Existential Philosophy and the Promise of Education: Learning from Myths and Metaphors

Myths and metaphors share not only an ability to call our attention to aspects of our world of which we were previously unaware, but also a propensity toward symbolic meanings and interpretations. In Existential Philosophy and the Promise of Education: Learning from Myths and Metaphors, Professor Gordon draws on some well-known myths and metaphors of various Existentialist thinkers and writers as a lens and an interpretative framework with which to explore a variety of issues in philosophy of education. His book argues that symbolic or metaphorical interpretations can offer us representations of problems in education that go beyond what we can gain when we consider them only in their literal sense. Existential Philosophy and the Promise of Education is an excellent classroom text for a variety of foundations courses, including the Philosophy of Education.

Table of Contents:
Contents: Teachers as Absurd Heroes: Camus’ Sisyphus and the Promise of Rebellion – Education as Empowerment: Exploring Dostoyevsky’s Notion of ‘the Underground’ – Kafka’s The Metamorphosis and the Challenge of Relating to Strangers – Negotiating Contingency: Sartre’s Nausea and the Possibility of Losing Control in a Technological World – Nietzsche on the Significance of Learning about the Past – Martin Buber’s Metaphor of ‘Starting from Above’ and the Issue of Educational Authority – Hannah Arendt’s Concept of the ‘Banality of Evil’: On Thoughtlessness in Education – Maxine Greene, Opening Spaces, and Education for Freedom.

About the Author :
Mordechai Gordon is a Professor of Education in the School of Education at Quinnipiac University. His areas of specialization are philosophy of education, teacher education and humor. He is author of Ten Common Myths in American Education (2005) and the editor of Hannah Arendt and Education: Renewing our Common World, winner of the 2002 AESA Critics Choice Award. Dr. Gordon has published numerous articles in scholarly journals such as Educational Theory, Journal of Teacher Education, Oxford Review of Education and Journal of Aesthetic Education.

Review :
"Mordechai Gordon exemplifies the best in contemporary philosophy of education. He writes clearly, imaginatively, and persuasively on the value of thinking deeply about education and schooling. In this remarkable book - one of the only books relating existentialism to education - Gordon offers several potent cases where existential writers are useful and important in addressing current educational issues. Philosophers of Education are only one of several audiences for this impressive collection of essays. Practicing teachers and educational policy makers, as well as any other serious person committed to quality education, would benefit from Gordon's scholarship. He sheds a fresh and more probing light on such problems as: the working conditions of teachers, the standardization of curriculum and assessment, the limits and possibilities of technology, the effects of negative educational authority on the teaching-learning relationship, and the need to envision schools as democratic spaces/places from which to build a common world." (Wendy Kohli, Professor Emerita, Fairfield University, Author of Critical Conversations in Philosophy of Education and Feminisms and Educational Research)