way,3 no greater blessing than to escape misfortune.
I once tried spending the whole day in thought, but I found it of less value than a moment of study. I once tried standing on tiptoe and gazing into the distance, but I found I could see much farther by climbing to a high place. If you climb to a high place and wave to someone, it is not as though your arm were any longer than usual, and yet people can see you from much farther away. If you shout down the
Some of the translator's footnotes have been omitted.