[Xmca-l] Re: Laws of evolution and laws of history

[Zavala, Miguel]

The distinction between propaganda and education is an analytic one that
is useful for me as a teacher. But I also think that it's a distinction
resolved not so much at the level of philosophy (theories, such as those
being proposed here) but ethically.

Anyone who has taught and been reflexive of her/his pedagogy will sense
this distinction between the two, 'propaganda' and 'education'.  There is
perhaps a particular instrumentalism (as an 'ethic', such as that
promulgated in 'revolutionary' struggles and in neoliberalism) that sees
people as objects not as Freire would term 'historical subjects' in
propaganda.

I fully recognize the solipsism in all distinctions, such that some may
argue that even in Freirean, participatory pedagogy the issue remains
unresolved.  That there is a dimension of propaganda in education (and
education in propaganda).  But what some have pointed out (as I read their
posts) is that we also should look at these processes in larger
spatial-scales.  What are the collectives that give birth or make possible
education and propaganda projects?  Do these strive for rehumanization?
How does the struggle for rehumanization remain a struggle at theoretical
and practical and historical and spatial levels?

How do folks draw this distinction in their own pedagogical praxis? How is
the ethical conceptualized, lived, and embodied in your pedagogy?  I
suggest looking at it less from a theory of communication and more from an
ethical one (ethics as primary, epistemology as secondary) that we might
begin to re-conceptualize the very distinction between 'propaganda' and
'education'.

Miguel Zavala 


On 1/17/15 5:37 AM, "Andy Blunden" <ablunden@mira.net> wrote:

>And I found the Engels he was quoting, in the Russian translation:
>
>    /Вечные законы природы /также превращаются все более и более в
>    исторические законы.
>
>The English translation says:
>
>    The eternal laws of nature also become transformed more and more
>    into historical ones.
>
>but then it goes on to say:
>
>    That water is fluid from 0°-100° C. is an eternal law of nature, but
>    for it to be valid, there must be (1) water, (2) the given
>    temperature, (3) normal pressure.
>
>So this does NOT mean what it appeared to mean. Engels simply means
>"nothing remains constant" It is not saying anything about "laws of
>history"!!
>
>Andy
>------------------------------------------------------------------------
>*Andy Blunden*
>http://home.pacific.net.au/~andy/
>
>
>mike cole wrote:
>> Thanks David -- That is certainly where I must have encountered the
>>phrase
>> often enough for it to stick in my mind. And thanks to Jessica and Andy
>>we
>> see versions of the idea in many places.
>>
>> Double the pleasure.
>> mike
>>
>> On Tue, Jan 13, 2015 at 11:36 PM, David Kellogg <dkellogg60@gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>>   
>>> Mike--
>>>
>>> See Vol. Four of the Collected Works in English: the quote you refer
>>>to is
>>> the epigraph to HDHMF. It's from Dialectics of Nature, and Vygotsky
>>>keeps
>>> coming back to it again and again, throughout the whole text of HDHMF,
>>> which is one reason why I am assuming (against what Anton Yasnitsky has
>>> written) that HDHMF is a whole book, one of the very few that Vygotsky
>>> completedly completed (and also his longest work).
>>>     
>>
>