User:JennyRosen/Common schools, uncommon identities, national unity and cultural difference

Reference
Feinburg, Walter (1998)

Common schools, uncommon identities. national unity and cultural difference.

Reflexion
In his book, Walter Feinberg raises the question of what role schools, and especially the common schools, could and should have in a multicultural society. Feinberg mainly deals with the philosophical aspect of education and do not enter the doors of the classrooms he talks about. As education has become more multicultural, concerns have been raised regarding the question of whether that policy has weakened national identity, unity and loyalty (2). According to Feinberg, there are several challenges to the aim of developing a common identity in public schools in multicultural liberal state. One essential question concerns the possibility to use schools to connect children’s sentiments to national understandings, memories and norms, without imposing and violating their different collective experiences from their primary group. A second question is concerned with whether memories, interpretations and norms advanced through a common national identity can reflect the experiences of different groups rather than the dominant economic, racial, gender and social class groups. And the last question posed asks if it is justifiable to take systematic steps for the schools to develop a favoured representation of the national experience? (66).

In order to understand Feinberg’s discussion regarding multicultural education, it is valuable to look at his division between pluralism and multiculturalism. These concepts, which are sometimes used as synonyms, are basically different. Pluralism refers to the idea that members of different cultures (in the US) should be allowed to pursue their own meanings and traditions in their communities, while the public (common) schools should strive to unify all children under a single national identity, regardless of their cultural affiliations (6). Multiculturalism, on the other hand, strives for an active role by the schools in recognizing children’s cultural identity as well as their national identity (7). Both pluralism and multiculturalism rejects assimilation of children with different cultural background in schools, but their reasons for doing so are different. Pluralists argue that assimilation violates the freedom of association, as they are not given the possibility to maintain their cultural identities (18). From the multiculturalists’ point of view, assimilation needs to be rejected since it denies the important benefits from community and affiliation (19). Separatism can be seen as the opposite of assimilation, as it argues in favour of separate educational institutions for different groups in order for them to maintain their specific identity.

For the pluralist, separatism violates the freedom of association just as much as assimilation, as it locks the child into a presupposed identity and, therefore, should be rejected. According to a multiculturalist perspective, separatism is regarded as a tool for maintaining cultural identities and development of cultural affiliation and pride, but it does not achieve the understanding and recognition of different cultures, which is a central goal in education for multiculturalists (19). The pluralist perspective is based on the idea that there are two different spheres of identity formation – a cultural as well as a public one. The goal of the public school is to prepare children for a life in the public sphere (economical and political) and to establish a common citizenry, holding certain values and attitudes central in modern industrial societies (20). Due to the division between public and culture spheres, the school should aim for a “cultural-neutral” environment, in which different cultural expressions are allowed, but encouraged only as means to a diverse but unified nation (20). The goal with education is civic harmony and a national identity (21). (One could ask if such cultural neutral environment is possible and whether it is not the case of just one dominating culture (liberal, capitalist) which is not perceived as a culture but as the “truth”). Respect for individuals from different cultural groups is essential but should be based on individual accomplishment and not cultural background (21). The multiculturalists disagree with the separation between cultural and public spheres and argues that the school culture tends to reflect that of the dominant group, while other cultures are marginalized into the private sphere – that, if the assymetry of power between different cultures are not taken into account and dealt with in school (21). If schools do not address the issue of power and the stigmatization and marginalisation of some cultural groups, they will reinforce the degradation of the latter (22). Therefore, schools can not only focus on the inclusion but should also take into account contemporary and historic practices of exclusion (24). Multiculturalists argue that the public is cultural and that cultural identity should not only be allowed but, in fact, encouraged in schools (24). Individual growth is made through cultural affiliations, as those provide meaning to individuals. Therefore, cultural communities are the preconditions of individual growth (25). In other words, while pluralism seeks national consensus, multiculturalism seeks cultural authenticity (26).

In his title, Feinberg uses the word common schools instead of government schools, since he wants to emphasize the rationale and purpose of the schools rather than how the school is supported and controlled (3). Then, he goes on talking about public schools and how the tasks performed by them are justified in regard to two central functions in a liberal society. The first is to socialize children in the general rules of society by establishing a commitment to the safety an well being of other members in the society (nation state). That is important for the public safety as well as a mean to provide them with skills in order to advance both their individual and social interest, which also serves in the development of society. And second, to reproduce the basic values of a liberal society in order to assure its continuation. These basic values can be sum up in three principled reasons: equal opportunity, freedom of association and individual growth (9). Equality of educational opportunity is important in order to compensate for inequalities that arise due to other liberal commitments such as individual choice (10). Freedom of association is essential for maintaining a democratic society. People should be allowed to form whatever alliances they may choose and children need to be educated regarding the implications of the different social choices they make. Children do not have to relive the life of their parents, but should be introduced to different ways of life and the diversity of human culture, so that an individual choice is possible (11). Individual growth refers to the right of children to choose their own conceptions of the good and to develop their talents and tastes as long as they do not deny others the same possibility. As in the case of freedom of association, this requires schools to present children with new ways and to open up for alternatives (11). Critics may ask what gives schools the right to teach values to other peoples’ children. Feinberg writes that schools do not teach children what to choose but how to choose (13), which could be seen as legitimate. But Feinberg also argues that a multicultural education does more than just provide children with tools of how to choose, since it leads them into an acceptance of a single conception of the good while rejecting other possibilities. (13). The schools need to be able to justify these changes in children’s ideas and values (14). Therefore, in regard to justification of public education, it is important to examine the responsibilities towards both the ideal of cultural communities as well as the ideals of a liberal democratic nation (17) (which also doesn’t have to contradictory)(( (which do not have to be mutually exclusive).)).

The difference between educational democracy and political democracy is important in order to understand the limits of what can be justified in regard to school and minority groups (27). If the state has the authority to require that children experience certain kinds of education, on the ground that it advances a legitimate state interest, then it is a political goal and one which can be questioned on educational grounds (29).

Looking at the common school from an historical point of view, it could be said that the general vision has been to deliberate with the public on behalf of the nation and values of liberty. This meant that children from different backgrounds would unite on a shared national identity and linked together in a common epistemological and moral order (33). However, the vision was hardly accomplished, as different groups (blacks, women, working-class, Asians) were not given the same opportunities as other, more privileged groups. The failure throughout history to include all children in common schools increased the scepticism of many in the US towards the common school and public education (33). This view is partly grounded on the belief that the nation-state, as the foundation of public education, is arbitrary and mainly a tool for dominant groups to remain in power (33). Feinberg brings us to a philosophical argumentation concerning fairness and arbitrariness, which I would leave out from this presentation. Furthermore, he also asks what it means to have a national identity. This is essential as in my reading of him, views the nation-state as “the” organisation of societies in the world and as the foundation of liberal democracy. However, nations and their boundaries are constructed and need nationalism and the reproduction of national identities in order to continue to exist (37). A nation exists partly because a group of people made an enffort shaping and reshaping a certain identity and nations are connected to states because of the need to protect and to develop this identity (91). Still, the construction of the nation is not arbitrary in Feinberg’s eyes but, in accordance with Benedict Anderson, constructed around a shared standardized and printed language. The standardization of language and decisions concerning the inclusion or exclusion of dialects and groups that should form the national language are, in fact, arbitrary (38). (But I would like to argue that this process is a matter of power between different groups and not as arbitrary as described by the author). Because of the formation of nation-states around boundaries of language, religion and geography, which I the authors view is reasonable (one could ask when something become reasonable!) the nation cannot be seen as an arbitrary construct (40). An important task of the common school is to bring everyone, both in the margins and the centre of the nation, into a shared national identity (41) This means both identifying with the national experience and to be actively engaged with issues involved in the material and moral climate of the nation (231). The knowledge needed to live in society, adequate vocational skills, appropriate meanings, good and virtuous habits as well as a collective identity, are no longer a result of living in a certain community but a function assigned to the common school (a state institution) (44). In common schools, children adopt an identity as a member of a nation: they develop an intuitive understanding that they have special obligations towards other co-nationals, taught the idea of nationalism and that their nation exists in a field of other nations (46). Taking on a national identity also involves the idea of inclusion and exclusion, both in the present as well as in the past (47). Embracing a national identity also means grasping the concept of nationalism (47). And without nationalism, there wouldn’t be any nation-states. Feinberg writes “Through the nation individuals are brought together as a people and as such, and they stand in distinction from others who are brought together as a different people” (47-48). More than the idea of nationalism, individuals share through their membership certain ideas, norms, self-understandings and practices that distinguish them from other individuals who are members of other nations (48). Part of being a member in a modern nation also involves learning how to be modern (49). But a nation cannot just be neutrally represented, since representations are always done by people from different standpoints and, therefore, the questions concerning which standpoint is to be accepted and who is to authorize it, remains (230).

Reading Feinberg’s perspective regarding the construction of nation-states, which is close to the ideas popularized by Benedict Anderson, I was surprised by his strong modernist and linear understanding of nation-states and his fast rejection of post-modern criticism. Moreover, he doesn’t acknowledge the relations between gender and nation and how different roles for women and men are constructed in relation to the nation (see Yuval-Davies 1997, Anthias & Yuval-Davies 1992, Cockburn 1998, Enloe 1990). Furthermore, his examination of the nation-states is, to a great extent, Eurocentric. It ignores both the importance of colonialism in the creation of European states as well as neglects the different conditions in countries outside of Europe and the US. I also find his division between traditional nation-states (in which membership is based on stories of a common ancestry and blood) and constitutional democracies (where membership is based on the acceptance of certain institutions and practices)(45), to be rather problematic, since most national identities are constructed on both.

Still, the main question of how a democratic society can justify imposing education on groups of citizens who want to maintain their own values and to reproduce them in their children remains (52). The common school is an instrument for individual and cultural change and it changes the way people think, their basic moral understandings and their commitments and loyalties (56). The development of school was a self-conscious decision in order to advance a certain kind of identity (57).

Although Feinberg recognises that a nation may organize itself for immoral purposes (54), there is a strong positive and modernist tone in his argumentation.

The identity role of the common school in a liberal nation has been challenged from two main perspectives: the strong culturalist and the communitarian. The strong culturalist argues that there is no neutral system of true knowledge, but that what one holds as true knowledge is cultural dependent. Moreover, they argue that there are collective experiences which can only be authentically understood from the inside, and to try to describe them from the outside may risk distorting the experience (60). The basic assumption is that meanings and norms are group-specific and cannot transcend differences between groups. All practices and institutions are culturally embedded, as also is the public school despites its’ claims of neutrality (62). In this view, the particular knowledge system that are forced upon children in school and the distortion of groups experiences can be seen as a form of symbolic violence (60). The second perspective, communitarianism, is sceptical towards the ability of modern society to develop moral norms and understandings (60). While the strong culturalism focus on the hegemonic exercise of authority and its legitimacy, communitarianism argues that the claimed neutrality of public schools is inadequate for the development of moral citizens (61).

The strong culturalism argues that learning always takes place inside and that is due to culture. It is through culture that individuals make meanings (63). Moreover, culture provides the conditions for learning through, for example, language, which make some understandings more accessible than others (64). Feinberg writes that “when we enter culture – that is, when we are born – we begin to pick up certain horizons of understandings about ourselves and others and about our relationship to our so called natural environment” (64). Feinberg’s perception of culture can be criticized both for its monolingual norm as well as for defining culture mainly in ethnical terms.

Culture also provides an important material for the development of the I / Self since the “we” provides the ideas of identity and attachment that constitute the “I” (64). It is alto through culture that individuals can make sense of their own experiences as well as others’ (65). From the strong culturalist view, culture does not just affect how we learn (patterns for socialisation of children) but also what we learn and what we see as objects of knowledge and, therefore, the question of culture is also an epistemological one (70,72). However, according to Feinberg, to say that learning is made through culture can mean at least four different things: a)	We can only apprehend the world through the conceptual and emotional frames that are both the products and elements of culture, such as language. b)	Culture determines the elements of development that are understood as leaning, resulting in some ways of developing been seen as more significant than others. c)	How we apprehend the world is dependent on the instruments and symbols that constitutes different cultures, such as language, norms, relational possibilities and shared meanings. d)	As the instruments are different in different cultures, different apprehended worlds are created (71-72).

Taking these four points into consideration, culture makes a difference on how we apprehend the world, but also in the world that is apprehended (76). So, even if people were not different at birth, differences are created by cultures (feelings, for example) (76). Moreover, since we apprehend the world through our culture, we can only view a different culture through our own frames of meaning, resulting in that we will construct the other culture through our own culture and judge it by our standards (82). If this is the case then, how is it possible for children of different cultural backgrounds to understand each other? Still, if educational systems fail to provide children with the tools they need to make a reasonable life in modern society (regardless of their cultural background) they are, according to Feinberg, guilty of cultural neglect (85).

In regard to identity, Feinberg differentiates between being an American and identifying oneself as an American, with the later refering to an active engagement in the formation of the nation and the national story (232).

To hold a common identity self-consciously means an awareness of sharing with each other certain conceptual and normative frameworks and that we use them in our everyday interactions (234). In school, children need to become accustomed to the different ways of people from different backgrounds and with different needs, appealing to the nation as a framework for meaning and renewal (235). However, identities are not only confined to national or cultural boundaries but, in some cases, are shared more globally (236).

The common school need to teach children how to advance their own concerns, which includes also cultural ones, and to express themselves in ways that ring true (245).