Education for the Sake of Education

[liadnan]

Katyha brought this one to my attention and there are comments by others on her entry too, but as a medieval historian I feel the need to rant about this a little...

I feared things like this when they renamed the Department of Education the Department of Education and Training.

Charles Clarke, the education secretary, has continued his assault on the great subjects of academe by revealing that he regards medieval history as "ornamental" and a waste of public money.

Not long after expressing the view that he didn't think much of classics and regarded the idea of education for its own sake as "a bit dodgy", Mr Clarke, who read maths and economics at King's College, Cambridge, went one further.

"I don't mind there being some medievalists around for ornamental purposes, but there is no reason for the state to pay for them," he said on a visit to University College, Worcester. He only wanted the state to pay for subjects of "clear usefulness", according to today's Times Higher Educational Supplement.

Michael Biddiss, professor of medieval history at Reading University and a former president of the Historical Association, said: "Perhaps Mr Clarke and his spinners at the DfES are hoping to inspire the band of political yahoos who, in making New Labour ever more illiberal, must feel increasingly tempted to parrot Khrushchev's lament that 'historians are dangerous people - capable of upsetting everything'."

...

A spokesman for the Department for Education and Skills said: "The secretary of state was basically getting at the fact that universities exist to enable the British economy and society to deal with the challenges posed by the increasingly rapid process of global change."

This really depresses me. It is the philistinism which seems to have been growing in all parts of the political spectrum since at least the 1960s, a philistinism that seems to be shared by Thatcherites and other followers of Milton Friedman, by Blairites, by fascists, by Stalinists. From my point of view it is the fundamental mistake of all that they put the cart before the horse, they consider the economy and the theory that guides it more important than the ultimate reason why the economy matters.

Universities do NOT exist to do anything for the British economy. The purpose of education at any level is NOT primarily to enable people to get jobs. The fact that it does so is a useful side effect but training for jobs and employment is really a distinct role of government.

The primary purpose of education is to assist people in becoming civilised human beings, to allow them to realise their full potential as such. Ultimately, I believe education is about understanding one's relationships and context, to others, to our past, to the physical and metaphysical universe, and thus to ourselves. Those whose full potential is realised between 9 to 5 Monday to Friday are in a poor way.

The economy exists to serve civilisation, not the other way around. Or to be more accurate, it is important that the economy is doing well so that we can afford to have civilisation. I do not think it makes a difference to this axiom whether one believes, as I do, that the best way the economy can do this is through a free market, or whether one thinks it does so best through socialism. And what I find most depressing about this is that there seems no longer to be any political party in this country (or elsewhere) which speaks up for civilisation as an end in itself.

Why history? Why not English. Well, I suppose studying English at university is important because unless you can write English you won't be able to sit at your desk and write 30 pages of marketing newspeak. But don't think that if you're in an English faculty that Charles Clarke thinks it's ok that you're spending your time writing essays on Blake.

Biddiss makes a good point in the quote. History forces one to examine how people behave, to detect patterns, to question sources. (So one could even say that Clarke is in any event wrong, an inquiring mind is good for the economy. I certainly think I am a better lawyer because of my historian's training. A significant and growing number of those who make it as barristers did first degrees in history and classics, and we're pretty good. We understand evidence and we understand how people and society works.) More frightening for politicians, it leads one to be cynical, or at least sceptical, about our leaders' motives. The medieval period more than any other, perhaps. But I would say that, wouldn't I. (One wonders, incidentally, why he singles out medieval history. Obviously, Britain went through more of a fundamental change in 1485 than we all thought). Similar claims can be made for all arts and humanities subjects.

It is, I think, the role of the state to give money to universities. And to arts foundations, and the rest. My more extreme free-market friends will probably disagree with this, but there you are: I don't think it's inconsistent. It is also appropriate for the state to encourage private gifts to such institutions, and in the long run, practically, I think that is where the universities will have to go.

It is not the role of the state to say what is done with the money, what subjects it is inappropriate to spend it upon. To allow otherwise is, eventually, to allow the government of the day to control how well the people it educates can think and how independent minded they are.

Comments

[cdr.livejournal.com]

From my perspective history began on Jan 1st, 1970, making the mediaeval period some time around the Falklands War. But still I agree with my learned acquaintance.

[meirion.livejournal.com]

Universities do NOT exist to do anything for the British economy. The purpose of education at any level is NOT primarily to enable people to get jobs. The fact that it does so is a useful side effect but training for jobs and employment is really a distinct role of government.

the person who was quoted in the bit that you denote by "..." is writing/has written a book on the way in which the role of the university is changing/has changed from that that we would wish to see to that that governments and big business wish to say (with particular reference to cambridge, as it's all rather obvious here). i'd recommend reading it when it's published; it's compelling (and shocking) stuff.

-m-

[adjectivegail]

that book definitely sounds interesting; please remember to tell us about it in your journal when it's published? i think i'd be interested.

[clodaghfiona.livejournal.com]

*amen brother, amen!*
(hurah for liberal arts!)

[kiera-smith.livejournal.com]

Oh..my...god. That's so ridiculous.
I applaud your rant, i couldn't have put it better.
I'm a bit pissed off now, I think I'll phone someone and have a rant myself.

[liadnan]

I suppose one shouldn't expect any better from our masters...

What really worries me is the thought that the twin statements from Clarke and his department are not off the cuff things, but ranging shots in a long tertm campaign. Three or four years down the road there'll be a bill before parliament.