Forschungsprojekt ::

Contributions of an appropriated humanistic conception of Bildung to key discourses in the philosophy of education

Projektbeschreibung

The proposed project will focus on the concept of Bildung in early German
Romanticism and demonstrate the relevance of a systematic appropriation of
the concept for philosophical discourse in general and to the field of
philosophy of education in particular. In contrast to Humboldt and Hegel’s
more well-known concepts of Bildung, the early Romantic concept of Bildung
as reconstructed by Taylor has so far not received sufficient scholarly
attention. Its importance for defending a modernist idea of the self
against post-modernist attacks, while avoiding the typical shortcomings of
the individualist Enlightenment conception,has to be reconsidered
particularly in light of current developments in the field of
philosophy of education. On the basis of the early Romantic concept we will
provide a systematic interpretation of Bildung as an emancipatory,
developmental and explorative concept of self-formation through
world-disclosing which, firstly, can be shown to be compatible with the
postmodern insight into the intersubjective conditions for the
constitution of subjectivity, and, secondly, to usefully extend the
inter-subjective paradigm by adequately taking into account the importance
of subject-world relations in subject-constitution in addition to the
interpersonal dimension. Bildung understood in this way can be seen as a
foundational concept for current debates in philosophy of education on
personal autonomy, dialogue, recognition, and liberal education. A special
concern of the project is to make the critical and emancipatory potential
of the appropriated humanistic notion internationally available.