This research questions the prevention and health promotion practices developed for young people, in France, and re-examines the nature of competences enlisted in the classical model of empowerment in health education. Moving away from the epidemiological postulate of evidence based medicine (EBM), it explores another approach of these educational practices. The research uses the perspective of narrative mediation; it tries also to identify issues about a better knowledge of oneself, making more comprehensive the issues of young students’ health.

Flaubert himself, in an early and now famous letter, identifies in "bêtise" the effect of an inordinate desire to conclude: "Oui, la bêtise," he writes, "consiste à vouloir conclure. Nous sommes un fil et nous voulons savoir la trame" . This is to say stupidity, to Flaubert, is less a given content of discourse than a particular order of that discourse itself.1 It is the sign of an hasty and elliptical intervention into thought of a series of preconceived conclusions, the (...) source of which may be situated in the doxa and in the rhetoric of verisimilitude that sustains the persuasive power of the doxa. Stupidity, as the project of the Dictionnaire demonstrates, is an endless fabric of maxims and probable syllogisms the function of which is to determine the particular and the specific, the singular and the different, as paradigmatic exempla of the larger discourse of encyclopaedic universality expressed in the verisimilitude of received ideas. It is in this sense that one can see in Flaubert's notion of "bêtise" the denunciation by the writer of an especially vulgarised form of the Aristotelian concept of verisimilitude, which, built around the rhetorical figures of the probable syllogism—the enthymeme—and the exemplum , is directed towards winning adhesion to a particular thesis by appealing to generalities and probabilities, and which constructs its arguments from material drawn from the doxa.2 It is this rhetoric of persuasion by verisimilitude that Flaubert, in the various discourses of the lover, the dreamer, and the politician, will throw into ironic relief in Madame Bovary and L'Éducation sentimentale. · 1. Cf. Valéry, Oeuvres, 1:1452.· 2. The concept of verisimilitude is a difficult one and one which had received much critical attention in recent years. I have taken the term here to refer to the complex network of constraints by which the mimetic novelist, like the rhetorician, is able to engage his audience in a contract of mutual recognition and to persuade them of the "sense of reality" of his narrative, that his is a plausible interpretation of reality, worthy of belief . It is here that Aristotle's elaboration of mimesis and of the art of rhetoric is decisive. Both in the Poetics and in the Rhetoric, Aristotle distinguishes two concepts with regards to the manner in which the artist or the rhetorician solicits from his audience the belief in the justness of his reconstruction of reality. The first concept is that of pithanon, the plausible or the persuasive. This corresponds to the speculative consideration of what strategy will be most forceful in any given case. Rhetoric is indeed defined as "the faculty of observing in any given case the available means of persuasion " . As such, pithanon is the sign of a desire to convince, a decision on the part of an individual in a particular situation. For this desire to convince to become fully operative in the context of an audience, it needs to be recast not as a plausibility, but as a probability, as eikos. Aristotle defines eikos as "a thing that usually happens: not . . . anything whatever that usually happens, but only if it belongs to the class of the 'contingent' or 'variable.' It bears the same relation to that in respect of which it is probable as the universal bears to the particular" . Eikos is on one level a collection of contents, of topoi. But it is more than this. For otherwise this would mean that works deriving from different historical contexts would become unintelligible to the uninitiated reader. Eikos is a patterning of discourse, a rhetorical syntax, based upon the integration of the singular in the universal, and translated in the text by the enthymeme and the exemplum. The homogeneity of the mimetic novel derives from the way in which the desire to convince is mediated and dissimulated by a totalising, "natural" eikos, when, in other words, the narrator is "objective." It is when these two dimensions are dissociated, as in Bouvard et Pécuchet, that all manner of disturbance is generated. . Leslie Hill, fellow in Clare College, Cambridge University, is presently doing research on Flaubert and on general aspects of the modern French novel. This is his first publication. (shrink)

À partir d’une analyse des diverses conceptions de l’éducation dans les contextes historiques et culturels du Niger, de la Réunion et de l’Amazonie brésilienne, nous allons nous focaliser sur leur interaction, et notamment sur la capacité du système scolaire à s’ouvrir à d’autres formes d’éducation, comme les savoirs et savoir-faire traditionnels. L’exemple du Niger montre comment un système qui ignore la diversité et refuse une dialectique des formes de connaissance conduit à l’échec scolaire et au rejet de l’école par (...) une partie importante de la population. À la Réunion, si l’école coranique s’ouvre à la diversité, ce n’est pas le cas de la forme scolaire qui continue à rejeter et à exclure les élèves qui lui sont socialement et culturellement éloignés. Dans l’Amazonie brésilienne, nous constatons que c’est par la reconnaissance de la diversité culturelle et le métissage des différentes formes de savoir à l’intérieur de l’école qu’il est possible de favoriser la réussite scolaire et le désir d’école.Drawing on an analysis of the various approaches to education in the historical and cultural contexts of Niger, Reunion Island and the Brazilian Amazonia, we’ll focus our attention on their interaction, and more particularly on the ability of the school system to open up to other forms of education, such as traditional knowledge and know-how. Through the Niger case, we will see how a system which disregards diversity and refuses dialectical forms of knowledge leads to school failure and rejection of school by a major part of the population. In Reunion Island, while Koranic schools are going along with diversity, current educational policies do not, and continue to reject and exclude pupils with a different social and cultural background. The Brazilian Amazonia case will show that the acceptance of cultural diversity and the intermixing of various forms of knowledge within the school can lead to school success and to the desire to learn. (shrink)

Les sites internet santé français relèvent-ils de la vulgarisation scientifique et médicale? Et, si tel est le cas, dans quelle acception du terme « vulgarisation »? Comment ce média transforme-t-il la recherche d’information sur les questions de santé? Il permet une nouvelle forme de vulgarisation, où l’utilisateur définit lui-même le degré de vulgarisation souhaité. Cette autonomisation affranchit davantage de la normativité imposée par les vulgarisateurs, qui jusqu’alors choisissaient et limitaient contenus et forme des textes. Outre une fonction informative, quels sont (...) les autres usages de ces sites? Qu’apportent-ils d’autre que la consultation d’ouvrages ou de revues sur la santé? Ils offrent (notamment grâce aux échanges sur les forums de discussion) une autre vision de l’information santé : moins verticale, elle remet en question les traditions de paternalisme médical, encore passablement ancrées en France, et s’opposent ainsi à la normativité du discours médical, où le savoir est transmis de manière unilatérale, des professionnels de la santé et du médicament vers le grand public. (shrink)

Les sites internet santé français relèvent-ils de la vulgarisation scientifique et médicale? Et, si tel est le cas, dans quelle acception du terme « vulgarisation »? Comment ce média transforme-t-il la recherche d’information sur les questions de santé? Il permet une nouvelle forme de vulgarisation, où l’utilisateur définit lui-même le degré de vulgarisation souhaité. Cette autonomisation affranchit davantage de la normativité imposée par les vulgarisateurs, qui jusqu’alors choisissaient et limitaient contenus et forme des textes. Outre une fonction informative, quels sont (...) les autres usages de ces sites? Qu’apportent-ils d’autre que la consultation d’ouvrages ou de revues sur la santé? Ils offrent (notamment grâce aux échanges sur les forums de discussion) une autre vision de l’information santé : moins verticale, elle remet en question les traditions de paternalisme médical, encore passablement ancrées en France, et s’opposent ainsi à la normativité du discours médical, où le savoir est transmis de manière unilatérale, des professionnels de la santé et du médicament vers le grand public. (shrink)

This paper moves from an educator's experience with people with strong disability and from his trouble to grasp the hidden potential of the subject, almost covered by precomprehension and prejudice, that like a sort of veil of Maya prevent him from seeing the implicit resources residing within everyone. It is argued that the educator must gain a phenomenological stance which allows him to go beyond the experience of limits towards the very essence of the person. The educator's gaze arises from (...) a path of awareness and personal growth, capable of revealing the authentic meaning of the educational act. Ispiring to the narrations of some literary figures, the main characteristics of the educational gaze are outlined here, in terms of a way of being-in-the-situation, capable of wonder and astonishment, attention to details and untiring search for meaning. (shrink)

Dès l'origine, l'idée d'Ecole est liée à celle de savoir. Une même avancée a créé les savoirs théoriques distincts des techniques et les disciplines scolaires, qui ont pour fin une éducation désintéressée. Et le principe fondamental de l'Ecole est resté que les savoirs ne sont pas seulement les résultats de la formation mais qu'ils sont par eux-mêmes formateurs. Encore faut-il que les contenus et les modalités de l'enseignement ne compromettent pas cette fonction proprement scolaire. Or l'Ecole d'aujourd'hui se (...) déscolarise sous la pression de la logique libérale, de l'attente sociale, du modèle de l'entreprise, du pédagogisme, des contre-cultures et de toutes les formes modernes d'irrespect pour l'étude. B. Barthelmé, Ch. Coutel, G. Guillot, B. Jolibert et B. Vandewalle examinent ici sous des angles différents, dans cinq contributions complémentaires et empreintes d'une même vigilance philosophique pour l'Ecole, cette problématique qui est celle de l'avenir de l'éducation. (shrink)

The Mamluk period of Islamic history witnessed a very vivid life of scientific endeavours. This was mainly due to the fact that the higher education institutions (madrasa) established by the Seljuqid and Ayyubid dynasties continued to develop as well as that Mamluk sultans and their commanders gave great importance to charitable institutions of education. With the facilities provided by these charities, Cairo and Damascus grew into important centres of attraction for scholars and teachers from all over the Islamic world. In (...) this atmosphere, a serious training activity was going on in almost every branch of religious and intellectual sciences alongside production of scientific works in these areas, in which both scientific traditions of earlier generations was preserved and continuity was maintained with considerable amount of detail and depth. The Mamluks, thus, became an important basin that nourished all regions of the Islamic world in terms of science and intellectual culture. The Mamluk period was also prolific in terms of tafsīr literature. A tafsīr chair was established in each one of the educational institutions, such as madrasas, mosques and khangāhs, where various tafsīr courses were taught, and tafsīr texts were read, by distinguished figures of the era. In these courses, the main text was usually the al-Kashshāf of al-Zamakhsharī (d. 538/1144), who had hitherto gained a dominant position in the tafsīr science, followed by the tafsīrs by al-Bayḍāwī (d. 685/1286) modelled on al-Kashshāf and al-Baghawī (d. 516/1122). Moreover, one of the peculiarities of the Mamluks in the scientific life was the public courses, called al-mīʿād, in which books were perused in public on tafsīr, ḥadith, or admonitions (mawʿiẓa). It is evident that these lessons and the tafsīr books had serious contributions to the development of the tafsīr literature and these tafsīrs were welcomed in every part of the Islamic world and have been taught until today. Works by prominent exegetes, such as al-Qurṭubī (d. 671/1273), al-Khāzin (d. 741/1341), Abū Ḥayyān (d. 745/1344), Samīn al-Ḥalabī (d. 756/1355), Ibn Kathīr (d. 774/1373), al-Biqāī (d. 885/1480) and al-Suyūtī (d. 911/1505) are most notable examples of such works of the period. In the Mamluk period, a good number of works was produced in the literary forms of commentary (sharḥ), gloss (ḥāshiya) and adjudication (muḥākamāt), a fact that reflects the scientific and intellectual level of the time. While commentaries and glosses were generally focused on the tafsīrs by al-Zamakhsharī and al-Bayḍāwī, the critiques and the adjudications, discussing different positions in these tafsīrs or commentaries and glosses on them constitute the textual evidence attesting to the high level of scientific activities. Of these texts comes first the commentary on al-Kashshāf by Quṭb al-Dīn al-Rāzī (d. 766/1365) which has determined the course of the discussions of the later commentaries. Among the most remarkable works of the Mamluks was the commentary on al-Kashshāf by the Hanafīte verifying scholar, Akmal al-Dīn al-Bābartī (d. 786/1384), and ʿAbd Allah b. Yūsuf al-Zaylaʿī’s (d. 762/1360) work. Taqī al-Dīn Ibn Taymiyya (d. 728/1328), who lived in Damascus at an early period of the Mamluks, developed a system of thought and science, at the heart of which he placed the Prophet, his companions and the following generation (al-salaf). This approach, which amounts the revitalization of the Salafist thought, was also reflected in the tafsīr area, while Ibn Taymiyya adopted a tafsīr method based on narrations, assumed a staunch attitude against the opinions based on sectarian affiliations, and, in this context, made harsh criticisms against the tafsīrs written before him. The tafsīr work, which was targeted most by his criticism arrows, was the al-Kashshāf, the most commonly read exegesis in the madrasas of the Mamluk period. He also sometimes accused the exegetes, such as Ibn ʿAṭiyya (d. 541/1147), a Sunnite exegete, of giving weight to the views of the theologians and stated that the ideal exegesis was that of al-Ṭabarī (d. 310/923), which generally depends on the views of al-Salaf with solid transition chains.Tafsīr education and works in the Mamluk period have not yet been given sufficient scholarly attention. This study therefore aims to show that this period had many peculiar aspects regarding tafsīr education and studies and that it had notable influence both on the Ottoman period and the modern times. Based on the historical data and products it contends that this period successfully continued the tradition of tafsīr as well as enjoyed a dynamic and an in-depth scholarly vitality on the area. (shrink)

Il semble que, malgré les nombreuses mises en garde de ces dernières années venant de différents côtés, l’installation de dispositifs d’évaluation s’opère actuellement dans tous les secteurs de la société et les institutions : l’hôpital et le système de santé, les institutions d’éducation et de formation en général, les universités et la recherche en particulier,...

Emile Durkheim est essentiellement connu comme l'un des pères fondateurs de la sociologie moderne. Fondée sur l'analyse structuro-fonctionnaliste des systèmes sociaux, son œuvre pédagogique reste importante et toujours valable. L'éducation, " socialisation méthodique de la jeune génération ", implique une pédagogie désormais attentive aux valeurs intellectuelles et morales que le maître a mission de promouvoir. L'analyse sociologique et psychologique de la fonction du maître que propose Durkheim est située ainsi dans le cadre d'une conception des systèmes éducatifs possédant une " (...) autonomie relative " susceptible de faire des éducateurs des agents de changement. Les pages ici présentées sont significatives de la pensée d'un pédagogue posant, à partir d'un travail de sociologue, que rapport au savoir et rapport aux valeurs doivent être liés au sein d'une éducation fondamentalement humaniste. (shrink)

This book reads Milton’s Paradise Lost as a poem that seeks to educate its readers by narrating the education of its main characters. Many of Milton’s characters enter the action in late adolescence, newly independent and eager to test themselves, to discover who they are and their place in the world. The poem charts their progress into moral adulthood. Taking as its premise that attention to the moral development of the poem’s main characters will open the poem to most (...) undergraduate readers, this book explores both the pedagogical activity within Paradise Lost and the pedagogical activity that the poem encourages. (shrink)

Today, after the family, the school is the first institution in which children experience the implementation of social rules and the behaviors that follow from them. It is useful, therefore, to insert paths that favor the consolidation of a system made up of rules, inspired by the principles of transparency, fairness and solidarity, which can be the first and most effective lesson of democratic legality. In this perspective, teaching activities can appropriately refer to the programmatic contents of the disciplines which, (...) not only with regard specifically to civic education and law, but also with regard to other cultural areas, are bearers of explicit information and formative experiences. Particular attention is paid today to the planning of “Percorsi per le Competenze Trasversali e l’Orientamento” [Paths for Soft Skills and Guidance] (PCTO), which will also have an implicit educational value, that consisting in showing, through field experiences, the convergence of multiple cultural interests towards the purpose of education to legality. (shrink)

Cette article présente l'étude comparative des systèmes éducatifs grecs et chrétiens dans la mesure où tous les deux accordent une place centrale à l'obéissance dans la formation des individus. Il vise à mettre en évidence leur opposition absolue. Chez les grecs l'obéissance joue le rôle d'un outil éducatif destiné à faire de l'élève un être libre. Elle est pensée comme une méthode d'accès à la liberté inséparable d'un enjeu politique : la formation des citoyens libres. L'obéissance au maître, c'est-à-dire la (...) docilité, constitue ainsi la condition de possibilité de l'assujettissement de la partie irrationnelle de l'âme à la partie rationnelle. Or dans le projet éducatif monachique, la lecture de la Bible comme pratique ascétique joue le rôle d'un outil de lutte contre les tentations, non celui d'un moyen d'apprentissage qui vise l'acquisition d'un savoir. Cette pratique ascétique est donc inséparable d'une exigence : la purification de l'âme. Dès lors, l'obéissance devient une voie d'accès à la vertu et le lieu d'une attention exclusive inséparable d'un autre enjeu politique, diamétralement opposé à celui des systèmes grecs : la destruction de toute idée de liberté. Elle ne représente plus une méthode devant conduire à la liberté, mais le terme de la formation des individus. Elle n'est plus visée comme un moyen, mais comme une fin en soi. Elle ne vise plus le développement de la raison, mais la soumission de la volonté. (shrink)

This article, in the example of the subject of shukr (gratitude), proposes a ‘perspective’ for the instructor who determines the processes of bringing a subject into the learning environment. This perspective is related to the encounter with the knowledge of the subject to be taught. It points to the approach of the instructor to the information he/she will refer to about the subject he/she will teach while preparing in the mental plan. The content of the subject, the objectives, the methods, (...) techniques, and resources to be used to present the subject, and how the output will be measured and evaluated are largely determined by this perspective. In a way, the proposed perspective involves monitoring the change and transformation of life and the contextualization of religious knowledge by paying attention to the methodological functioning. Thus, the way the subject of gratitude presented in the Qur’an and hadith narrations aims to provide the teacher with a ‘perspective’ on what kind of content to prepare. This is a suggestion for the instructor to reveal that while managing the process of religiously understanding/interpreting life as it flows by, the instructor should not ignore the ways in which knowledge appears in the Qur’an and hadith narrations. For example, the first meaning of the word shukr (gratitude) in the Qur’an is “faith in Allah.” However, traditionally, shukr (gratitude) is not taught within the subject area of faith. In this context, the article follows the suggestion that referring to the method and source of the knowledge to be taught can provide the instructor with a holistic and in-depth ‘perspective.’. (shrink)

During the Mamlūk period (648-923/1250-1517), some developments such as the support of the state dignitaries for scholarly activities, the interest of the ʿulamā to the Mamlūk geography and the establishment of many scientific institutions increased the interest in scholarly activities in society. In this period of intensive scholarly activities, women also started to increasingly take part in this field, and as a result, many female scholars were trained. The fact that women scholars were encountered among the teachers of the famous (...) scientists of the period is a clear proof of this situation. As a matter of fact, the teachers of Najm al-Dīn Ibn Fahd, one of the famous muḥaddiths and historians of the 9th (15th) century, set an obvious example for this. Sixty-seven of his four hundred ninety-seven teachers were women. Najm al-Dīn Ibn Fahd, a member of a prominent ʿulamā family of Mecca, traveled to different cities in the Mamlūk geography and took lessons from many teachers, men and women. What is more valuable for our subject is that he wrote a work called Mu’jam al-shuyūkh, which contains extremely important information about his teachers. This article tries to assess women's participation in scholarly activities and social positions in Mamlūk society, based on his female teachers. This work, made up of two parts, first deals with women’s opportunities to pursue academic studies and their subsequent contributions to science. The second part is about their position in social life which stemmed from the families they belonged to and from their marriages. In this article, in which sixty-seven female scholars of Najm al-Dīn Ibn Fahd are discussed, some important results have been reached. This look into his sixty-seven female teachers shows how widespread women’s relationships with scholarly circles were in Mamlūk society, and that especially girls of families with scholarly traditions were included in academic circles from a young age. These girls were able to get their initial education from close relatives and then they were able to connect to academic circles easily via family relationships, taking courses with many scholars including women. Women have been instrumental in the transfer of knowledge more so than its production. Their efforts both during their studies and as scholars were focused on ḥadīth transmission. It is difficult to pinpoint the exact reason why ḥadīth sciences were the focus, but one can say that the ubiquity of ḥadīth sessions and their ease of accessibility must have been a factor. It is seen that young girls who participated in these sessions were encouraged to study with older scholars, thereby acquiring a strong isnād chain and becoming a source of information in later years for the transmission of knowledge. However, it is hard to say that every woman who got some education took a role in knowledge transmission. One can even claim, based on Najm al-Dīn Ibn Fahd’s female teachers, that a lot of women in academic circles did not take a role in knowledge transmission as scholars, despite their potential. The fact that no official institutions are mentioned with regard to women’s acquisition and transfer of knowledge may be indicative of the importance of teacher-student relationships rather than institutions, or, it can be that women were more active outside of these official institutions. Also, the fact that most of Najm al-Dīn Ibn Fahd’s female teachers were all taught by several common teachers shows the liveliness of academic activity outside of official institutions. There is very little narration regarding the social lives of women who were engaged in scholarly activities. Among the most important reasons why this is so is the desire to put their scholarly competencies to the forefront. However, it is possible to get some information about their families and marriages for many of them. One can see that Najm al-Dīn Ibn Fahd’s female teachers generally married men who were also engaged in scholarship. The fact that women, especially those in the scholarly class, married from among their relatives must have been related to this. All of the married women except one have at least one child. While divorce is not too common, marrying again as a result of the death of a husband or as a result of divorce is not rare. (shrink)

The Qurʾān was taught in the letter method for many years. After the names of the letters in the Arabic alphabet are memorized in this method, the teaching of origins and signs begins. The syllabic method was developed over time as an alternative to this method, and the letters were taught directly with their superior vowel signs without memorizing their names. Unlike these two methods, the sound-based alif ba method has begun to be used in recent years. This method coincides (...) with the primary literacy teaching method based on the sounds thatwere adopted in Turkish teaching since 2005. Basic principles such as teaching the letters one-by-one, following the sound learning stages in teaching each sound, conducting the lessons in class, reading the syllables and words formed with the learned letters from the first day are adopted in both teaching methods. The purpose of the present study was to find out how the Qurʾān can be taught by applying the sound-based alif ba method and to draw attention to the original aspects of this method for learning the Qurʾān with the right sounds. Since the correct teaching of the Qurʾān is closely related to the teacher’s content knowledge and teaching skills, the alif ba that will be used and the method to be applied are important in reaching the target more systematically and faster. The case study design was used in the study in which the qualitative method was employed. The primary data of the study were Sound-Based Alif ba, for which I was the project assistant of, and the book with the title A New Approach in Teaching the Qurʾān: Sound based Alif baand Tajwīd Method, which was an editorial book of which I was one of the authors, and the thirty-episode series We Are Children and We Are Reading the Qurʾān, published on Diyanet TV, for which I was the production coordinator. Also, to see the applicability of the method, interviews were conducted with eight instructors who used Sound-Based Alif ba in their lessons. The study received ethical approval from Ankara Social Sciences University Rectorate Social and Human Sciences Research and Scientific Publication Ethics Committee on 8 July 2021 with the decision no 12450. The main thing in the sound-based alif ba method is the correct vocalization of the Qurʾān. The letters in alif ba are arranged differently from the classical alphabet order and are divided into six groups considering the frequency of occurrence in the Qurʾān and the degree of difficulty of origins. Each letter is taught in a separate lesson with the support of the ḥarakas and the sukūn (such as اَلْ, اِلْ, اُلْ). During the teaching, attention is paid to the sound learning steps, and the student is expected to feel the sound of the letter to be learned, distinguish it from other letter sounds, and then pronounce it from the correct origin as much as possible. In the sound-based alif ba method, the teaching of the shape of the letter is done after the sound of the letter is pronounced. During the teaching of the shapes of the letters, the part of the letter that does not change when written within a word is emphasized, and the writing is used so that the shape of the letter can be placed in the mind of the student. In the sound-based alif ba teaching, reading from the Qurʾān is done in every lesson, starting from the teaching of the first letter. During the teaching of alif ba, educational games, question-answer, and narration methods are used, primarily with the taʿlīm method. In this way, the teaching of Sound-Based Alif ba is spread over a period of 40 lessons. The study findings showed that the sound-based alif ba method has similar characteristics with the sound-based primary literacy teaching method; however, Arabic has its own unique aspects with its language structure. Among these originalities, which is adopted in the teaching of letters, firstly teaching the letter with the sukūn and with the support of movable ا and then showing the shape of the letter is carried out. As a matter of fact, the teachers have the opinion that this vocalization method, which is adopted, facilitates the learning of the correct sounds, and that teaching the letters in line with the sound learning steps increases the efficiency of the lesson. Although most of the instructors pointed out to the positive aspects of teaching tajwīd sounds in alif ba, one of the instructors did not find it necessary. The opinions of the teachers showed that the sound-based alif ba method can be applied efficiently in online lessons, but the teacher-student relation is affected negatively when compared to the classroom setting. All of the instructors said that the materials used in the lessons and demonstration and educational game methods increased the quality of the course, and that the We Are Children We Are Reading the Qurʾān program is an important resource for them. (shrink)

In Anglophone educational research in the United States, the name Foucault has been more pointedly celebrated in some subfields such as curriculum studies relative to its more noticeable censorship in subfields such as history of education. This paper illustrates how such differential epistemological politics might be accounted for through reapproaching the challenges to historiography that Histoire de la Folie (Madness and Civilization) raised. Through the formalist lens of performative apophasis, and with attention to the dependencies of discourse that characterize (...) narrative prosthesis, this paper re‐engages the least referenced of Foucault's major histories in the educational field to bring into noticeability other ‘conditions of possibility’—ones that explicate how an apophatic turn might account for divergent reactions to less familiar philosophies of history and/or to ‘alternative’ approaches to documents through which history is now being narrated and critiqued in education and beyond. (shrink)

L'ŒIL, Observatoire d'Ethique Interculturelle de Lyon, a pour objectif de préserver la dimension éthique de notre société démocratique et pluraliste dans son approche de l'homme. De nouveaux savoirs et techniques, le dynamisme de la recherche scientifique, les forces du marché, le souci de juste allocation des ressources, ainsi que les demandes de la société, mettent les acteurs des systèmes de santé dans des situations confuses. Cet ouvrage est le premier témoignage des rencontres et des recherches décidées par ces auteurs (...) venus d'horizons divers, engagés dans l'ensemble du monde francophone à partir de Lyon où se sont tenues les Premières Journées internationales francophones d'Ethique interculturelle, en 2004. Pour les auteurs de cet ouvrage, l'humanité peut mieux se constituer en s'ouvrant sur le différent, sur le multiple. Par regards croisés, ils questionnent la place relative du progrès, abandonnant le mythe simpliste selon lequel seul le progrès techno-économique entraîne les progrès sociaux, politiques et moraux... Au contraire, ils adoptent les principes d'incertitude et de complexité. Ils s'interrogent sur l'éthique interculturelle résultant d'une interaction à géométrie variable entre nos appartenances à différents groupes humains - culturels, sociaux, professionnels... sur le bon usage de la vie qui peut présupposer d'avoir en tête un archétype de la vie humaine, une vie exprimée dans sa plénitude. Certaines cultures ont exalté le héros, le chevalier ou le saint, avant de mettre en avant l'homme engagé ou l'entrepreneur accompli. Ils partagent la conviction que l'univers, la vie en général et la vie humaine en particulier ne sont pas des réalités monolithiques, mais résultent de l'interaction entre des polarités apparemment opposées, mais complémentaires. En effet, chaque être humain résulte des relations tissées avec l'Autre, s'enrichissant personnellement à travers chacune d'entre elles, s'ouvrant ainsi progressivement à toute l'humanité dans sa diversité. Nous construisons notre singularité en fonction de notre ouverture sur l'universel. Ce livre multidisciplinaire intéressera médecins et autres soignants, philosophes, spécialistes des sciences humaines et de l'éducation, des sciences exactes, voire responsables politiques. (shrink)

J’explore de façon critique la supposition du DSM[1] et de théoriciens tels que Wakefield et Gert selon laquelle les troubles mentaux doivent être attribués à un individu plutôt qu’à un groupe de personnes. Cette supposition est particulièrement problématique en pédopsychiatrie où le système familial est très souvent au centre de l’attention clinique. Il y a bien sûr des éléments de preuve substantiels indiquant que certains troubles mentaux des individus sont causés par leurs relations avec les autres et que leur (...) guérison est grandement facilitée en traitant le groupe, tel que la famille, comme un tout. Malgré cela, il y a eu beaucoup moins de travail conceptuel visant à définir ce que cela pourrait être pour un couple, une famille ou un autre groupe que de se voir attribuer un trouble mental. Pour traiter de cette question, j’utilise un débat entre Wakefield et Murphy et Woolfolk sur la question de savoir s’il fait partie du concept de trouble mental que celui-ci soit causé par une dysfonction interne de la personne. Je discute aussi de la proposition faite par Bolton d’abandonner complètement le concept de trouble mental et d’utiliser plutôt le concept, plus large, de problème de santé mentale. Je soutiens qu’en fin de compte le caractère individuel des troubles mentaux ne constitue pas une vérité conceptuelle a priori, et qu’il faut faire intervenir des considérations pragmatiques pour décider s’il est utile de nous limiter à une telle définition ou si nous pourrions être mieux servis par une définition plus extensive. Je fais le lien avec le pragmatisme et je soutiens qu’une approche pluraliste non réductive est particulièrement appropriée en pédopsychiatrie.I critically explore the assumption of the DSM and theorists such as Wakefield and Gert that mental disorder must be attributed to an individual rather than a group of people. This assumption is especially problematic in child and adolescent psychiatry where very often the focus of clinical attention is the family system. There is of course substantial evidence that some mental disorders of individuals are caused by their relationships with other people and that their recovery is greatly facilitated by treating the group, such as a family, as a whole. However, there has been much less conceptual work on defining what it might be for a couple, family or other group to itself be attributed a mental disorder. To address this issue, I employ a debate between Wakefield , Murphy and Woolfolk on whether it is part of the concept of a mental disorder that it is caused by an internal malfunction of a person. I also discuss the proposal of Bolton that we do away with the concept of mental disorder altogether and instead use a broader concept of mental health problem. I argue that ultimately it is not an a priori conceptual truth that mental disorders are individual, and we need to bring in pragmatic considerations to decide whether it is helpful to restrict ourselves to such a definition or whether we could be better served by a more expansive definition. I link this to the philosophical view of pragmatism and argue that a pluralistic nonreductive approach is especially appropriate in child and adolescent psychiatry. (shrink)

Based on a close reading of the debate between Rawls and Sen on primary goods versus capabilities, I argue that liberal theory cannot adequately respond to Sen’s critique within a conventionally neutralist framework. In support of the capability approach, I explain why and how it defends a more robust conception of opportunity and freedom, along with public debate on substantive questions about well-being and the good life. My aims are: to show that Sen’s capability approach is at odds with Rawls’s (...) political liberal version of neutrality; to carve out a third space in the neutrality debate; and to begin to develop, from Sen’s approach, the idea of public value liberalism as a position that falls within that third space.En me basant sur une lecture attentive du débat entre Rawls et Sen sur les biens premiers versus les capabilités, je soutiendrai que la théorie libérale est incapable, dans un cadre neutraliste conventionnel, de répondre adéquatement à des injustices dans le domaine de la santé. À partir de l’approche des capabilités, j’explique pourquoi et comment cette approche permet de défendre une conception plus robuste de l’opportunité et de la liberté, de même qu’un débat public sur des questions substantielles concernant le bien-être et la vie bonne. Mes objectifs sont : de clarifier le rapport entre le neutralisme de Rawls et sa défense des biens premiers,, de démontrer les implications de la critique des capabilités de Sen, et, d’esquisser une troisième position dans le débat sur la neutralité versus le perfectionnisme – à savoir, celle d’un perfectionnisme motivé par des considérations de légitimité. (shrink)

La médecine change de visage. Le progrès dans les sciences médicales a modifié l’aspect des maladies. La relation médecin-malade se désagrège. Le phalanstère médical est agité par la contestation. Tous ses membres, malades, médecins et non-médecins sont assujettis aux contraintes de l’Economie de la Santé. Les paradoxes qui obscurcissent la vie médicale appellent des solutions nouvelles. L’enseignement n’est plus réservé aux futurs médecins mais aussi, à travers l’Education sanitaire, aux futurs malades que sont les gens bien portants. La part qui (...) se déroule en Faculté n’est plus qu’une préparation à la Formation permanente. La recherche n’est plus réservée seulement à un étroit sérail, mais s’inscrit dans les préoccupations de tous au service de tous. L’informatique offre au médecin le moyen le plus sûr de faire rayonner le savoir et de mieux organiser le service public qu’est aujourd’hui la médecine. L’hôpital enfin est appelé à devenir le foyer de toutes les activités médicales, la « Maison » du malade aussi bien que celle du médecin. Le paradoxe du médecin est celui de la médecine tout entière. Il est l’occasion de faire naître un autre malade, un autre médecin pour une autre médecine et d’assurer le passage de l’éthique médicale vers une éthique de santé. (shrink)

Is physical presence an essential aspect of a rich educational experience? Can forms of virtual encounter achieve engaged and sustained education? Technophiles and technophobes might agree that authentic personal engagement is educationally normative. They are more likely to disagree on how authentic engagement is best achieved. This article argues that educational thinking around digital pedagogy unhelpfully reinforces this polarising debate by failing to recognise that digitalisation is, as Stiegler has argued, pharmacological: both a poison and a cure. I suggest that (...) Biesta’s critique of learnification can be applied to online learning, but that any such application does not sufficiently acknowledge the pharmacological nature of modern technology. While Stiegler has something important to contribute on the relation between technology, attention and education, I suggest his account is rather too bound up with critical theories of technology. In the end I turn to philosophers of religion, such as Eliade and Smith to suggest different ways of conceiving the role of attention in education that does set technologies up over/against the formation of attention essential to education. (shrink)

In its ideal conception, the post-apartheid education landscape is regarded as a site of transformation that promotes democratic ideals such as citizenship, freedom, and critical thought. The role of the educator is pivotal in realising this transformation in the learners she teaches, but this realisation extends beyond merely teaching the curriculum to the educator herself, as the site where these democratic ideals are embodied and enacted. The teacher is thus centrally placed as a moral agent whose behaviour, in the classroom (...) space particularly, should, ideally, represent and communicate the values we aspire to cultivate in post-apartheid South African society generally. Thus, this notion of what teaching encompasses fits broadly into the conception of a “practice” in the sense developed by Alasdair MacIntyre, in that it is a transformative activity the enactment of which not only benefits the practitioner, but also extends to and benefits the broader community as well. Furthermore, practices are grounded in features of social or moral life we hold to be significant and, importantly, it is only through their active cultivation that they can be made tangible and further developed. MacIntyre’s theory of virtue is based on a three-fold interrelationship between practices, how they meaningfully narrate and shape an individual life, and how, in turn, this builds and sustains our moral and social traditions. Using these ideas to analyse post-apartheid South Africa, and the structural transformation paradox it is in, reveals the difficult and complex nature of a society that is in this transitional space. The claim is that attentiveness to practices in the educational space, and to the way they shape and inform moral and social traditions, is necessary to more fully understand and guide this societal transformation. (shrink)

Since the emergence of the global challenges of COVID-19 pandemic, its impact could be widely viewed in various human society aspects, such as education, business trading and also social interaction limit. Apart from many discussions on the pandemic from a wide range of such perspectives, scholarly attention is still rarely mainly in trying to elaborate the critical overview from an Islamic perspective following theological, historical, and sociological points of view. In this paper, the critical elaboration of the pandemic has (...) been widely discussed by analysing the contents of sacred scriptures and responses from an Islamic point of view. The literature was critically conducted from religious sources such as the Qur’an and Hadith, and also related contemporary works. The finding reveals that the pandemic has been given full attention as stated in the Qur’an and narrated in Hadith by taking a lesson from pandemics and strategically battling the pandemic. The following attentions were addressed in order to strengthen the Muslim community and society in order to support the health protocols arranged by the local and international health organizations. The value is that religion’s clear comprehension could give continued support to encourage the Muslim community especially and general society at large in the attempts to battle the spreading pandemic. -/- . (shrink)

Ethical decision-making in school administration has received considerable attention in educational leadership literature. However, most research has focused on principals working in secondary school settings while studies that explore ethical reasoning processes of academic deans have been significantly few. This qualitative study aims to describe the ethical decision-making processes employed by a select group of Filipino college deans in solving ethical dilemmas using the ethical paradigms proposed in the works of Starratt (Educ Adm Q 27:185–202, 1991) and Shapiro and (...) Stefkovich (Ethical leadership and decision-making in education: applying theoretical perspectives to complex dilemmas, 2005) as frameworks for the analysis. Data was gathered using semi-structured interviews and field text was analyzed using deductive thematic analysis. Findings of this study show that majority of the deans chose to share ethical dilemmas involving students and teachers. The findings also show the ethical frameworks of care, justice, and profession as the dominant paradigms utilized by Filipino deans and their preference for adopting multiple ethical frameworks when making their decisions. Most of the ethical dilemmas which the deans narrated relate to their tasks of academic administration such as monitoring student performance, faculty evaluation and maintaining school discipline. Interestingly, only a few dilemmas involving university administrators were expressed, and dilemmas that refer to broader societal issues usually associated with school administrators’ utilization of the ethic of critique were also significantly left out in the narratives of this study. This paper intends to contribute to current literature by expanding research to administrators working in the context of higher education in the Philippine setting. The findings of this study could serve as knowledge base in designing ethics courses to enhance educational leaders’ ethical decision-making skills. The study also provides useful insights of ethical decisions and reasoning processes employed by academic administrators in resolving real life ethical dilemmas that could be useful at the practical level for aspiring and practicing deans. (shrink)

Cet article porte sur la première phase de formation d’une philosophie économique proprio sensu en Chine, dans les années 1910-1930. Parmi les économistes chinois, ceux ayant reçu une éducation à l’économie occidentale appliquèrent leur savoir tout neuf de l’économie moderne à réinterpréter la pensée chinoise traditionnelle. Ils proposèrent un cadre analytique neuf pour systématiser les idées de la Chine ancienne et concentrèrent leur attention sur les enseignements des sages Laozi, Confucius, Mencius, Mozi, et Guanzi. La comparaison interculturelle plaça des (...) concepts chinois dans un contexte de pensée sociale et économique occidentale. Ensuite, on tira de nombreuses mentions et citations de nature « économique » des sages de l’Antiquité chinoise, pour les insérer dans la littérature universitaire en tant que tels, avec de facto un impact durable sur la recherche ultérieure. Cette entreprise intellectuelle préparait une histoire de la pensée économique chinoise comme discipline universitaire. Une lecture moderne des idées économiques de la Chine ancienne se liait à des questions de développement national. Les économistes de la période républicaine analysaient l’éthique traditionnelle des normes, les relations entre justice et profit, le contrôle des besoins et des désirs humains, les comportements de consommation, dans l’objectif de trouver les obstacles cachés retenant la Chine sur la voie du développement moderne. Ils soulignèrent les réussites de la pensée confucéenne, qui avaient contribué à jeter les bases de succès à venir. Les arguments critiques furent présentés en reconnaissant l’influence de l’éthique confucéenne sur la vie économique du peuple chinois. Le présent article se fonde sur l’étude des écrits d’économistes chinois de la période républicaine : Chen Huanzhang, Yuan Xianneng and Li Zhaoyi sont examinés pour leur exploration de l’héritage philosophique traditionnel, après avoir fait leurs études en Occident. Quant à Li Quanshi et Tang Qingzeng, ils publièrent leurs ouvrages sur l’histoire de la pensée économique chinoise en chinois. Une étude exhaustive de ces sources permet de reconstituer la démarche intellectuelle qui interpréta les idées économiques de l’ancienne Chine. L’examen des origines de la saisie de sources économique dans la philosophie traditionnelle met au jour les racines de la pensée économique moderne en Chine. (shrink)

Peu de philosophes contemporains choisissent de faire vivre leurs outils critiques grâce au terreau d'une association, d'un collectif. C'est le cas de Bernard Stiegler, qui a fondé Ars Industrialis en 2005. Le manifeste de l'association, Réenchanter le monde (Flammarion, 2005 ; 7400 ventes en Champs), devait connaître un grand retentissement. Depuis, les travaux et contributions fleurissent (de l'économiste André Gréau au comédien Robin Renucci, en passant par les spécialistes des digital studies), et Ars Industrialis franchit un cap en s'associant à (...) des collectivités locales (Nantes) ou en nouant des partenariats internationaux (Grande-Bretagne, Allemagne). Cet ouvrage fournit une synthèse de tous ces travaux en proposant un vocabulaire philosophique à la fois ambitieux et accessible. Qu'est-ce le marketing - le psychopouvoir - et pourquoi est-il un des dangers majeurs de notre époque? En quoi la technique influence-t-elle des fonctions aussi capitales que la mémoire ou l'écriture? Quelle nouvelle vision de l'éducation devons-nous mettre à jour depuis l'avènement du numérique? Que sont la bêtise et l'intelligence? Comment aider la transformation de citoyens passifs et débordés en amateurs, acteurs et membres d'une communauté de goûts et de savoirs? Faire attention propose, dans ces courts essais-définitions, le manifeste d'une époque charnière qui voit définitivement s'éloigner le monde ancien, tout en souhaitant mettre les outils de l'extrême contemporain au service d'un nouvel humanisme. (shrink)

A la fin du XIXe siècle, le progrès des sciences et des techniques parut ouvrir une ère de bonheur où l'homme, délivré des tâches serviles et de toutes les superstitions, serait enfin le maître de la nature et de son propre destin. Mais le XXe siècle ne tint pas ces promesses. Certes, le progrès des sciences a fait reculer la mortalité infantile et allonger l'espérance de vie. Les nouveaux moyens de communication ont permis la circulation rapide d'informations autour du globe. (...) Mais notre environnement est menacé par toutes sortes de déchets. La biologie a ouvert des voies effrayantes. l'automatisation a bouleversé le monde du travail. La nécessité de former des scientifiques pour créer et maîtriser ces nouveaux outils a fait reculer la culture classique. De tels changements ont obscurci les repères traditionnels, les esprits sont déroutés, le sens est en crise. A l'entrée du troisième millénaire, l'Académie d'Education et d'Etudes sociales ne pouvait laisser ces questions dans l'ombre : elles sont trop souvent l'objet de débats plus passionnés que fondés et raisonnés. La science menace-t-elle l'homme et son environnement? Pèse-t-elle sur la cohésion sociale et la démocratie? Quelle est sa place dans la culture, à côté de la philosophie? Comment le chrétien se situe-t-il dans ce monde scientifique et technique? Par une étude raisonnée de ces questions, l'AES souhaite délivrer un message d'espoir et de confiance, et contribuer à mettre le développement scientifique et technique au service de l'homme, suivant la parole de l'Ecclésiastique : " Le Très-Haut a donné à l'homme le savoir pour être glorifié dans ses merveilles " (17,8). (shrink)

The Philippines, a treasury of oral folk epics, gives us opportunities to research epics in transition, which implies documenting and introducing them to wider audiences. The losing of living epic tradition attracts national and international attention and becomes a concern of the state and the educational system. This study is focused on the literary characteristics Ricaredo Demetillo’s Barter in Panay: An Epic in which his materials were gathered from Maragtas, a semi-legendary recordof the Bornean settlement in Panay. The study (...) is anchored to Hornedo’s theory of reality frames in teaching literature. It unfolds the literary characteristics of the text through descriptive-qualitative method employing formalistic-contextualist approach. The study reveals the theme/s through the narration of the persona, the Filipino worldviews in contemporary times though the language of the characters. Barter in Panay: An Epic reflects the “sweetness and light” of the Filipino lifeways and traditional values. Demetillo’s literary epic is vehicle of preserving our folkloric tradition depicting our Filipino identity and worldview, making the text significant in the canon of Philippine and World literatures. The author emphasizes the urgency to know our past and to revise our understanding of the world within the progress of time. Keywords - Folk literature, barter in Panay, formalistic-contextualist approach, reality frames in teaching literature, literary epic, Central Panay, Philippines. (shrink)

Sunnah is an issue that Muslims pay special attention to it, since it is the second source of the religion of Islam. After the Prophet’s passing away, both the companions (al-saḥāba) and the successors (tābiʻūn) and tabaʻu al-tābiʻūn made extraordinary efforts to understand and interpret the Sunnah correctly. In fact, since the science of hadith is the common denominator in all fields of basic Islamic sciences, all scholars have tried to explain the transmission of hadith, the way it was (...) narrated, whether the narrators were competent to narrate, the explanation of unknown words in the hadith, etc. Although it is possible to find this activity during the Prophet’s time, it continued in a semi-systematic manner over time, especially after the third century. After the fourth century of hijri, the hadith commentary (sharḥ) process took on a completely systematic character and the science of hadith commentary became a sub-discipline of the hadith department. The process of writing commentaries, which started in the Islamic world and became a tradition over time, concentrated on the books that established the dominance on Muslim society. In this framework, serious contributions were made to the commentary literature in the following periods of time and an enormous commentary literature was formed. However, in the formation of the hadith commentary literature, the sectarian affiliation of the commentator was one of the most influential factors in determining the content of the commentary. In this context, Imām Mālik’s study named al-Muwaṭṭaʼ and al-Kutub al-Sitta took the lead in the development of the hadith commentary literature. In particular, al-Imām Mālik’s al-Muwaṭṭaʼ attracted the attention of the scholars of Andalusia who were interested in the science of hadith, and scholarly trips were made to Medina, one of the eastern Islamic countries, for the education and training of hadith, and as a result of these trips, the people of Andalusia adopted the Mālikī sect. Therefore Imām Mālik’s study named al-Muwaṭṭaʼ became one of the most important books. In Andalusia, serious commentaries were written on the aforementioned study in almost every century starting from the third century of hijri. One of these commentaries is Abū al-Muṭarrif al-Qanāziʻī’s study named Tafsīr al-Muwaṭṭaʼ, which is the subject of our research paper. There is no detached study on this study. For this reason, this study is important in terms of obtaining information about Andalusian hadith commentary. Likewise, it is expected that this study will also be a source of literature for comprehensive studies such as Maliki hadith commentarism and hadith methodology. (shrink)

How to explain the contradiction between, on the one hand, the decline of teaching in contemporary history, which necessarily brings about the decline of the historical event “Shoah” itself, and, on the other hand, the ever more growing attention towards the memory of the genocide of the Jews? In the past year only, ten “trains of the memory” have left Italy to take more than fifteen thousand students to Poland — thereby making our country the third country in the (...) world as for amount of visitors of holocaust sites. Under the sign of the “duty of memory” and of an approach to Shoah more and more devoted to human rights and to moral education, most teachers prefer to focus on the visit to the places of the massacre and on the testimonies of survivals, rather than on a historical and political reconstruction of the context and of the facts.Precisely because the narrator-victims are survivors of the lagers, they are the mediators between the dark of the obscene world that they were compelled to see, and the world of the listeners: they are the human visages of a universe of victims without a name, and their stories are the key for us to question our sense of responsibility. However, with no solid historical teaching, their narration elicits only a emotive participation, it provides the impression to have fulfilled a moral duty, but it remains, as a matter of fact, incomprehensible. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reading History: On Jacob Burckhardt as Source-ReaderJürgen GroßeThere is a gap between the reputation Jacob Burckhardt (1818–97) has enjoyed among the educated public and among professional historians—a discrepancy that has become commonplace in the century-long reception of the Swiss cultural historian’s work. 1 Nevertheless, in the light of recent appraisals of Burckhardt as an ancestor of a different—perhaps a new—cultural history, and with the rediscovery of his contributions to (...) the history of art, aesthetics, and historical anthropology, the gap seems to be ever-narrowing. 2 However, let us keep it open in the following few pages.The chasm between assessments of Burckhardt as an historian-writer and as an historian-researcher appears roughly analogous to his above-mentioned respective reputations among laymen and professional scholars. As a historian Burckhardt did not want to be a scientific researcher. From the time he began writing history he admitted that he felt little commitment to the predominating concept of scientific progress as a continuous accumulation of facts and theories. Thus, as an outsider to the profession he had only one option, which was to [End Page 525] attain a place of honor as an esteemed writer of historical books for the educated public—a “master historian.” Yet it is precisely this characterization of Burckhardt that makes a curious fact appear all the more baffling: the act of writing books made Burckhardt feel thoroughly tormented. Throughout his career, he lamented historical authorship as a thankless occupation—a form of “slavery.” Just four years after finishing Die Cultur der Renaissance in Italien (1860) Burckhardt wrote to his friend Paul Heyse:I now consider my modest literary career as finally closed, and feel much better and content reading sources, as I only study and make notes for teaching and not for possible book-making. The historical market is tremendously overcrowded as things are, and it will be worse if peace lasts. 3Books like Die Zeit Constantins des Großen, Die Cultur der Renaissance in Italien, and Der Cicerone—works that gained the Basler historian fame that has endured to the present day—were either not prepared by the author for further editions or abandoned for colleagues to revise. Thus, Burckhardt seemed to regard himself neither as a researcher nor as a writer but rather as a reader of history. His dislike of research and authorship deserves our attention not only because it stands in sharp contrast to the mores of the scientific community, both in his and our times; for it might also elucidate yet another interesting paradox: Burckhardt, who celebrated the “reading of sources” and “the insights accessible from sources” as no other nineteenth-century historian, was soon to be charged with failing to meet the accepted standards of source-criticism. This essay examines these problems in terms of a series of questions concerning Burckhardt’s reading of history.Why Burckhardt Prefers ReadingBurckhardt clearly abhorred what he called the “history of the events.” Already as a student, he felt himself confronted with a barrage of events, not so much as matters of real history as rather as products of historical science—the ever-increasing facts that historians produced in relation to actual events. Unlike the humanistic and enlightenment paradigms of history, mainstream nineteenth-century scholarship no longer relied on the eyewitness to guarantee authenticity. The focus had shifted from remembrance to reconstruction; events were now narrated in terms of newly conceived abstractions like “development,” “process,” “spirit of an age,” and “spirit of a nation.” This increasing detachment from eyewitnessed experience paved the way for an endless production of information, [End Page 526] which had become an occupation in its own right. Every newcomer to the study of history now encountered a huge mass of mere historical facts, largely devoid of content—“a desperate prospect at the beginning of the study of history,” according to Burckhardt. Furthermore, the dynamism of modern history itself continued to produce more and more “events,” which were then to be reproduced as “facts.” This mire of facts burdened the reader of historiography even more than the student of history. “Even the most well-meaning of contemporary historians,” Burckhardt... (shrink)

Dār al-Funūn Theology founded in 1924 was a modern educational institution which adopted both traditional and modern approach to Islamic Sciences. The changes in the field of hadīth during the process of transition to the university caused a change in the definitions and the titles of the courses such as from hadīth al-sharīf and usul al-hadīth to hadīth and the history of hadīth and the time allocated to each course was gradually reduced. The preparation of the texts by the teachers (...) in the hadith history courses and their content will answer the question of whether there is a transformation in the field of hadīth in the early years of the Republic of Turkey. As a matter of fact, Izmirli İsmāʿīl Ḥaqqī’s History of Ḥadīth and Ḥuseyin ʿAvnīʿ Arapkīrli’s al-Buġya al-Hasîs fī Tārīh al-Hadīth which were written in this period, pioneered the studies based on the field of the history of hadīth in Turkish hadīth literature. In addition, these works are the main source in understanding the period. In this study, the mentioned works will be textually analysed through the induction method. Therefore, the subjects that would reflect the ideas of the teachers will be discussed. Thus, it will be tried to determine whether the courses of the history of hadīth are closer to tradition or modern ideas and, how the education of hadīth is practised.Summary: After the foundation of the Turkish Republic in 1923, the Faculty of Theology was opened at Istanbul University as a result of the abolition of madrasas issuing a law regarding to the Unification of Education announced in 1924. With the opening of this faculty, the education in the field of Religious Sciences continued its presence on a new foundation, which can be considered modern, until 1933. In this study, it was attempted to trace the courses of Ḥadīth and the History of Ḥadīth given in the Faculty of Theology at Istanbul University between 1924 and 1933. Firstly, a brief history of the courses will be given, and then it is among the purposes of this study to perform a textual analysis of the works written by the teachers of these courses. While doing this, Izmirli Ismail Hakkı's History of Ḥadīth, which was written as course notes and Huseyin Avni Arapkirli's al-Buġya al-Hasîs fī Tārīh al-Hadīth, which has not been known until discussed it this article for the first time, were focused on. These works are very important in terms of initiating the History of Ḥadīth literature. Furthermore, these are the first works in the field of hadīth in the Turkish Republic, and they are very important sources for revealing the ideological infrastructure of the period. To begin with, it is necessary to attract attention to the change in the course names and duration if there is a need to briefly mention the history of hadīth courses in University. In the universities founded before the opening of the Faculty of Theology, the courses were named as Ḥadīth al-sharīf and usul al-hadīth. Besides, these courses were included in the curriculum for four years, which constituted the duration of the education. In the university founded in 1924 after the proclamation of the Republic, the name was changed as Ḥadīth and the History of Ḥadīth. It is seen that the courses of Hadīth and the History of Hadīth were taught three hours a week for two years from the opening of the Faculty of Theology until 1931. From 1931 until 1933, when the faculty was closed, the courses continued to be given two hours a week. When the content of the works is viewed, it can be seen that Izmirli İsmāʿīl Ḥaqqī followed a historical system in his work History of Ḥadīth. Beginning the subject with the classification of sciences, Izmirli touches upon the topics such as the writing and codification of hadīths. Afterwards, he also deals with the methodology of in detail. He then mentions about the history of hadīth by Shiʿā and draws a general map of the history of hadīth as of the third century of the Islamic calendar. This work differs from the previous tradition of the education of hadīth in terms of including the Shiʿā’s the history of hadīth and especially of ahl al-raʾy’s understanding of the hadīth. In addition, the detailed discussion of hadīth practice in the work is significant in terms of showing that the content of the course did not only cover the history of hadīth.Moreover, it is observed that Izmirli touched upon controversial topics in his work such as the writing of hadīth, Bukhari's criticism and hadīth-history relation. However, Izmirli does not express his approach to these topics so clearly. In doing so, he hides his views between lines, using ambiguous statements related to the topics while trying to base the views on authority. For instance, he says that the hadīths were written on the special pages of the companions in the early periods when it comes to writing hadīths, which was one of the most important topics of the history of hadīth. Even though this gives an impression that the hadīths were written in the companion period, it is stated in the following explanations that the hadīths had not been gathered and written down in one place. Izmirli also says that they refer to the hadīths in the hearts of the companion. In another example, he mentions that there is no doubt about the accuracy of the narrations in Bukhārī's work. However, in the following pages, he states that there are narrators, who are not trustworthy, in Bukhārī's work and says Dāraqutnī's criticisms related to Bukhārī. When the aforementioned two examples are examined, it can be stated that Izmirli acted a bit more cautiously especially in controversial topics. When it comes to Ḥuseyin ʿAvnīʿ Arapkīrli, who starts his work with the classification of sciences as Izmirli does, it is seen that he discusses the part of practice much more briefly. Additionally, he gives more attention to Prophet Muhammad and companion period of the hadīth history. In his work, he also provides detailed information about the formation of the hadīth literature in the third century of the Islamic calendar and afterwards. When the issue is reviewed within the scope of the topics discussed by Ḥuseyin ʿAvnīʿ in his work, it is necessary to mention that the topics related to the history of hadīth were more dominant in the work. Unlike Izmir, he does not allocate much space to controversial topics in his work. However, it should also be noted that he partly touched upon some controversial topics such as hadīth -history relation and writing of hadīths. Ḥuseyin ʿAvnīʿ considers the history of hadīth as a sub-heading of history. Regarding the writing of hadīths, he states openly that the hadīths generally were not written down because of the possibility for them to be mixed up with the Qur’ān in the early periods, and this continued until the time of caliphate ʿÖmer bin ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz. Thus, it can be said that both writers, who applied different methods in their works, looked for a new method. However, it should be remembered that these names were a part of the Ottoman educational system and included in a new system together with their background. Consequently, the fact that they were somewhere between old and new. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:La séduction de la fiction by Jean-François VernayDiana MistreanuVernay, Jean-François. La séduction de la fiction. Hermann, 2019. 214pp.Published in Hermann’s prestigious “Savoirs Lettres” book series founded by Michel Foucault, Jean-François Vernay’s latest work is a compelling neurophenomenology of literary fiction. This makes it a valuable contribution to the burgeoning field of cognitive literary studies pioneered in Anglo-Saxon research in the late 1970s, but which French academia, with (...) a few notable exceptions such as Jean-Marie Schaeffer, Pierre-Louis Patoine, Alexandre Gefen, Catherine Grall, or Françoise Lavocat, is still largely reluctant to embrace. The author is a lecturer in Australian studies at the Global Institute in Sydney, and he is a bilingual literary scholar whose recent research explores the complex interface between fiction and human cognition.Vernay’s book starts by restating a narratological cliché: in the words of Paul Valéry, stories accompany humans from the cradle to the tomb, as monsters, pirates, fairies, and other fantastic creatures fascinate children’s minds from the first years of their lives (7). A truism follows this cliché: the origin of any story is the human brain (16), as the author reminds us by underlining the bio-anthropological origins of fiction in pages that cite the works of Umberto Eco and Nancy Huston (the writer who coined the notion of “espèce fabulatrice,” “the tale-teller species” [2008]), and that echo the research of scholars such as Mark Turner (1996) and Jean-Marie Schaeffer (1999). Indeed, oral and written stories are not only created, but also interpreted by human minds, triggering states and emotions that range from extreme boredom to excitement and inviting identification with fictional characters. Nevertheless, the mechanisms of the interaction between the human mind and brain and one of its most sophisticated products, namely fiction, are largely still understudied in the field of literature. Placing fiction under the sign of seduction (8) – which allows us to read between the lines an homage to Roland Barthes, the theorist of the “plaisir du texte” referenced later in the book (85-86) – Vernay defines works of fiction as catalysts of a sensori-affective experience [End Page 151] that engages almost all our senses and arouses emotions (“le vecteur d’une expérience sensori-affective qui sollicite la quasi-totalité de nos sens et suscite des émois” [19]). Characterized by the interdisciplinarity that forms the core of cognitive approaches to fiction, Vernay’s study investigates the literary phenomenon in its complexity, asking not only how fiction seduces us, but also why it sometimes fails to do so. Drawing on state-of-the-art research in cognitive psychology and neuroscience, the book manages to eschew over-simplified or reductionist analyses. Our engagement with and consumption of literary fiction is thus analyzed by discussing marketing strategies and editorial choices, the activity of reading as a solitary pleasure versus a professional obligation, as well as the interplay between society, politics, and educational curricula. The author answers his multi-layered research question in nine different chapters, each of them exploring one facet of the relationship between literature and the human mind.The first chapter, “Émois livresques,” highlights the marketing value of books, as well as their status as objects of consumption, in the capitalistic sense of the word. Books are presented here as the targets of our desire, since in financial terms, the notion of reader, the author reminds us, is a mere euphemism for that of consumer (20-22). As we are entering the era of what Yves Citton, often quoted in this essay, calls “cognitive capitalism,” a system in which society is conceptualized as a set of machines that process information (21), fictional literature, along with the arts, is devalued. To counterbalance this trend, Vernay explains, the book industry has to adopt effective strategies that create a desire for consumption. Thus, this chapter addresses the editorial and marketing techniques designed to attract our attention and trigger our impulse to buy and read. From the smell and color of books to the blurb and the careful mention of literary prizes, no detail is overlooked or considered redundant.After addressing the... (shrink)

Resumo: Defendo que a relação entre filosofia e magia possibilita processos de subjetivação para experimentarmos outro tipo de educação filosófica, que possa resistir à biopolítica e ao neoliberalismo na contemporaneidade. Faço uma caracterização de ambos como um tipo de poder enfeitiçador que se enraizou em nossa subjetividade. Partindo de uma leitura anarqueológica sobre o pensamento de Michel Foucault, procuro conceituar os processos de subjetivação, evidenciando como a cronologia ocidental silenciou a magia, experiência-limite para a filosofia, da mesma maneira que teço (...) algumas considerações sobre como esse paradigma nos conduz a experimentar outro tipo de educação filosófica, mais atenta à erótica e ao resgate de saberes e práticas originárias. Palavras-Chave: Educação filosófica. Magia. Processos de subjetivação. Biopolítica. Michel Foucault. Philosophical Education and Magic: The experimentation of other subjectivation Processes: I argue that the relationship between philosophy and magic enables subjectivation processes for us to experiment with another kind of philosophical education, which can resist contemporary biopolitics and neoliberalism. I characterize them both as a kind of bewitching power that has taken root in our subjectivity. Starting from an archeological reading on Michel Foucault's thought, I seek to conceptualize the processes of subjectivation, highlighting how Western chronology has silenced magic, the limiting experience for philosophy, just as I make some considerations on how this paradigm leads us to experiment with another kind of philosophical education, more attentive to the erotica and to the rescue of originary knowledge and practices. Keywords: Philosophical education. Magic. Subjectivation processes. Biopolitics. Michel Foucault. Éducation philosophique et Magie : l’expérience d’autres processus de subjectivation Résumé: Je défends que la relation entre la philosophie et la magie nous permet d’avoir des processus de subjectivation pour expérimenter un autre type d’éducation philosophique, qui peut résister à la biopolitique et au néolibéralisme dans la contemporanéité. Je fais une caractérisation des deux comme un type de pouvoir enchanteur qui s’enracine dans notre subjectivité. En partant d’une lecture anarchéologique sur la pensée de Michel Foucault, je cherche à conceptualiser les processus de subjectivation, en mettant en évidence la manière dont la chronologie occidentale a mis au silence la magie, expérience-limite pour la philosophie, de la même manière que je tisse quelques considérations sur la manière dont ce paradigme nous conduit à expérimenter un autre type d’éducation philosophique, plus attentif à l’érotique et au sauvetage des savoirs et pratiques originaires. Mots-clés: Éducation philosophique. Magie. Processus de subjectivation. Biopolitique. Michel Foucault. (shrink)

continent. 2.1 (2012): 40–43. Lance Olsen is a professor of Writing and Literature at the University of Utah, Chair of the FC2 Board of directors, and, most importantly, author or editor of over twenty books of and about innovative literature. He is one of the true champions of prose as a viable contemporary art form. He has just published Architectures of Possibility (written with Trevor Dodge), a book that—as Olsen's works often do—exceeds the usual boundaries of its genre as it (...) explores his interests in narrative theory and pedagogy. The book is a kind of “anti-textbook;” a performative polemic against the stale, conservative and monolithic conception of the literary that so often dominates institutional discourse around creative writing. The following interview takes the occasion of AoP's publication as a chance to speak with Olsen about the book itself as well as to engage with larger, unanswerable, questions about the futures and intersections of literature and education. —Ben Segal INTERVIEW: 1) First, I want to start before the beginning, with the title. I’m really fascinated by the concept it conjures. Can you say something about innovative/experimental/(choose your adjective) literature in relation to both ideas around architecture and possibility? Innovative or experimental are tremendously fraught adjectives, needless to say. But for the purposes of my book, they modify a fiction concerned with the questions: What is fiction? What can it do, and how, and why? Now, of course, what looks “innovative” or “experimental” to one at 17 may not be what looks “innovative” or “experimental” to one at 27 or 57, and what looks “innovative” or “experimental” in 1812 may not be what looks “innovative” or “experimental” in 2012. A certain existential and historical perspectivism is always at work. But I think it’s fair to say that innovative and experimental usually refer to a narrativity that includes a self-reflective awareness of and engagement with theoretical inquiry, concerns, and obsessions, as well as a sense of being in conversation with fiction across space and time. One can't create challenging writing in a vacuum; it has to challenge in relation to something. So contemporary writers interested in the subject are not only in pursuit of the innovative, but are also always-already writing subsequent to it—writing, that is, in its long wake. Architectures of Possibility conceives of creativity as a possibility space, a locale just outside our comfort zones where we can and should take multiple chances in order to imagine in new ways, explore fresh strategies for finding and cultivating ideas, re-view what it is we’re doing and why, better understand what Samuel Beckett meant when he wrote: “Try again. Fail again. Fail better.” It reminds us that there are other ways of narrating our worlds and ourselves than those we have inherited from the entertainment industry, the government, academia, previous writing, and so on. 2) AoP seems to be directed at several audiences (and purposes) simultaneously. What I mean is that it seems at times a polemic in favor of innovative literature, at other times a creative writing textbook, and still other times a guide to the network of publishers, journals, and programs that make up the current world of non-mainstream literary art in the U.S. In my mind, Architectures is a theorized anti-textbook about writing. Most textbooks on the subject (think of Janet Burroway’s Writing Fiction: A Guide to Narrative Craft , taught in most creative-writing classroom across the country) orchestrate how to construct conventional stories. They instruct from a place of power how to generate familiar stories that are repeated so often that many of us begin to take them as the primary model for narrativity, if not unconsciously as a kind of truth. The result, as Brian Kiteley points out in 3 A.M. Epiphany (one of the only other alternative textbooks about innovative writing around, by the way, and a tremendous repository of exercises), is merely competent texts. Architectures problematizes that gesture by outlining what conventional narrativity looks like, urging writers to think about its ideology of form as well as content, and invites them to imagine writing, not as a set of relatively stable conventions, but, rather, as a possibility space where everything can and should be thought, tried, challenged. It thereby rhymes with Roland Barthes’s definition of literature: the question minus the answer—which is to say Architectures poses complications to the act of writing rather than solutions. 3) One of the most notable things about the book is the use of interviews. This is also one of the reasons that I think the book works so well for a variety of audiences—that anyone with even a passing interest in the state and future of literature will have an interest in your conversation with people like Ben Marcus, Samuel Delany, and Lydia Davis. I was hoping you could just talk a little about how you chose these subjects to interview, how you edited the interview material, and which answers you received struck you the most. Experimentalism , like realism , wants to appear in the plural. The idea of gathering more than forty interviews (with the help of my awesome collaborator, Trevor Dodge, himself a fine innovative author) represents an attempt to suggest that: the wide, rich, exciting opportunities inherent in the term. There are interviews with younger writers, elder statesmen in the field, publishers, editors, hypermedia artists, comic book makers, and so on: Joe Wenderoth, Carole Maso, Scott McCloud, Nick Montfort, Kathy Acker, et al. Trevor and I decided to do flash interviews: short, concentrated Q&As, each focusing on a particular troubling of writing. We only lightly edited the results to match the manuscript’s overall style, and every interview arrived as a surprise housing several unexpected insights. Three brief examples: Michael Mejia, when asked about what he dreads when setting about writing: “Dread is an interesting word here. I associate it less with loathing or aversion, I suppose, than with a kind of productive fear. Do I dread a project’s failure? Sure, who doesn’t? Who wants to waste time on something that comes to nothing, or is unreadable? But then, what do these terms mean, and who or what defines a work as a ‘failure,’ as ‘waste,’ as ‘unreadable’? Should a work actually try to interrogate and exceed these conceptual limitations? My tendency is to write into dread in order to reveal to myself, as much as to any reader that may come after, the varied complacencies that make other, mostly more conventional writings, readable. It’s at the frontier between readability (security) and unreadability (terror) that I want to live creatively.” Carole Maso, when asked what she’d like a sentence to accomplish: “I think a sentence can if allowed carry emotional and intellectual states as they flee, as they come and go, an escaping essence difficult to hold in other ways. In this way I think the sentence can work as a phrase of music does, sounding something large and elusive in us. Alternatively it can provide sometimes a stability, an essence, a moment of being. Unlike music the sentence also of course carries language with all its potential for meaning making and memory traces and association with it as well. I probably love the accretion of sentences most—those patterns, that shimmer, that resonance.” Shelley Jackson, when asked what is innovative about the innovative: “The purpose of the innovative is, I think, to wake us up. We are not quite alive, most of the time; we occupy a sort of cartoon version of our lives, its lines made smooth by repetition. Writing can open the seams in that world, reintroduce us to the real lives that we have forgotten. Maybe all good writing is innovative in some sense, in that it shows or tells or makes you feel something you never felt before—something for which you have no cartoon ready.” 4) You talk a little about N. Katherine Hayles’s concept of Media Specific Analysis and propose the supplemental notion of Medium Specific Generation—basically taking Hayles and applying her thought from the perspective of the writer. I’ve been trying to develop somewhat related theoretical frameworks, so I was really excited to come upon this section of the book. I’m wondering if you can talk a little more about this idea and, in general, about the potentials that you see as being opened up by writers engaging with and exploiting different media as literary platforms? “Lulled into somnolence by five hundred years of print,” Hayles urges in her (at least for me) transformative 2004 essay, “Print is Flat, Code is Deep,” “literary analysis should awaken to the importance of media-specific analysis, a mode of critical attention which recognizes that all texts are instantiated and that the nature of the medium in which they are instantiated matters.” She goes on to argue critics should learn to become more attuned to the materiality of the medium under investigation—which is to say a story isn’t a story isn’t a story. Rather, the “same” story remediated through film is intrinsically different from that story remediated through conventionally printed books is intrinsically different from that story remediated through hypermedia. “Materiality,” Hayles goes on, “is reconceptualized as the interplay between a text’s physical characteristics and its signifying strategies, a move that entwines instantiation and signification at the outset.” My point in Architectures is simply to emphasize Media Specific Generation: the idea that when writing you should be cognizant, not only of the thematics of the text you are working on, and, as it were, the internal components of its narrativity (character, language, plot, etc.), but also of the material embodiment those components take, and, perhaps more important, the material embodiment those components can take. The idea that the way texts matter matters isn’t something usually addressed in any significant way in creative-writing classrooms and textbooks. It may almost go without saying such experimentation with typography, layout, and white space has a long tradition—certainly one that tracks back at least as far as Guillaume Apollinaire’s early twentieth-century Calligrammes , Laurence Sterne’s textually ribald eighteenth-century Tristram Shandy , although one could arguably plot a hypothetical trajectory that reaches to ancient Greek romances like Achilles Tatius’ second-century Leucippe and Clitophon . Experiments into atomic materiality and digital immateriality bracket the definition of “book” at the same time they highlight Michael Martone’s prediction of its present future as increasingly viral, collaborative, and ephemeral. Or, as Matthew Battles points out: the future of the “book” has already arrived, and it is “ethereal and networked” rather than “an immutable brick.”While conventional writing and reading practices are conceptualized as private, individual, relatively fixed experiences, many of the new forms indicate that writing and reading—from production through dissemination—are rapidly becoming public, collective, incrementally unfixed experiences. That strikes me as an astonishing set of opportunities for a writer to investigate. 5) Another concept you elaborate in AoP is that of limit texts, basically texts that, once you read them, change what you imagine as the shape/horizon/potential of literature. You provide a fantastic reading list of limit texts at the end of AoP. I was hoping you could talk about a few of them in terms of how they specifically operate as limit texts for you—how they expand your understanding of what literature could be or do. Karl Jaspers coined the word Grenzsituationen (border/limit situations) to describe existential moments accompanied by anxiety in which the human mind is forced to confront the restrictions of its existing forms—moments that make us abandon, fleetingly, the securities of our limitedness and enter new realms of self-consciousness. Death, for example. Limit texts are a variety of disturbance that carries various elements of narrativity to their brink so the reader can never quite imagine them in the same terms again. Once you’ve taken one down from the shelf, you’ll never be able to put it back up again. They won’t leave you alone. They will continue to work on your imagination long after you’ve read them. Simply by being in the world, they ask us to embrace difficulty, freedom, radical skepticism. One of the most important for me is Samuel Beckett’s The Unnamable . Instead of establishing conventional setting and building traditional character, from its first words it unsettles both: “Where now? Who now? When now?” That first trio of question marks broadcasts the thematics of the writing (“novel” may be too strong a word) that will follow: it is all about a voice (or, perhaps, voices, about the grammatical mistake of the first-person pronoun), a consciousness (maybe, again, too strong a word), often genderless, removed from place and chronology and socioeconomic reality, hovering in a state of perpetual aporia. All it knows is what it doesn’t know, and its not-knowing is blackly, sardonically comic. The Unnamable is the embodiment of an unreliable narrator—a subject position that can’t trust itself, let alone be trusted by a reader. It contradicts, takes back, digresses, undoes what it just did, forgets, lies, hallucinates gloriously. The language is abstract, disembodied, devoid of sensory data, grayish rather than painterly in texture. Without knowing this passage is from a novel, a reader might well conclude s/he were reading a patch of (anti-)Cartesian philosophy. It might be helpful to conceive of what Beckett is doing as post-genre writing, then, or perhaps what Raymond Federman referred to as critifiction—a mode that blurs conventional distinctions between theory and narrative. In completely different register, and much more recently, Anne Carson’s Nox blew me away. It takes the form of an elegy for her older brother, whom she didn’t know well and who died unexpectedly while on the run from the law in Europe. The thing itself arrives in a box that simulates a thick book, as well as the brother’s textual coffin. Open it, and inside you discover, not a codex, but an accordioned series of “pages” that folds out into an arrangement that suggests an ancient scroll (Carson is, perhaps illuminatingly, a professor of classics) made up of shards of her brother’s letters, old photographs, tickets, Carson’s observations, Catullus’ poem 101 (the one addressed to the Roman poet’s dead brother, a doubling of Carson’s situation), and extensive dictionary entries on all the words that compose that poem. The aggregate produces a collage about the impossibilities of aggregates, the impossibilities of understanding fully, of capturing absences in language. At times Nox feels less an example of what most readers consider a book than something closer to a three-dimensional work of assemblage art. It’s a beautiful mechanism for contemplating Media Specific Analysis, for urging us all to be more extreme. 6) Finally, I want to talk a little about pedagogy and institutions. I’m less interested in questions like “Are MFA programs good for writers?” than in questions about how your role as teacher informs your understanding of literature and your writing practice. I’m also very curious about your take on how commercially marginal literary art is largely patronized by large state institutions and at the same time often imagines itself as a critical and even possibly revolutionary practice. How have your own positions within universities and university-affiliated organizations shaped your thinking about them and about innovative literature? I can imagine in many ways it might make you even more critical. And (I know, another ‘and’...) how does AoP (especially given its relation to Rebel Yell , your previous text on creative writing) reflect your personal history and experience as a teacher and member of communities that are largely defined by institutions? In the classroom, I try to generate the pedagogical field I would have liked to have inhabited as a student, but didn’t. Roland Barthes has a lovely line about this: “We need to substitute for the magisterial [classroom] space of the past (the word delivered by the master from the pulpit above with the audience below, the flock, the sheep, the herd)—a less upright, less Euclidean space where no one, neither teacher nor students, would ever be in his final place.” Easier said than done, of course, but an important life project for all who think of themselves as educators. My own classroom, my own writing, and Architectures of Possibility itself attempt to create the sort of possibility space where, as I mentioned at the outset of our interview, everything should be thought, tried, challenged; where everything rhymes with Roland Barthes’s definition of literature: the question minus the answer. I’m not sure I could write what I’m writing now without the conversations I have almost daily with my students, the conversations they have with each other, the conversations we all have with the texts we study. Especially in light of the paradigm shift over the last, say, quarter century from academia as intellectual exploration to academia as McDonaldized trade school, the irony isn’t lost on me concerning the discrepancy between the safe harbor innovative authors find there and the cultural critiques those authors launch through their writing and pedagogical work. In 2001, I quit my full professorship at one institution precisely because of my disappointment over what had happened to the learning environment there. I had no intentions of reentering the field. In 2007, however, the University of Utah approached me, and I found myself in an environment much more hospitable to the sort of work I want to do—teaching experimental narrative theory and practice. It isn’t by any means a simple irony. One could easily argue innovative writing and pedagogy represents the trace of the paradigm Barthes suggests, and that trace is tremendously productive in all kinds of ways. Innovative writing has never and will never change the world in any large, macrocosmic way. But we’ve all had our lives changed, one by one, by an encounter with a difficult, rich, resonant piece of prose, poetry, music, art, you name it. We’ve all had our lives changed at the ahistorical, microcosmic moment by a class we’ve taken, a teacher we’ve studied with, to such an extent that we became, quite literally, different people. I just came across a stunning set of sentences from Derrida on the topic: “What is education? The death of the parents.” That’s what we’re all up to in the innovative, be it in written texts or the texts we call our classrooms or the texts we call our politics: trying to disrupt what both can and can’t be disrupted, trying to undo what both can and can’t be undone, continuously. (shrink)

The contribution of the generation of Tâbi’un in the formation of Islamic sciences in general and in the development of hadith in particular is known. Various studies have been done on the quality of this contribution. Being a part of such an aim is among the targets of this study as well. Not to conducted any work on the hadithism of especially Abdullah b. Abbas' student and after him Atâ ibn Abi Rabah who the most famous teacher of the Mecca (...) school was another encouraging reason. While examining the life and scientific personality of Ata who was one of the early personalities, it has been tried to reach some results with the information obtained from the sources from the first period, especially the fatwa and rumors belonging to him. Atâ who was leading an observable, active political life, lived in the intellectual and social turmoil that emerged in the early period. Atâ who drawing attention with his educator personality, added his own experiences to the scientific heritage he received from the companions in the first instance Ibn Abbas, and had been passed it on to the next generations. Being a fatwa authority in Makkah mufti and pilgrimage organizations for many years is one of his important experiences. In addition to being well-known for his devotion to the Sunnah, he has been taken place between those known among the generation of Tâbi’un with his fatwa and ijtihad. Ata, who is a critical hadith reciter, is accepted as the absolute authority in the hadith. The fact that he was one of the first to make talfiq in the hadith shows that he knew the diversity of the sources he reported and the many tarikh of the narrations. He wrote narrations and encouraged writing of hadith. He contributed to the development of hadith terms with some of the hadith concepts he used and drew attention with the abundance of mursal hadiths. (shrink)

As in the Arab and Persian literatures, many works have been written on the education and teaching of tajwīd, which provides the correct reading of the Qurʼān in Islamic Turkish Literature. Works on this subject were written generally as prose. Besides, some of these works were written in verse style because of practical benefits in education. In this context, the work named Ẓafar written by S̲h̲umnulu Ḥilmī Efendi (d. 1200/1785-86), which is one of the poetical tajwīds that has not been (...) studied enough, is one of the works that can be evaluated under a separate title within religious literaty genres such as forty hadith, ʻaqāʼidnāme and s̲h̲urūt al-ṣalāt (pillars or prayer). This study primarily deals with Ḥilmī Efendi’s tajwīd of verse in Turkish, named Ẓafar, with form and content analysis. The aim of the study is to give information about Ḥilmī Efendi, based on his works and to reveal the text of the work named Ẓafar, which has been transcribed. The importance of the study stems from the fact that it will introduce the first Turkish tajwīd written in verse as far as it has been identified and the master of qırāʼat poet author who can be accepted as the founder of this genre.Summary: During the formation of Islamic sciences such as tafsīr, hadīth, kalām, fiḳh, and ḳırāʼat many works related to these sciences were written in Arabic, Persian, and Kurdish languages. After Turks met with Islam, works were written in verse and prose style to learn the al-Ḳurʼān, the hadīth and the sciences that would help to understand these two sources in order to live a true faith and worship life. On the other hand, as a result of the writing of verse works, some literary genres emerged in Turkish Islamic literature. This issue has also been appeared in the science of tajwīd, which is defined as “a set of rules for the correct pronunciation of the letters with all their qualities” and which ensures the Ḳurʼān to be read properly. As a matter of fact, the writing of both prose and verse tajwīd works defined as a religious-literary genre is an indication of this phenomenon. For instance, Tuḥfe-i Şerīfī (S̲h̲erīfī d. 1260/1844) and Naẓmuʼl-Ehem (S̲h̲eyhī d. 1235/1819-20) are examples of verse tajwīd works. In this context, one of the verse tajwīds is Ẓafar, which is defined by his own writer, S̲h̲umnulu Ḥilmī Efendi, as the first work written in this type.The author of the work, Ḥilmī Efendi, lived in Vardar Yenicesi (Giannitsa) for a long time and died in Hijāz in 1200 (1785-86), is one of the 18th century authors and an specialist in the field. In the work named Osmanli Müellifleri (Bursalı Meḥmed Ṭāhir, 1333 / Ottoman Authors) it is stated that he has works named Manẓūm Tajwīd (Ẓafar) and Manẓūm S̲h̲urūt-ı ṣalāt (Naẓm-ı nefīs) and that he wrote death dates with poetry on the gravestones of the grandchildren of G̲h̲āzī Evrenos Bey (d. 820/1417) and an Arabic khatim prayer. Information about Ḥilmī Efendi's personality, educational life, and scientific level could not be found. One of the works of Ḥilmī Efendi is Naẓm-ı nefīs, which was written in 1190/1776-77, and is in the form of S̲h̲urūt-ı ṣalāt. In this work of 125 couplets except for the title of “Tertīb-i Secāvend-i Ḥurūf” (fāʻilātün fāʻilātün fāʻilün) the author used the meter of the fāʻilātün fāʻilātün fāʻilātün fāʻilün and preferred the masnavī as a form of verse. The work consists of a introduction of 9 couplets, a main part of 24 couplets, an addition and conclusion of 3 couplets.Another work of Ḥilmī Efendi is the work called Ẓafar in the form of verse tajwīd, which he wrote on the request of some of his friends and which is the main subject of this study. There is no record of the writing date of this work. This study also includes the transcribed text of the work. However, when considering the period the author lived in and the time of his other work Naẓm-ı nefīs (1190/1776-77) it is estimated that Ẓafar was written after the second half of the 18th century. However no manuscript copy of Ẓafar could be found. Therefore, for the text to be transcribed in this study, the oldest dated and printed copy with Arabic diacritics of the work (Istanbul: Dār at-tıbāʻa al-āmire, 1265) was taken as basis. In this copy, the work was incorrectly named as Tajwīd-i Manẓūm. Also, there are some typographical errors in the headlines or text; these errors were tried to be corrected. It consists of 71 couplets; an introduction and 25 main titles. Ẓafar, written was written in half, full and rich rhyme. In some places, as well as rhyme, redif (repeated voice) created with an appendix or a word was used. The work has a clear, intriguing and narrative language and expression.Traditionally, the author starts his work by praising God, salawat, prayer, followed by a statement about the importance and the provisions of the learning tajwīd. Then the author gives informations about some tajwīd subjects such as ḥarf-i med, sebeb-i med, medd-i muttaṣıl, medd-i munfaṣıl, and so forth.The author bases on the Ḥafṣ narration of the ḳırāʼat of the ʻĀṣım probably because of taking into account the readers. Another point that draws attention in the work is that the tajwīd issues are explained shorter and clearer compared to other verse tajwīds. There are also no secondary topics such as ţūl, tevaṣṣut, ḳaṣr, ḥarf-i muḫaffefe, kelime-i müṡaḳḳale or istiʻāẕe-basmala, states of tā-i teʼnīṡ. To provide an easy memoration Ḥilmī Efendi does not apply the method of formulations of letters corresponding to the bases such as ikhfā, iẓhār as in many other tajwīd Works. Instead, he writes the letters of a specific rule one by one. Additionally, he does not give many examples from Qurʾān verses to consolidate the rules, and sometimes refers only to the surahs. With his work called Ẓafar, the author follows and represents the tradition of religious-literary works in general, and in particular, the tradition of the verse tajwīd. In some verse types of tajwīd works, for example, only subjects of ḳatʻ and vaṣl are discussed, however, in Ẓafar, most rules of tajwīd are included.It can also be said that the work has a special place and importance due to the possibility of being the first text (constituent text) written in verse tajwīd. On the other hand, when considering the conditions of the period and the fact that it was published more than once, it can be stated that Ẓafar was used as a material in educational activities and raised attention. (shrink)

This paper argues that the influential French thinker, Simone Weil, has something distinctive and important to offer educational and ethical inquiry. Weil’s ethical theory is considered against the backdrop of her life and work, and in relation to her broader ontological, epistemological and political position. Pivotal concepts in Weil’s philosophy – gravity, decreation and grace – are discussed, and the educational implications of her ideas are explored. The significance of Weil’s thought for educationists lies in the unique emphasis she places (...) on the development of attention, a notion elaborated here via the key themes of truth, beauty and love. (shrink)

In a longitudinal naturalistic study, we observed German mothers interacting with their infants when they were 3 and 6 months old. Pursuing the idea that infants’ attention is socialized in everyday interactions, we explored whether eye contact is reinforced selectively by behavioral modification in the input provided to infants. Applying a microanalytical approach focusing on the sequential organization of interaction, we explored how the mother draws the infant’s attention to herself and how she tries to maintain attention (...) when the infant is looking at her. Results showed that eye contact is reinforced by specific infant-directed practices: interrogatives and conversational openings, multimodal stimulation, repetition, and imitation. In addition, these practices are contingent on the infant’s own behavior. By comparing the two data points (3 and 6 months), we showed how the education of attention evolves hand-in-hand with the developing capacities of the infant. Keywords: multimodal input; eye contact; interactional adaptation; ecology of attention; social learning. (shrink)

Diyanet İşleri Başkanlığı 2013-2014 eğitim yılıyla birlikte kendine yeni bir hizmet alanı açmış ve Cumhuriyet tarihinde ilk olarak resmi okul öncesi din eğitimini 4-6 yaş Kur’an Kursları ile başlatmıştır. Bu alanda her geçen yıl tecrübe kazanılmış olsa da çeşitli noktalarda bazı sorunların devam ettiği görülmektedir. Araştırmanın konusu 4-6 yaş Kur’an Kursları etkinlik kitaplarında yer alan hikâyelerin içerik ve resimlendirme bakımından okul öncesi çağındaki çocuklar için uygunluğunun incelenmesidir. Araştırmamızın amacı, okul öncesi dönemde okuma yazma bilmeyen çocuklar için hikâyelerin ve özellikle de (...) hikâyelerde yer alan resimlerin ve görsellerin öğrenmede çok önemli bir paya sahip olduğunun altını çizerek etkinlik ve ders kitaplarının düzenlenmesine ve zenginleştirilmesine katkı sağlamaktır. Nitel bir araştırma olan çalışmada mevcut etkinlik kitapları incelenmiştir. Araştırma, var olan durumu, var olduğu şekilde betimlemeyi amaçlayan tarama modelidir ve etkinlik kitaplarındaki hikâyeler ve resimler betimsel analiz yoluyla incelenmiştir. Ulaşılan sonuçlara göre; 4-6 yaş Kur’an Kurslarındaki etkinlik kitaplarındaki hikâyelerin içeriklerinin okul öncesi çocukların seviyesine göre, bilgilendirme işlevini gören ancak etkileme ve çocukta merak uyandırma noktasında yetersiz olduğu, resimlerinin ise bazı hikâyelerde metne uygun olmadığı ve çocuğun hayal dünyasına hitap etmediği tespit edilmiştir. Bu konuda daha hareketli ve renkli resimlerle hazırlanmış ders ve etkinlik kitaplarının gerekliliği ortaya konmuş ve önerilerde bulunulmuştur. The Presidency of Religious Affairs initiated a new service area in the 2013-2014 Academic Year. The Presidency, which previously provided educational activities for young and middle-aged groups and primary school children during summer courses, started official preschool religious education for the 4-6 year-old age group in Quran Courses for the first time in 2013-2014. Although the experience has been acquired in this field with each passing year, some problems are still noticeable at various points. The present study examines the contents and aesthetic aspects of the stories included in Quran Courses activity books for 4-6 year-old children. The purpose of the study is to underline that stories and especially the illustrations and visuals in stories, have very important roles in learning for children who are illiterate in the preschool period, and the study aims to contribute to the organization and enrichment of the activities and textbooks by drawing attention to this field. In this study, which has a qualitative design, the existing activity books are examined. The study also has a screening model, which aims to explain the present situation in the way it is. The stories and illustrations in the activity books were examined in this study via descriptive analysis based on the criteria that should exist in children’s literature books. In this respect, we tried to summarize and interpret the data obtained in the study according to the pre-determined criteria. This study, which draws attention to the importance of books with illustrations, which have an important function in the development of preschool children, and their effects on children, examined the contents of the stories and the pictures used in the narration of the stories in the activity books used in the Qur'an Courses for 4-6 year-old children. Before making an assessment on the subject, the author tried to find an answer to the question of what stories and pictures mean for preschool children and what is the function and importance of pictures and stories in their education. According to the criteria, the author examined and evaluated nine stories in the activity books prepared for the Qur'an Courses for the ages of 4-6, in which especially pictures are used in the narration. (shrink)

Cosmopolis A Review of Cosmopolitics -/- 2015/3-4 -/- Editorial Dominique de Courcelles & Paul Ghils -/- This issue addresses the general concept of “spirituality” as it appears in various cultural contexts and timeframes, through contrasting ideological views. Without necessarily going back to artistic and religious remains of primitive men, which unquestionably show pursuits beyond the biophysical dimension and illustrate practices seeking to unveil the hidden significance of life and death, the following papers deal with a number of interpretations covering a (...) wide field extending from belief to theory, from emotions to concepts, from the wisdom of personal experience to the most sophisticated doctrines. Spirit and spirituality are indeed many-faceted notions. They may refer to the intricate world of the interacting spirits which inhabit living beings in animistic traditions, without excluding a “grand force” linking human beings within a dynamic whole on which their very existence rely . They also bear upon more atomistic and either/or approaches of Western philosophy, which have become embodied in Cartesian dualism against a monotheist background, to the point of freezing the essence of individuals and culminating in the extreme individualism that characterizes our contemporaries. However, this equally refers to the opposite conception of materialism, across times and cultures, from ancient India and Greece (Cārvāka, originally known as Lokāyata, or some Buddhist doctrines for the former, Democritus or Lucretius for the latter) to more contemporary materialistic schools, whether modern or postmodern. -/- The following papers look at the contrasting forms of the philosophy and spirit of the human factor set into a whole, with no artificial disjoint between the psychical and the physical levels, as Wittgenstein put it: “And how can a body have a soul?”. This approach is not unrelated to the notion of anthropocene examined in a recent issue of Cosmopolis, with provides another comprehensive framework open to a spiritual life emerging from the very environment that generated it. -/- *** The first section of this issue was edited by Dominique de Courcelles, director at the National French Research Centre (CNRS), whom we wish to thank for collecting relevant studies relating to the religious and political questions, with a view to focusing on the war of ideas inevitably waged behind images, concepts and perceptions, taking an asymmetrical approach. To the extent that they are mindful of global/local interactions and include representations, opinions and beliefs, such disciplines as philosophy, philology, history and social sciences can provide useful studies accounting for new practices in geopolitics and a fair diplomacy. -/- In her introduction, Dominique de Courcelles first poses the question of how the religious and political spheres interrelate, with their corresponding religious demands and humanistic values. She then suggests that the right question today may be breaking with the philosophy of human rights concerned with the defense of human beings against the hazards of arbitrary politics or the instrumental use of religion, in favour of a fair philosophy of humankind, a new humanism. This would consist in recognizing a common loyalty of all towards one interhuman, not only interstate community, to protect it from both the autonomy demanded by individuals and the instrumental use of minorities. -/- Considering the fact of diversity, so important today in terms of both politics and religion, Abdelhai Azarkan looks at the conditions under which tolerance could obtain the double status of right and duty. He revisits to two philosophers, John Locke and Voltaire, who thought about it from the historical reality of religious wars. The former made tolerance into a right, basing his analysis on the political-legal level, while the latter saw tolerance as a duty, from an analysis based on ethical-political criteria. -/- Mathieu Guidère examines what he calls semantic denominationalism, a term which implies religious attributes and identities, whichever national loyalties or personal belonging they may have at the same time. Since the early 2000s, thie phenomenon has expanded tremendously, compounded by the “war on terror” and the over media-oriented terrorist actions. Denominational expressions act as formal names for ordinary and high-profile players in domestic and foreign policies of democratic states. These systems reveal a receding secularization, while the powerful comeback of religious identities signals the failure of nation-states and the weakening of the humanist spirit. -/- Barbara De Poli retraces the history of a contemporary jihadism claiming its Islamic essence and asserting the truth of genuine coranic principles via the war on infidels, with a view to restoring the Caliphate. After defining the term jihad, she shows that even if this contemporary jiadism is spreading in the Muslim world, it radically departs from Islamic law and the received use of the term jihad, in so far as it is rooted in the early radical thinking of Islamic ideologues in the 20th century, starting with with Hassan al-Banna, the founder of the Muslim Brotherhood. This current has been fueled by by international conflicts since the outbreak of the war in Afghanistan, in which the so-called Western countries bear a major responsibility. -/- Abderrazak Sayadi starts from the Tunisian experience to ask the question of humanist values and democracy within the relationships between the religious and political spheres. As a historian of religion, he is brought to demystify certain islamic principles and to paying attention to the reform of law, seeing the separation of religion and politics as a precondition to a successful democratic gamble and the establishment of a renewed humanism. -/- Dominique de Courcelles reminds us that getting a better knowledge of narrations and words makes it possible to better understand how logical and rhetorical thinking works for those who wage an asymetriccal war, re-enchanting and mystifying the world to better take control. As soon as 1932, an exchange of letters between Einstein and Freud made it clear that, in order to free man from fatality and war, education understood as culture was fundamental. Such illustrations as the exécution of Oussama ben Laden and the Caliph’s speech in Mossoul show that a premiminary analysis of images and words is essential to a fair diplomacy conducted by people from civil society, whose culture and wisdom allow justice and force to speak together and better resist war. -/- Marcel Boisard thinks that on the day the guns fall silent, exhausted by war, we will not return to the state borders that have prevailed for a century as an outcome of the Sykes-Picot agreement of 1916. It is time to prepare the “day after”, which will be a huge challenge. To this end, a summit of Middle-East nations is urgently needed to globally decide the fate of those peoples. On the condition that we know who the enemy is and accept to name it, to understand the history of the countries, groups and alliances, and to question any false or self-interested sense of certainty. -/- *** In the second section, Paul Schafer provides the author’s experiences to explain how culture, from the artistic to the biological, has the power to to open the doors to spirituality, from the inner self to the global environment. He asks himself whether a relative permanence of spirituality can arise from the specific moments that characterize it. Laurent Ledoux synthesizes the conclusion of a symposium held on 22 January 2015 on the links between philosophy and management, on the basis of the spiritual dimension conceived as “natural” and the answers it may suggest to the issues that face the organizations in a “contemporaniversal” world. Jacques Rifflet makes that question in a secular perspective, based on the wellsprings of personal commitment before it can be caught by any religious creed or scientific theory. In this sense spirituality, in alliance with reason, both inspires human consciousness and illuminates its destiny. Sami Aldeeb asks himself whether Islam can be reconciled with human rights. Caught between the belief in an absolute and final Word descended from the sky, and evidence showing that any religion is the creation of a given culture and a society situated in time and space, the Makkan and … contexts et médinois call for differentiated, if not opposite answers and exegeses. Bernard Carmona provides the outline of a dialogical framework, which is known to be a feature of debates between the various philosophical schools of classical India, exemplified here by the transdisciplinary perspective of debates within a Buddhist context. *** The articles not focused on the previous topic include a study by Landry Signé on China’s strategy, competing with the United States to control African resources. The author deals with the specific case of China’s rapprochement with Southern Sudan since Sudan was broken up. In the last paper, Goran Fejić and Rada Iveković, return to the essential role that women should play, and comments upon the role of some international legal instruments related in particular to the elimination of all forms of discrimination. The perspective is transnational and transethnic and is based on secular criteria, as regards nation-building and more generally society-building. Considering the persistence of widespread violence, whether in times of armed conflict or in times of peace, the question remains whether it is possible to fully implement rights and justice instruments. (shrink)