Abstract
The article examines not-so-evident influences of postmodernism on modern Russian education, its values and norms. At school, children have to face inadequate competitions and carry out projects, which are irrelevant to their experience and even age. During holiday festivities, the rejection and oblivion of traditional culture and core human values becomes even more blatant. In the meantime, schoolteachers are loaded with paperwork and have to conform to new educational standards, while parents are forced to find some out-of-school solutions to the existing learning environment. The author reveals that postmodernism is, in fact, deeply rooted in Russian everyday life, filling it with absurdities and simulacra.
Notes
English translation © 2015 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC, from the Russian text © 2015 “Narodnoe obrazovanie.” “Obrazovanie v stile Kafki,” Narodnoe obrazovanie, 2015, no. 4, pp. 31–40. Temyr A. Khagurov, doctor of sociological sciences, is a professor at Kuban State University, Krasnodar. Translated by Kenneth Cargill. Translation reprinted from Russian Education and Society, vol. 57, no, 8. doi:10.1080/10609393.2015.1117880.
1. T.A. Khagurov, “Kak vliiaiut tseli obrazovaniia na sotsial'nuiu dinamiku,” Narodnoe obrazovanie, 2014, no. 5, pp. 73–76.
2. Cargo cults emerged in Melanesia at the turn of the twentieth century, and they were based on the natives' magical imitation of the actions of white people. By imitating the technical operation of planes and cars (by constructing wooden counterparts), the natives thought that they could appeal to spirits, as opposed to investigating the meaning or purpose of such technology.
3. This currently trendy toy emanates not just the absurd but blatant necrophilia, but this is a topic for another conversation.
4. T.A. Khagurov. “Kuda ukhodit skazka?” Vospitatel'naia rabota v shkole, 2011, no. 1.
5. Golden Fleece, http://www.rakurs230.ru/golden_fleece/
6. Anyone who is seriously interested in the Renaissance knows that the opposite is quite frequently the case. However, that does not negate the real achievements of this era.
7. Golden Fleece, http://www.rakurs230.ru/golden_fleece/