Europe as an Educational Framework: Cultures, Values and Dialogue

Abstracts

 

Piermarco Aroldi, Fausto Colombo: Generational Belonging and Mediascape in Europe

"Web generation", "Nintendo generation", "e-generation" and so forth, are just a few among the popular generational definitions often mentioned not only in journalistic simplifications but also in scientific publications. This paper presents a theoretical examination of the implications and the limits of the generational approaches to audience research, in order to show under what conditions they can in fact be both relevant and useful.
Refusing the simplifying attitude that dominates in popularization just quoted, the analysis develops the sociological tradition, drawn on the work of Mannheim, that studies the generations as a collective subject bound by a shared historical semantics, a resource of models of interpretation and linguistic devices by means of which experiences are thematicized and crystallized in a common "we-sense".
On the basis of a certain body of empirical evidences, the authors outline some significant aspects and mechanisms of the mutually reinforcing relationship between media diet and generational semantics, pointing out the capacity of certain specific products to unite the generations in shared cultural legacy.
The article concludes with a look to European framework, suggesting that a common European culture must be promoted by institutional strategies that look at the media as means for its dissemination, and that take stock both of local construction of identities and of cultural diversification between generations.

 

Piermarco Aroldi, Fausto Colombo: Generational Belonging and Mediascape in Europe

"Web generation", "Nintendo generation", "e-generation" sont définitions générationales presentés pas seulement par les journaux, mais aussi par la literature scientifique. Cet essay veuy analyser d'un point de vu sociologique les implications et les limites des approches générationaux à l'étude du public des media, pour comprendre les conditions auquelles ils sont utiles.
L'analyse se develope à partir de la pensée de Mannheim, qui étude les générations comme subjets collectives fondés sur la condivision d'une specifique sémantique historique. Cette sémantique constitue une resource de modèles interpretatifs et de dispositifs linguistiques qui aident à lier les experiences dans un "sens commun" partagé.
Sur la base des résultats de leur recherche, les auteurs soulignent quelques important aspects des rélations entre la reception des média et les sématiques générationales, qui rendent possible la condivision de products culturel à partir d'une vraie culture générationelle.
L'essay se termine avec l'idée que une culture européenne doit être promotée à travers des strategies institutionnelles, qui utilisent les média comme instruments de dissémination, mais qui aussi respectent les différences culturelles des différents pays et des différent générations.

 

Enrique Banús: Educating in European Identity?

In the last decades, the claim for a "European identity" has been manifested sometimes as a solution for the citizens' distance to the European project, sometimes also as a precondition for a further development of the project itself. The paper submits these manifestations to a critical evaluation, bringing to the fore some prob-lems connected with the concept of collective identity. It distinguishes between identity and identification, underlines the relevance of the last one and asks how to implement this identification and in which way the education can contribute to this effort. The knowledge of the cultural heritage is underlined.

 

Enrique Banús: Zur europäischen Identität erziehen?

In den letzten Jahrzehnten ist so manches Mal die Bedeutung einer "europäischen Identität" unterstrichen worden, manches Mal, um die Distanz der Bürger zum europäischen Projekt zu überbrücken; andere Mal, um die Vertiefung dieses Projektes überhaupt zu ermöglichen. Der Autor unterzieht diesen Begriff einer kritischen Überprüfung, im Rahmen der Problematik der kollektiven Identitäten überhaupt, und unterscheidet zwischen Identität und Identifizierung, deren Bedeutung unterstrichen wird. Gefragt wird wie diese zu vermitteln sei und welche Rolle dabei die Erziehung spiele. Schließlich wird auch Bezug genommen auf die Allgemeinbildung und speziell auf die Kenntnis des sogenannten "europäischen Erbes".

 

Mendo Castro Henriques: Civil Society as a network of institutions

According to a political philosophy approach, civil society may be defined as the network of institutions of private origin and a public purpose in which communities share goods, meanings and values, significantly contributing to the progress or decline of governance. Its empowering role is growing as cooperation networks spread across the local, national, supranational and global levels, strengthening both the communities they serve and the governance procedures they legitimize. Those institutions cut through the "tabula rasa" model of political society, creating networks of cooperation among people with common or at least complementary fields of experience, aims and judgements. The building of a typology of institutions according to functions of care, culture, capital, and citizenship, enhances civil society as an intermediate between community and governance.

 

Mendo Castro Henriques: Civil Society as a network of institutions

Selon la philosophie politique, la société civile peut être définie comme le réseau de institutions d'origine privée et finalité publique, où les communautés peuvent coopérer, en partageant des biens et des valeurs et contribuant d'une façon relevante pour le progrès ou déclin de la gouvernance. Le rôle d' empowerment de la société civile est en croissance au niveau local, national, supranational et global, en renforçant les communautés qu'elles servent et les processus de gouvernance qu'elles légitiment. Ces institutions ont brisé le modèle "tabula rasa" de la société politique, en créant des réseaux de coopération entre des gens avec des cultures, finalités et jugements communs ou, tout au moins, complémentaires. Une typologie établie selon quatre fonctions primordiales - soins, culture, capital et citoyenneté - souligne la condition médiatrice de la société civile entre communautés et processus de gouvernance.

 

Concepción Naval, Charo Sádaba: How the media can influence and collaborate in the development of youth participation

This paper's objective is to deal with the educational potentiality of media in the development of the communicative and participative competences which are clearly needed and an essential part of all civic education. After a description of the situation in Spain at present with reference to the absence of participation and its possible causes, the text refers to the support that educational policy has given to civic education in schools over the last 15 years, and which will, hopefully, help to improve the situation. Secondly, the paper deals with the relationship between media and citizen participation, and analyzes the situation of young Spaniards and their relationship with the media in an attempt to discover if, by using media and new media it would be possible to generate positive attitudes towards participation. Before the conclusions a practical case study where media have been used to motivate youth will be analyzed.

 

Marianna Papastephanou: The Vision of a Future Europe: Infectious or Infected? The position of Education

This essay aims to examine the discourse that conceptualizes the educational exchange and the European culture within the framework of a theory of European identity construction. Then, I shall discuss the main positions of this discourse, their concern with the global market and their indifference about political and material inequalities. The following question is posed: which are the innovative proposals that could set in course an ideal of a unified, just and radical Europe? A first approach to it is provided by Habermas' and Derrida's recent publications. Their views constitute the starting point of my intervention in the debate on the educational future of Europe and the inculcation of a European identity in students' consciousness. But my response to the above question challenges the kind of European philosophical discourse that does not rethink the main objectives of the social and political elites of Europe. I suggest that we criticize the dominant position of those elites and that we promote an alternative normativity of equality and justice. In the absence of such a normative condition, the bad side of modernity may continue to prevail and serve the material and symbolic interests of the privileged European classes.

 

Marianna Papastephanou: Le Futur de L' Europe et la Position de l'Education

L'objet de cet essai est d'examiner le discours qui tente de conceptualiser l'échange éducatif et culturel européen dans la cadre de l'édification d'une identité européenne. En suite je mettrai en exergue les principales thèses de ce discours, leur souci de le marché mondial, et leur indifférence aux inégalités aussi bien politiques que matériels. La question qui se pose maintenant est la suivante: Quels sont les paradigmes novateurs capables de mettre en route un idéal d'une Europe unifiée, juste et radicale? Un premier élément de réponse est fourni par les publications récentes de Habermas et Derrida. Leur observations constituent le point de départ de mon intervention au débat actuel sur le futur pédagogique de l'Europe et l'inculcation d'une identité européenne dans la conscience des étudiants. Mais la réponse que j'apporte à cette question interroge l'adéquation du discours philosophique européen qui ne repense pas les objectives principales des élites économiques et sociales de l'Europe. On peut aussi critiquer plus radicalement la position de dominance que ces élites occupent et promouvoir une normativité alternative d'égalité et de justice. En l'absence de cette condition normative, la dimension négative de la civilisation moderne risque de prévaloir et servir la satisfaction de l'intérêts symboliques et matériels des classes favorisées européennes.

 

Stavroula Philippou: On the Borders of Europe. Citizenship Education and Identity in Cyprus

This paper is about the concept of "Europe" and how it could be used as an educational framework to alleviate existing tensions regarding citizenship education and Euro-pean/national/state identity in the context of Cyprus. To this end, the paper serves both a descriptive and a normative agenda, in that it largely describes recent theoretical and political development in civics and citizenship education in Europe and in Cyprus, in order to explore, in the last part of the paper, the potential of using "Europe" and "European citizenship" as tools for reflection and dialogue over (Greek)-Cypriot citizenship and identity. The study of European citi-zenship is complicated due to its different meanings and associations with national identities; I argue that in Cyprus this is further complicated by a political problem of community conflict and partition, which has long been challenging peoples' national identities. Cyprus, an island lying on the borders of (traditional geographical definitions of) Europe and one of the European Union's most recent member-states needs to revisit its approaches to citizenship as a condition of EU membership. The paper illustrates how ongoing discussions and debates over the political problem of Cyprus render it extremely difficult to take decisive steps towards reconceptualising existing Greek-Cypriot civics and citizenship education curricula, exactly because notions of national identity have so far been inextricably interwoven into these curricula. It is proposed that a revisiting of the meaning of "Europe" and the discourses of post-national, multicultural and European citizenship, as well as human rights and democracy might be useful tools to address citizenship and identity dilemmas deriving both from EU membership and the political problem in Cyprus.

 

Luisa Ribolzi: Between Inclusion and Marginality: The Role of Education in Migrant Children

Creating and transmitting a common idea of European citizenship, based on values as individual freedom, equality, tolerance, dignity of individuals independently from gender, religion, race or social class is possibly the main task for educational policies in school and in permanent education. This is a difficult task, because European Union is becoming more and more heterogeneous in its composition, but also because migrations have to be considered as one of the social megatrends affecting Europe, increasing the community's complexity. The rate of migrants students is growing also in Italy by number, native country and level of education: in this varied population school attendance could be both a source of marginalisation or a tool for inclusion and social mobility. The concept of citizenship, including participation, cooperation, and tolerance, becomes then crucial, and the socialisation processes and agencies have to cooperate organizing education to support civicness, and mediating between ethnic origin and culture and the values of the host countries.

 

Luisa Ribolzi: Between Inclusion and Marginality: The Role of Education in Migrant Children

Le plus important des objectives de la politique de l'éducation et de la formation permanente est probablement celui de la création et de la transmission d' une idée commune de citoyenneté européenne, à partir de valeurs comme la liberté, l'égalité, la tolérance, la dignité de la personne quel que soit son sexe, sa religion, race ou classe sociale. C'est une tâche très difficile, parce que la composition de l'Union Européenne est en train de devenir de plus en plus hétérogène, mais aussi parce que les migrations doivent être considérées comme l'un des megatrends qui changent la face de l'Europe, en augmentant sa complexité. Même en Italie, le nombre des étudiants d'origine étrangère croit constamment, comme par ailleurs les nationalités d'origine représentées et les niveaux d'instruction : pour ces jeunes, la scolarisation peut constituer soit une source de marginalisation, soit une possibilité de mobilité sociale. Le concept de citoyenneté au sens large, incluant aussi bien la participation, la coopération, la tolérance, devient alors un facteur crucial. les institutions qui interviennent dans le processus de socialisation et d'éducation doivent collaborer à l'organisation d'un dispositif d' éducation capable de favoriser le développement du sens civique, et de jouer le rôle d'intermédiaire entre culture d'origine et valeurs du pays d'accueil.

 

Javier Vergara: The History of Europe and its Constituent Countries. Considerations in Favour of the New Europe

This article analyses the process of the development of Europe. The discussion is divided into three parts. First, the idea of a European identity with its humanizing, civilizing and Christian dimensions; we will consider how this served as the original foundation for a European identity. The second part looks into the diverse attempts to create a united Europe based on efforts to overcome models which in their turn sprang from nationalist perspectives. Finally, it examines the idea of a European interculturism whose foundation is a commitment to ethics and education.

 

Javier Vergara: The History of Europe and its Constituent Countries. Considerations in Favour of the New Europe

L'article analyse le processus de développement d'Europe. La discussion a trois parties. Dans la première il étudie l'identité européenne et leur dimension humaniste, civilise et chrétienne comme emblèmes qui ont mis l'idée primitive de l'Europe. Dans la deuxième partie il analysé les intentions différentes de créer un Europa uni qui commence des efforts de vaincre les modèles nationalistes de l'histoire d'Europe. Finalement, il examine l'idée d'un interculturalism européen par l'éthique et l'éducation.

 © 2007 sowi-online e.V., Bielefeld  Editors of JSSE 1-2007: Concepción Naval, Carolina Ugarte, Enrique Banús  WWW-Presentation: Norbert Jacke  Processing: André Schöne  URL: http://www.jsse.org/2007-1/abstracts.htm  Publishing date: 2007/10/31  Corrections: 2008/05/05