Learning in the Key of Life, Essay Example

Knowledge Speed: Organic Intellectuals and the resurrection of the American Dream

In What Does it Mean to be educated, John Spayde (2010), addresses the convergence of knowledge formation in late-capitalism. Dedicated to the review of contemporary educational praxis, Spayde’s discussion points to the polemic that has arose in response to the knowledge vs. information paradigm. Situated amidst the rapid flow global capital interests is the devolution of centuries of classical thought. As Spayde opines, in the United States, the current state of knowledge as a field of query may only be understood by way of systemic analysis.
If classical thought looks to economic, social and political formations for insight into the efficacy of pedagogy as a technology of power, then Spayde offers continuity to the idea of the mid-twentieth century concept of the ‘organic’ intellectual.’ The possibility of equity through education reveals his commitment to the classical lineage, with maintenance of the modernist tendency to divide between classical learning and vocational learning as an apparatus for distinguishing elite propriety, and the possibility of education as a catalyst for social reform.

The potential of reasserting classical education into the everyday lives of Americans as a model of distributive equity and platform for ‘right’ is worth the challenge. It is precisely in through the exercise of core subject matter (i.e. Latin) that a shared basis for professional practice is achieved (i.e. law and medicine). The crucible of lies here: the use value of classical knowledge is exceptional. Analytical ability does not develop in a vacuum say classical proponents, and the limits of something called ‘information’ must be discerned from ‘knowledge’ if we are to find our way back to competency as a nation.

With the advent of the internet and virtual ‘commons’ we have the opportunity for dialogue perhaps never seen before. As Oberlin College, environmental studies professor, David Orr suggests, at present, it is a matter of degrees. Knowledge is ‘slow’ in development and deep in integration in particular ecological or cultural contexts, where information is ‘fast’ zipping “through the terminals” – a testament to the ‘advancement’ of our society. In short, information is not knowledge per se, but with revision of pedagogical assumptions we might find a way to engender knowledge production with the assistance of technological tools.

National economies share an intrinsic link to intellectual forces in that it is ‘thought’ not merely demand that gives iterative rise to innovation and production in technological industries. Scientific in scope, this new landscape and pervasive focus on this area of knowledge production is inevitably reconfiguring the field of ideas so radically so, that alterations of this manner cannot be dismissed as mere vocational work, and rehabilitates that classical distinction between working with one’s mind and working with one’s hands. Still, cautionary warning is given says Spayde, as certain episteme are reified over others we may dismiss entire segments of knowledge on a whim. From the perspective of modern philosophy, however, we have come full circle. The accusation of Marxism’s right to contest the path of ideological production – once seemingly fixed by the means of production ever more.

Works Cited

Spayde, J. (2010). In what does it mean to be educated, by John Spayde. Utne Reader. Retrieved from: http://www.utne.com/print-article.aspx?id=10660