Contemplating philosophy of education: A Canadian west coast perspective

Starting with an assertion that philosophy’s prerogative is to propose alternative worldviews and values, in addition to the basic interpretation of philosophy as an inquiry into the myriad dimensions of human experience, this paper proffers a view of education that centers the cultivation of a more balanced and integrated humanity in resistance to the increasing instrumental forces in modern societies that fragment, alienate, and therefore dehumanize. Distinguishing between education (primarily concerned with the human being) and instruction (primarily concerned with the human having), this paper is primarily concerned with education, and it proposes a contemplative mode of intersubjective relationality between the self and self-other. A variety of critical observational and interpretive notes are offered on major concepts that animate contemporary discourses in education, such as dualisms, imbalance and fragmentation, dislocation and alienation, progress, and existential crisis, all refracted through the prism of the most recent contemplative turn in education. The chapter ends with a curated dialogue among the four authors of this chapter, all of whom share how they have come to situate themselves in the intersection of philosophy of education and contemplative inquiry and how they see the nature of contribution that the latter makes to the former.