ABSTRACT
In this chapter, we discuss and analyze impossibilities of intrinsic education on a mass scale in our current society. We define genuine intrinsic education as having a goal in itself, as a basic human craving for reflective self-actualization, self-transcendence, and self-realization. In contrast, we define mainstream institutionalized education, both conventional and some innovative, as instrumental, as a servant to other practices and societal spheres like economy, democracy, patriotism, nationalism, societal cohesion, social mobility, and so on. Conventional institutionalized education is often aimed at students’ arrival at curricular endpoints – knowledge, skills, attitudes, values – preset by the teacher and society. However, we argue that genuine education is an inherent and existential human need and right, involving human self-realization, self-actualization, and self-inspiration. We found two bases for intrinsic education: 1) creative authorship and 2) critical authorship. Both involve promoting students’ authorial agency and voices. Creative authorship is primarily interested in the production of new culture. Meanwhile, critical authorship is primarily interested in deconstruction of ready-made culture in a critical dialogue. We abstracted six types of academic freedom that support both kinds of intrinsic education: curricular, instructional, participatory, valuative, ecological, and role-based. These academic freedoms of the students are currently violated almost in all educational institutions. In our view, this is because current society is survival- and necessity-oriented and not leisure-based. Modern societal and mainstream institutional conditions distract students and teachers from their focus on intrinsic education and their fundamental existential needs. Thus, these conditions produce discontent and a feeling of lifelessness in the participants. However, changes in technology and economy may create new societal conditions for genuine education in the future, orienting society on authorial agency and leisure. We will ground our critical discussion in our pedagogical experimentation with genuine education.
