FROM SCHOOLING TO EDUCATION: THE CONTEMPORARY POTENTIAL OF IVAN ILLICH'S PROPOSAL

Sandro Serpa
Prof. Dr., University of the Azores, Faculty of Social and Human Sciences,
Department of Sociology;
Interdisciplinary Centre of Social Sciences – CICS.UAc/CICS.NOVA.UAc;
Interdisciplinary Centre for Childhood and Adolescence – NICA – UAc. PORTUGAL, sandro.nf.serpa@uac.pt

Abstract

In the contemporary world, characterized by the growing presence of digital in everyday life in various dimensions: social, economic and even political, the school institution, considered a codified and socially accepted form of massive schooling, is in crisis of legitimacy. In the 21st century, the socialisation that took place in a school context and, consequently, the School as a meritocratic institution with a formal dimension that fosters the skills necessary for the integral development of the individual, needs, increasingly more clearly, to be reformulated, emerging the need to learn and learn the acquisition of various skills as an application in context, both specific and also more transversal. It is in this context that the thought of Ivan Illich, still today an author with little recognition even in the specialised community of researchers linked to educational phenomena, presents several aspects that enhance a transformation of traditional schooling. There are several reasons why his proposals were perhaps too quickly disregarded and/or misinterpreted. The purpose of this communication is to contribute to a current (re)reading of Illich by answering the following question: what is the relevance of Illich's proposal for a successful education in an increasingly digitalized society? It is concluded that Illich, as one of the main authors of critical pedagogy, unable to be applied ipsis verbis, provides very interesting instruments both for understanding current schooling and society, and for thinking and the transformation of this relationship into that which can be designated from schooling to education.

Keywords: Illich, Digital Society, Education, Schooling.