Literature, Education, and Society: Bridging the Gap

Literature, Education, and Society offers a fresh strategy by focusing on how literature and the arts provide distinctive domains of experience that stress significant values not typically provided by other disciplines. It distinguishes sharply between a focus on experience of what solicits knowledge and a focus on experience as which encourages careful attention to what can be embedded in particular experiences. It then characterizes the making of art as an act of doubling, where the making fashions some aspect of experience and invites self-conscious participation in the intensity provided by the particular work. Finally, it argues that while this theory cannot persuade us that the arts improve behavior, its stress on arts purposive structuring of experience can affect how people construct values, something essential to education itself.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 84 pages
Publication date: 27 May 2024
Publisher: Taylor & Francis Ltd

Literature, Education, and Society (LES) offers a novel approach to understanding the role of literature and the arts in education by emphasizing the distinctive domains of experience they provide, which stress significant values not typically found in other disciplines. While practical disciplines tend to treat experiences as instances for which we learn to provide interpretive generalizations, making knowledge possible and helping us establish concrete programs for acting in accord with what we come to know, the arts do not encourage generalizing from particulars. Instead, they emphasize how to appreciate the particulars for qualities like sensitivity, intensity, and the capacity to solicit empathy.

To dramatize this crucial difference, LES distinguishes sharply between a focus on experience of what solicits knowledge and a focus on experience as which encourages careful attention to what can be embedded in particular experiences. Then, the book characterizes the making of art as an act of doubling, where the making fashions some aspect of experience and invites self-conscious participation in the intensity provided by the particular work.

After exploring several aspects of doubling, LES discusses the importance of the arts in developing moral values and critical thinking skills. It argues that the arts can provide valuable forms of knowledge by testing moral values and by developing the skills of critical thinking required to understand the cost of apparently perennial social problems.

However, LES also acknowledges the challenges faced by literature and the arts in today's classrooms. Budget cuts have led to reduced funding for arts programs, and students tend to prefer majoring in disciplines that provide clear, practical knowledge and the promise of relatively lucrative careers. This has led to a crisis in the field, with educators struggling to find ways to address the needs of their students while also maintaining the integrity of their disciplines.

To address this crisis, LES proposes a new strategy that focuses not on knowledge but on how literature and the arts provide distinctive domains of experience that stress significant values not typically provided by other disciplines. It suggests that literature and the arts can provide valuable forms of knowledge by testing moral values and by developing the skills of critical thinking required to understand the cost of apparently perennial social problems.

In conclusion, Literature, Education, and Society offers a fresh strategy for understanding the role of literature and the arts in education by emphasizing the distinctive domains of experience they provide, which stress significant values not typically found in other disciplines. While practical disciplines tend to treat experiences as instances for which we learn to provide interpretive generalizations, making knowledge possible and helping us establish concrete programs for acting in accord with what we come to know, the arts do not encourage generalizing from particulars. Instead, they emphasize how to appreciate the particulars for qualities like sensitivity, intensity, and the capacity to solicit empathy. By focusing on the making of art as an act of doubling, LES provides a powerful tool for developing moral values and critical thinking skills in students. However, the challenges faced by literature and the arts in today's classrooms require a new strategy that focuses not on knowledge but on how literature and the arts provide distinctive domains of experience that stress significant values not typically provided by other disciplines.

Weight: 130g
Dimension: 215 x 138 x 9 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9781032393179