- Review: Teaching as a Subversive Activity by Neil Postman and Charles Weingartner
- Review: Teaching as a Conserving Activity by Neil Postman
- Review: The End of Education by Neil Postman
What It’s About
In part 1 of this series, we looked at Teaching as a Subversive Activity, in which Neil Postman and co-author Charles Weingartner make the case that the American public education system is in need of major reforms if it is to be effective in preparing students for the challenges of the ever-changing modern world. More specifically, they call for a transformation of the school environment into one that encourages open, critical inquiry and the exploration of questions relevant to the lives of students. Over a decade later, in Teaching as a Conserving Activity, Postman (this time alone) reconsiders some of these ideas and explores some new ones as he approaches the subject of public education from a dfferent angle.1Neil Postman, Teaching as a Conserving Activity (New York: Dell Publishing Co. Inc., 1980). He bases his claims in the new book on the general theory that the proper role of education in society is to function “thermostatically” – to work in opposition to particularly strong cultural biases or trends in order to restore a healthy balance. Applying this principle to his contemporary context, he identifies some of the cultural biases that are most prominent in modern America and in need of counterbalance. He maintains that schools can and should serve as a counterbalance to some of these biases through what they teach and how they teach it. To this end, he proposes making several changes that span many aspects of the public education system. Because so many of the trends of wider culture emphasize and encouage rapid and incessant change, public education in our context, according to Postman, should serve an essentially conservative role – working to “conserve that which is both necessary to a humane survival and threatened by a furious and exhausting culture.”225.
Postman begins by identifying the basic question that is the focus of his book, the question he considers to be “the most important issue” concerning education: “What should be taught in school?”312. In answering this question, he first describes the general principle, or theoretical perspective from which he is working, a perspective he calls “the themostatic view.”4See Chapter 1: “The Thermostatic View,” 19-24. This view stems from the more basic insight that a society contitutes an ecosystem of sorts; it is not just a collection of individuals but a group with a shared environment, whose members are interrelated and interdependent in important ways. Like any ecosystem, society is subject to balance/stability or imbalance/instability depending on its ecology, on the interplay between the forces within it. In ecological terms, the healthiest ecosystem is that which attains a high degree of balance, or homeostasis, and the primary way this is achieved is through “oppositional complementarity”518-19. – the interplay between opposing forces in an environment.
In considering what this has to do with American society and the role that public education plays in it’s health, the key metaphor Postman employs is, of course, a thermostat. Just as a thermostat works to ensure the stability of the temperature in a room by introducing heat in response to too much cold or vice versa, he argues that when it comes to society, schools should work to ensure overall stability by introducing ideas and arguments that are in opposition to those already too prominent in the wider culture. In this sense, “education is best conceived of as a thermostatic activity.”619.
As for just what elements of modern American society are in need of counterbalance, Postman has much to say. First and foremost, he makes the case that American culture is overly invested in and overly driven by the ideas, sentiments, and values encouraged by and through electronic media, especially television. A crucial part of his argument here is the idea that all communications media (from face-to-face conversation to broadcast television), by their nature, shape and define not just what sorts of things are communicated, but how, when, where, why, and in what context those things are communicated. This in turn influences the way we think about, understand, and value information, knowledge, and (not least) communication itself.7These ideas are explored in more detail in his slightly later work, Amusing Ourselves to Death (1985), in which the societal impact of communications technology, specifically television, is the focus.
Because television is so prominent and powerful in Postman’s contemporary context, the influence it holds over society is very great indeed – so great that he characterizes television as constituting a “curriculum” all its own – “a specially constructed information system whose purpose, in its totality, is to influence, teach, train, or cultivate the mind and character of our youth.”849. He goes so far as to state that in the modern world, television is the “first curriculum” while school is the second.950.
As Postman summarizes them, the characteristics of the “TV curriculum” are as follows:
- attention-centered
- nonpunitive
- affect-centered
- present-centered
- image-centered
- narration-centered
- moralistic
- nonanalytical
- nonhierarchical
- authoritarian
- contemptuous of authority
- continuous in time
- isolating in space
- discontinuous in content
- immediately and intrinsically gratifying1069-70.
What this curriculum teaches, then, are ideas, behaviors, and values consistent with these characteristics. So, in general, people are themselves becoming more attention-centered, affect-centered, present-centered, image-centered, and narration-centered; they are declining in their interest or ability to think analytically or reason carefully about complex or abstract ideas and are instead becoming concerned with what is immediately and presently compelling, appealing, and emotionally gratifying. This is problematic, Postman warns, because, if left unchecked, these trends in our culture could undermine important, stabilizing societal values and traditions including historical awareness, scientific inquiry, effective psychotherapy, or even, perhaps, a strong investment in reality itself.
While the TV curriculum is the most prominent cultural bias Postman identifies as needing counterbalance, he also describes two other important and dangerous ideas: the “technical thesis,” and the “utopian thesis.”11See Chapters 5 and 6 respectively.
The technical thesis is a term Postman uses to describe the increasingly prominent belief (a belief more implicit than explicit, but quite prominent nonetheless) “that it is only through technique and technicalization that we may find what is real, what is true, and what is valuable.”1289, For those interested in the precise meanings behind these terms, Postman defines a technique as simply “a standardized method for achieving a purpose,” 89-90, and technicalization as “a method of transforming a technique into an abstract, general, and precise system,” 91. The problem is that we have become so invested in and committed to certain methods, technologies, and procedures that we have begun to lose sight of their original purpose and utility – and the limits of that utility. In extreme cases, we may begin to reify technique, to begin serving it as if it were its own end or valuable in itself. Postman views this belief as permeating many of our social institutions (including, of course, the schools), and he warns that its continued advancement could lead us to become so subserviant to our machines and machinations that we eventually lose the ability to think or judge for ourselves.13It is my understanding (as I have not yet read the book) that these ideas about society’s problematic relationship with technology and technique are explored further in Postman’s later work, Technopoly (1992).
The second idea Postman identifies as dangerous – the utopian thesis – is the idea that schools can and should provide solutions to a large number of the difficult problems facing contemporary society (e.g. the emotinal instability of many American youth or their lack of motivation to learn). Postman acknowledges that there are many such problems,14In discussing the many causes schools have taken up in recent decades, he states the following: “Within our own lifetime, we have seen the schools go into the sex-education business, the drug education business, the driver-education business, the brotherhood business, the psychological counseling business, the free-lunch business, the babysitting business, the racial integration business, the social equality business, the motivation business, and lately, the business of ethnicizing the population, after having failed in de-ethnicizing it,” 109-110. but (despite the natural inclinations educators might have toward trying to address them) he argues there should be clear and strict limits on what public schools and educators should be required or expected to do about them. This is because public schools lack the tools and competence to address these problems effectively, or even adequate clarity or consensus in understanding what the problems are, let alone what their potential solutions might be. Therefore, schools should limit their scope to providing counterbalance to the TV and media curriculum in accordance with the thermostatic model of education outlined previously. Furthermore, they should avoid taking on problems or issues traditionally addressed by other social institutions because this can often have the unintended consequence of weakening the authority and/or competence of those other institutions in dealing with their respective concerns.15This is the case, for example, with the institution of the family, which has weakened considerably in authority and competence at guiding and educating children in social and moral values. “. . . By taking over the family’s responsibilities,” warns Postman, “the school removes the ability of the family’s ever restoring its authority,” something he considers especially dangerous considering the importance of family to society, 117. Finally, by making all sorts of concerns public rather than private, there is a danger of eroding in individuals their sense of personal responbility and empowerment.
So, if schools need to provide counterbalance to the media curriculum while avoiding the pitfalls of over-technicalization and utopianism, how is this accomplished? What exactly should be taught in school? The answer, quite naturally according to the thermostatic view, is that students should be taught what is in oppositional complimentarity to culture, particularly media culture. As Postman puts it, “What is relevant, therefore, is what the culture is insisting is irrelevant.”16131.
Because of the sense of disconnectedness and incoherence prevalent in media curriculum, one thing that has become culturally irrelevant is coherence and connectedness. Therefore, Postman suggests as a starting point that schools work to provide coherence and interconnectedness in their curriculum. As an organizing principle to such a curriculum he proposes the theme of “the assent of humanity” – an exploration of humanity’s ongoing quest for knowledge about the world and our place in it. This would necessarily encompass a wide variety of disciplines or subjects, including history, science, philosophy, language, art, and religion, and would seek to address where these subjects have come from, what they are for, and how they are related. As he puts it, “I am proposing, as a beginning, a curriculum in which all subjects are presented as a stage in humanity’s historical development; in which the philosophies of science, of history, of language, and of religion are taught; and in which there is a strong emphasis on classical forms of artistic expression.”17145-46.
Postman goes on to propose several other potential solutions to the problems he identifies, tackling everything from language and media education to behavior management to testing and evaluation.18To be specific, he suggests the following: that all teachers, regardless of their subject, teach language, that they illuminate the ways in which language shapes and sometimes distorts knowledge of their subject and of our sense of reality in general (Chapter 8); that traditional forms of grammar and linguistic expression be conserved by the schools because of their value as the longstanding standard form of communication in our history and as a tool for diverse and precise expression of ideas (Chapter 9); that schools not simply teach with the latest communications and entertainiment media, but actually teach about various media and their effects and biases (Chapter 10); that the classroom environment be maintained and oriented above all as a place of ordered learning, which means the avoidance of entertainment, emotional appeasement, or other accommodations to the biases of culture (Chapter 11); and, finally, that assessments and evaluations of student learning should reflect what is most worth learning, not what is most readily quantified, standardized, or streamlined (Chapter 12). What unites all of these proposals is that each reflects one or more biases of media culture, the technical thesis, and/or the utopian thesis and stands in opposition to these biases in one way or another.
A Few Thoughts
I found Teaching as a Conserving Activity to be extremely stimulating and insightful in terms of both content and delivery. Postman is able to combine wit and wisdom in a way that allows for serious critique without sacrificing grace and good humor and that presents rather complex concepts and connections in a relatively clear and straightforward manner.
The book and its central argument are organized into three main parts, which aid the reader in following and reasoning through the argument. This is especially helpful considering the sheer scope and diversity of concepts Postman covers throughout the book’s twelve chapters, touching on everything from politics to technology to psychology to philosophy. Indeed, if there is a criticism I have concerning organization it is that he tries to cover too much, which can seem overwhelming, leaving the reader with so many ideas floating around in their head it is difficult to keep track of them all. Some of the chapters could probably warrant an entire book of their own, and in fact Postman did later develop and expand on at least two of them in this way.19For more on the overpowering influence of media culture on society see Amusing Ourselves to Death (1985). For more on the pervasiveness and pitfalls of the technical thesis see Technopoly (1992).
One of the problems with all of this information overload is that it can be difficult to identify one clear takeaway from the book as a whole. This is partly by design since in the final section of the book Postman doesn’t offer up one clear and simple solution to the problems he identifies, but rather proposes several possible solutions, each dealing with a somewhat different aspect of public education and its organization or implimentation. He does frequently draw connections between concepts as he introduces each new proposal, but absent is any sort of concluding chapter that sythesizes everything into a grand organizing principal. Instead, the reader is left to ponder each of the various proposals and their implications. As Postman himself suggests in the introduction, his goal is not so much to spark a new education reform movement as to simply start “a good conversation.”2012.
All of that being said, there is an organizing principle (or set of principles) to the book in both the framework Postman uses to approach education and the key problems he identifies using that framework. In the world of social criticism, accurately identifying and understanding a problem is no doubt as important as offering up solutions, so it seems to me these two principles – framework and problems – together constitute the core of the book’s central argument. In what follows, I consider that argument in more detail.
First, the framework.
As described previously, the theoretical framework or perspective from which Postman is operating is what he terms the thermostatic view – the idea that public education should serve as a corrective counterbalance to those elements that are already too prominent in the wider culture, with the goal of achieving overall balance and stability in society. I find this idea convincing for two main reasons, one general, the other more specific.
First, the thermostatic view is convincing for the reasons cited by the author – that societies in general require a balance of oppositional cultural forces in order to maintain stability and, ultimately, in order to survive at all. I find quite reasonable the idea that almost any cultural value or norm can prove dangerous to a society if not held in check by an oppositional value.21I believe this point does beg some important questions. One may ask whether or not a given society deserves to survive and remain stable at all, or whether perhaps instability is preferable in some cases. Then, even if we agree that stability is valuable, there remains the question of just what a healthy balance of values looks like and who gets to make this decision. I see the legitimacy of these objections. In response to the first, I’ll just say I have what I think are good reasons that the stability of our particular society (The USA) is worth maintaining. I touch on some of these reasons in the paragraphs below, but beyond this, suffice it to say here that despite all our shortcomings I think we have much in our society that is worth preserving, both within our institutions and our culture. As for the second objection, I don’t imagine there is a very simple or easy answer to how best to strike a balance of values in our society. However, my hope is that by first agreeing to approach education with this framework in mind, we can work together in finding the best way to do that. Incidentally, this may have much to do with the subject of Postman’s third major work on education, which we will examine in part 3 of this series. Furthermore, Postman makes the excellent point that schools, as one of the only universally imposed institutions without a vested interest in any particular cultural trend (at least in theory, if not in practice), can and should serve to provide that opposition to wider culture.
Second, when it comes to American society specifically, I think we have even more reason to adopt a thermostatic view of education. This has to do with the type of nation that we are. To put it briefly, the United States, as a liberal-secular society populated by peoples of increasingly diverse beliefs, values, and backgrounds, is constitutionally obligated to accommodate diverse peoples and their perspectives and to refrain from officially favoring any one group or interest over others. But, beyond merely tolerating this diversity, I would argue that if the United States is to survive and cooperate as a liberal-secular society (and especially as a democratic society) it can only hope to do so by cultivating a foundation for productive dialogue through mutual understanding among groups. And, just as the schools are without a vested interest in any particular cultural trend, they do not belong to any one group’s beliefs, values, or perspective. In a word, they are public; they belong to everyone, which makes them the ideal institution through which to provide something of a balance of perspectives. This line of reasoning goes a bit beyond what Postman argues for explicitly in his book, but I believe it is consistant with the thermostatic view of education both in that it is concerned with creating a balance among various cultural values in society and in that, by doing so, it is providing a counterbalance to the current cultural trend toward undermining or flat-out avoiding open and productive discussions of controversial topics such as politics and religion.
And, here we have already arrived at the second part of Postman’s thesis – the problems – because it seems to me the inability to engage in sustained or productive dialogue about difficult problems or controversial topics is symptomatic of many of the teachings of the media curriculum that he outlines and considers problematic. In fact, some of the symptoms about which he warns have to do precisely with an inability or unwillingness to sustain attention to things not immediately interesting or gratifying, to reason carefully and analytically, or to connect ideas together to form coherent concepts or theories. Postman doesn’t delve very deeply in the present work into many details of how these trends are playing out in society, but the basic points – first, that they are at play generally and, second, that they are connected to TV and other media – are convincingly demonstrated through the coherence of his arguments and some of the examples he does mention. By his own admission, at least some of these examples are speculative.“But,” he adds, “none of it is ‘mere’ speculation. I believe that reason, historical analogy, and observable trends within our society point to their plausibility.”2285.
Plausibility is one thing; actuality is another. The key question of course is this: were the speculations accurate? Was he right about the way culture was trending?
Reading his predictions today, about 40 years since they were first written, I think we can safely answer “yes.” Indeed, I believe we are seeing evidence of them now in everything from entertainment to economics, from psychology to politics, and of course education. I have already mentioned above the culture-wide trend toward undermining or avoiding productive conversations regarding controversial topics. Perhaps nowhere is this trend more clearly at play than in politics, where sustained dialogue and mutual understanding often give way to emotionally charged rhetoric and charismatic claims to authority.23As an illustration, consider the United States presidential debates. In my experience, it is often observed that television changed the nature and outcome of these debates by introducing a visual component to them that has naturally shifted some of the emphasis toward the visual. To start with, it matters, probably moreso now than before, what a presidential candidate looks like and how they physically comport themselves during one of these debates. This much might be relatively obvious. In light of Postman’s insights, however, we can go further. In thinking about the form of the debates, their presentation, and their reception, it seems to me there is a clear trend reflecting the biases of media culture. For one thing, answers are limited to a few minutes in length, with even shorter times allotted for rebuttals. Then, it’s on to the next topic, which may have no clear relevance to the previous topic, and so on. As a matter of course, discussions about important and complex topics are cut off before they really get going. The consequence of all of this is that candidates condense their thoughts into sound bites, sacrificing thoroughness, detail, and clarity in favor of merely hoping to evoke a favorable response, leave a positive impression, or at the very best, spark viewers to investigate their platforms further at some later point. One could argue this format is necessary in order to manage the length of the debate, but why is it necessary to manage the length in the first place? I imagine there are several answers: because that’s all the TV networks will allow, because that’s all the public’s attention spans or free time will allow, or because that’s all the candidates or their political parties find useful or beneficial to their campaigns. I would suggest that all of these answers amount to nothing short of an open admission that this particular part of the political process has already surrendered to the biases of media culture as Postman describes them. It is, in many ways, not a debate at all. There is very little true dialogue, certainly not much that could be called constructive. More often the point is to be destructive. The whole thing ends up being a sort of performance – a game, ideally with winners and losers – and it is treated as such by just about everyone. So, why is this a problem? After all, a presidential race is just that – a race – and there will be winners and loser Maybe so, but we must never forget that if this is a game, it is a game with an important purpose and with much at stake. The outcome should be that the winner is judged by a well-informed and clear-thinking public to be the most fit to serve the interests of that public. The problem lies in the fact that the rules of the game as they are do not encourage the sort of careful, balanced, ethical reasoning and decision-making – not to mention humility – that would befit a true servant of the public. They rather encourage the opposite – bold assertions, clever rhetoric, charisma, confidence bordering on arrogance. These are all characteristics consistent with the media curriculum, but not with leading a diverse nation toward cooperation and stability. Or, consider Postman’s claim that as a culture we are beginning to lose attachment to and investment in reality itself. This is a difficult thing to demonstrate, but overall I think there is a lot of evidence to suggest this is true. Consider for example the heavy investment and popularity we now have in video games of all sorts, with increasingly elaborate and immersive gameplay and virtual environments, including such things as virtual reality and augmented reality. Connected to this are other ways in which fantasy and/or gameplay have become a part of everyday life, including cosplay or the various motivational apps that reward us in one way or another for reaching certain personal goals. I recognize this is a large and complex issue all its own that I won’t do justice to here. I only wish to point out that whatever else these developments may tell us about culture, they certainly indicate an increased attachment to and investment in the virtual, which brings with it at least some level of detatchment from reality.24One of the key questions begged here is whether our increased investment in the virtual is ultimately good or bad for society, or rather, whether the benefits outweigh the detriments. Postman, I have little doubt, would say it is a bad thing, and I would tend to agree. But, I’m also sure there are those who consider it good. For our purposes here, it is important to bear in mind that the thermostatic view is about balance. So, while investment in virtuality or fantasy is almost certainly not a bad thing in all cases, it is the over-investment in it that can end up being destructive or destabilizing to society. As I mention above, this is a complex issue, and perhaps one day I will explore it in more detail.
As should be clear by now, I wholeheartedly agree with Postman’s claim that the teachings of the media curriculum have exerted too great an influence on culture and therefore constitute a problem for society, but what of the other two problems he identifies – the technical thesis and utopian thesis? Is he also right about these ideas exerting a powerful influence on culture, and even if so, are they as problematic as he suggests?
Here again, I am compelled to answer “yes,” both because of the soundness of Postman’s argumentation and cited evidence and because of the evidence I have come across in my own more recent experience that confirms these ideas are still alive and well in our culture today.
Considering first the technical thesis – the idea that technique and technicalization are the only means by which we find and retain what is most real, true, and valuable – I need go no farther than the field of education itself, which on the whole seems to have bought into the technical thesis with everything it has.25This is not to say that the field of education has bought into the technical thesis to a much greater extent than other areas of our society. Rather, it’s one area with which I simply happen to be relatively familiar, and it is of course highly relevant to this whole discussion. I should also mention as a disclaimer of sorts that I find much of value in public education as it is now, and especially in the hard work of my fellow educators. There is much being done well, but this does not mean there isn’t also much that can stand to improve. One aspect of this is the integration of newer, more advanced communications technology in the classroom at all levels, which I wrote about in part 1 of the present series. There my concern was with the lack of critical thinking and self-reflection that accompanies many of these added tools and the tasks students are given to perform with them. In light of our present topic, it seems clear that this lack of criticism and reflection are indicative of the technical thesis at work in our schools. The fact is that students are encouraged (forced, really) to devote more and more of their time and attention to learning technical skills – how to do certain things by certain ways and means. Meanwhile, they are devoting less and less time and attention to critical reflection – understanding what things there are in the world, where they have come from, and what they are for, much less reflecting on why things are the way they are or what they should be for. When, for example, a student learns how to write lines of code, how to create a slide presentation, or how to edit a video, they are learning a technique – a standardized skill, ability, or method – in this case for manipulating particular types of technology. It has been my experience that opportunities to learn these skills are multiplying with relatively very little increase in accompanying opportunities for reflection on their purpose.
But the influence of the technical thesis is far from limited to dealings with the latest tools or technologies (although the emphasis on such things is certainly a part of it). Rather, it can be perceived in nearly every corner of the field of education. Consider the ways in which language arts tend to be taught in school, with great emphasis placed on the technical rules and conventions of writing, pronunciation, grammar, and punctuation. Don’t misunderstand – I don’t deny that the use of language is partly technique, and that technique is important provided it is serving a purpose. But the use of language is also an art, which cannot and ought not be reduced to a set of techniques, much less a set of unbending rules. More importantly, language is useful for some purpose or purposes, not just in and of itself, but the technicalization of language arts in school tends to relativize and trivialize purpose, if it doesn’t cause it to be ignored altogether.26I am agreeing here with what Postman himself has to say about the technicalization of language: “The teaching of grammar is both the first and last refuge of the educational technocrat . . . he believes language competence consists of one’s being in command of an ensemble of mechanical skills, all of which lie outside of our personalities, our purposes, and our knowledge. I am here arguing the opposite: Of all things to be learned, in school or out, languaging, as I prefer to call the process, is least like a mechanical skill. It is, in fact, the most intimate, integrated, emotion-laden learning we do,” 150-51.
And, it doesn’t stop there. As it is with language arts, so it is with every other subject in school. Science, history, math, art – all are being reduced to sets of technical facts to be memorized or skills to be acquired with little or no sense of direction or purpose.
Direction, purpose, value – these are all quite beyond the merely technical. They lie instead in the realms of knowledge, belief, judgement, intuition, emotion, and experience – things notoriously difficult, if not impossible, to quantify, standardize, or otherwise technicalize, but for all that, things no less integral, indeed foundational, to human life. Therein lies one of the dangers with the technical thesis: if left unchecked, it leads us to misunderstand, devalue, or ignore significant aspects of our own nature. In this very real sense, it leads us gradually to become less human, which seems to me both irresponsible and undesirable for what I hope are obvious reasons to most of us.
So much for the first problem. What of the second, the utopian thesis – the idea that schools can and should take on many of the difficult problems facing our society? Here too, I am in agreement with Postman both because of the firm case he builds in his own right and because his observations and predictions match my own more recent experience. This experience confirms for me that schools have been and are continuing to expand into more and more areas of the lives of not just students, but families and communities as well.
I can think of no better example of this than the current trend toward emphasizing what is sometimes termed in education circles “social-emotional learning” (SEL). As the name implies, this is basically an attempt to teach students how to handle social interactions and their own emotions effectively. It may involve things as simple as students talking about their feelings, but also includes everything from breathing exercises to yoga and mindfulness meditation to lessons on psychological development (so that students can better understand their own minds) to various forms of interpersonal conflict resolution, not to mention the ubiquitous efforts to promote self-esteem, self-care, self-love, optimism, or just general “positivity” among students.
To be clear, I have no doubt there is a growing need for at least some of these types of services. I suspect few who work with school-aged children would disagree. What Postman urges us to consider, however, is whether schools and teachers are the best providers of those services, or whether, by taking on the cause of social-emotional learning, educators aren’t at once both detracting from other services they provide and undermining the ability of other institutions better positioned to handle the social-emotional health of children. This is a difficult question to answer and is complicated by all sorts of factors, so without delving into it too much, suffice it to say that I think regulating and providing for the social-emotional health of youth is best left to the institution traditionally charged with this task – the family. That many families are failing now to provide this for their children is indeed a problem, and one that needs solving, but not one that is best solved by schools simply picking up the slack and trying to take over the roles of parents.27To be a bit more specific, I’d like to suggest here several reasons schools might not be the best providers of social emotional-health to students. First, as already mentioned, the schools’ emphasis on SEL adds yet one more item to their ever-growing list of responsibilities, which almost certainly detracts somewhat from other responsibilities. Secondly, social-emotional health encompasses many aspects of a person’s life and personality, and anyone wishing to navigate this effectively must take into account these many aspects. Due to a number of factors, schools and teachers usually do not have the necessary intimacy with or legal rights over each student’s life to effectively meet them where they are and address their individual needs. Thirdly, partly for the reasons just mentioned, the question of just what a child’s social and emotional needs are in the first place is something traditionally within the purview of parents, not schools. The management of social relationships and emotions is closely linked to important and fundamental beliefs about life, morality, purpose, and meaning – beliefs I would tend to call religious, or at least philosophical. Thus, I would suggest that schools are overstepping their bounds somewhat in encroaching on this territory. Finally, and perhaps most significantly, the goals of SEL will inevitably many times be somewhat at odds with, or even directly opposed to, other more traditional educational goals. This is because education – good education – is often strenuous and uncomfortable. It requires the student to be challenged and stretched, to struggle with and against new, unfamiliar, or difficult skills, concepts, and abilities. By contrast, SEL, at least the SEL taught in schools in my experience, places emphasis on individuals finding comfort, coping with anxiety, depression, and trauma, and otherwise learning to understand and be at peace with themselves and with others. The point is that these goals will often require disparate sorts of mindsets and activities from the goals of academic education. In short, it’s difficult to challenge students and make them feel comfortable at the same time.
There are other examples of the recent encroachment of schools into more areas of public life, and the merits of some may be debatable, but overall I think the idea that there ought to be some rather strict limits to the purview of schools and public educators is a sound one. This not only protects the public from the undue encroachment of schools; it also protects the schools form the untenable expectations that might fall on them from the public.
So, I’m on board with the thermostatic view of education, and I’m in agreement with the main problems Postman identifies as needing solutions. But, what of the solutions? Do those he proposes actually provide a good counterbalance to the problems, or are there better solutions?
To this question, there is no simple answer. Rather, this is where the conversation starts. Some of Postman’s proposed solutions, I have no doubt, would be met with strong objections from many of today’s educators (not to mention parents and students).28Particularly controversial I think is the idea that classrooms should be oriented and organized in opposition to the biases and trends of wider culture rather than engaged closely with the latest cultural trends and developments. Others would probably tend to be much more welcome.29Many educators I know would agree enthusiastically with the idea that students should be taught to be critical and reflective consumers of media or that we should move away from highly technicalized standardized tests toward more practical, intuitive, and meaningful ways of evaluating student learning. For my own part, I can say that, while I certainly have my favorites,30I am particularly fond of the idea that students would purposely be taught the connections between subjects and the philosophies and histories behind them as well as the language of subjects and how to understand the ways in which language works in general. I can see the merits of all of them. And, it bears mentioning that for some of the problems addressed in the book, I’ve never known anyone else to offer a solution. This should probably come as no surprise, since I’ve never known anyone else to frame the problems facing public education quite the way Postman does here either. And, therein lies a major value of Teaching as a Conserving Activity: It provides a framework for thinking about public education that transcends the current social and political climate and helps us to respond and adjust to the latest changes and trends in society without being swept along by those trends. This is something we need right now as much as in 1979 or ever before.
One last question worth addressing is that of the relationship of this book to the earlier Teaching as a Subversive Activity. In my review of that book, I mentioned my reservations about some of the student-centered aspects of the education reforms advocated by the authors on the grounds that these could potentially result in somewhat reckless and imprudent changes in curriculum and instruction. One of my concerns was that relying too heavily on the input of students could lead to schools being too heavily controlled by the inexperienced and uninformed interests and whims of youth and youth culture.
It’s safe to say that Teaching as a Conserving Activity in several ways serves to address these concerns and represents a corrective counter-balance to the potential for youth-driven education left by the previous book. It does so not least simply by proposing that what should be most relevant in education may be precisely what society is insisting is most irrelevant. Several of the solutions proposed in the final section of the book also illustrate this well. For example, the idea that students should be taught “better”31176. forms of communication patterns and conventions even if that means disregarding their inhereted, cultural, and/or traditional forms of communication, and the idea that classrooms and schools should be special sorts of environments, in which only certain activities are expected and tolerated even if that means excluding certain would-be participants – these both put clear limits on the influence popular cultural trends might otherwise exercise over education. At the same time, other of Postman’s ideas, such as those involving critical studies of language use and media and those involving the reimagining of forms of academic evaluation, away from standardized testing, are very much in keeping with the themes explored in Teaching as a Subversive Activity. The present work thus constitutes, not a total departure from the previous, but a welcome shift in perspective that results in a more balanced view of some of the difficulties facing public education.
The Bottom Line
Teaching as a Conserving Activity is a brilliantly insightful and original work that is much more than a book about teaching written for teachers. It tackles crucially important questions about society and its overall stability with a focus on what the public education system should – or should not – do about them. As such, I would recommend it to anybody who cares seriously about the future survival and betterment of society as we know it.