Memorizing a memory: Schwab’s the Practical in a German context

Abstract

The paper outlines the reception of Schwab’s essay ‘The practical: A language for curriculum’ in German-speaking countries in the 1970s and 1980s. The story is a good demonstration of the ways in which different circumstances and phases of development determine transatlantic exchanges and the influence of concepts in the field of education, and especially of curriculum. The central ideas of Joseph J. Schwab’s concept of curriculum theory and curriculum-making were related to the traditions of general Didaktik in the German-speaking world. It would have been well suited for a reception. Nevertheless, the reception the essay received was at first not a story of success; on the contrary, we have to diagnose a historical neglect. Circumstances today are much better for rethinking Schwab’s analysis under the new conditions of standardizing and competence-oriented curriculum policies.

Keywords:

• curriculum theory
• German Didaktik
• Schwab, Joseph
• transatlantic exchange
• history of curriculum

Notes

Translated by Franziska Brunner

1. In his programmatic inaugural lecture on July 21, 1962 at the University of Göttingen, Roth (1962) announced this turn. He made a case for a science-oriented education and for dismissing the so-called humanistic education, the basis of which was educational philosophical contemplation and the hermeneutical method. Education was built on this Diltheyan tradition during a predominantly restorative phase after the Second World War.

2. ‘The task of the curriculum is to determine the educational goals, the selection and concentration …, the educational goods or the educational values; … The curriculum determines what has to be applied in class’ (Weniger 1975: 216; my translation).

3. For more on the institutional history of educational research, see Saldern (1992).

4. The German translation was under the title Wissensstruktur und Curriculum. It was part of a series called Sprache und Lernen. Internationale Studien zur pädagogischen Anthropologie, edited by Werner Loch, Harm Paschen and Gerhard Priesemann.

5. See also, Eisner’s (1994) concept of ‘connoisseurship’.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Rudolf Künzli

Rudolf Künzli was Head of the Teachers College of the University of Applied Sciences, North-Western, Schachen 24, CH-5000 Aarau, Switzerland; e-mail: [email protected]. He was a visiting professor at the University of Zürich. His areas of special interest include curriculum history and theory, teacher education, general didactics and pedagogical rhetoric.