Toward a pedagogy of humility as experience

Abstract

Humility is widely regarded as a moral excellence and telos, hence, openly inculcated-instructed. Character education in and for humility, however, sits uncomfortably against today’s pedagogical maxims such as self-esteem and self-assertiveness. This article looks into this and other tensions from the perspective of humility as experience (phenomenon) instead of humility as goal. Surveying humility qua experience can help us to understand how the mind directs toward objects of cognition with their content, meaning and axiology. Husserl’s phenomenology and its theory of intuition suggests that humility is a personal belief (doxa) that moral agents construct out of their lived-experiences. Through iterations of similar lived-experiences, humility can become a habitus and, arguably, episteme. This process is detailed by intersecting experience of humility with intentionality, phenomenological reduction, and intersubjectivity. It is argued that, in contemporary education, ‘experience’ is widely accepted as learning content and teaching method. Humility as experience has significant implications for the main schools in curriculum studies, namely traditionalists, conceptualists and phenomenologists. This article claims that inculcating humility poses ethical challenges, and the role of education should instead be to explain and present to learners the phenomenological reality of humility.

Keywords:

• Humility as phenomenon
• experience
• phenomenology
• mental state
• intentionality
• intersubjectivity
• pedagogy of humility

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1 In Judaic theology, the humble are the people of God: “The humble will increase their joy in the Lord, and the poor among men will rejoice in the Holy One of Israel” (Isaiah 29:19). Christian evangelical teaching inculcates and prescribes humility with Christ as its model that people of God should imitate: “Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls” (Matthew 11:29).

2 “The field of power is a field of forces defined by the structure of the existing balance of forces between forms of power, or between different species of capital” (Bourdieu & Wacquant, 1992, p. 76)

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Jae Park

Jae Park reads at the Education University of Hong Kong. His research interests are in sociology and philosophy of education, particularly sociological aspects of technological development and sustainability. He published in New Media & Society, Educational Technology Research and Development, Educational Philosophy and Theory, International Studies in Sociology of Education and Ethics & Behavior. He serves as the President of the Comparative Education Society of Hong Kong. He is the Editor-in-Chief of the International Journal of Comparative Education and Development.

Anselmo Bae

Anselmo Bae is the Managing Editor of the International Journal of Comparative Education and Development. His research fields are Curriculum, Education philosophy, and International Education which ranges from existentialism, phenomenology, and hermeneutics to post-colonialism and modernization. His research focuses on the educational experience of modernization in East Asia, such as peace, boredom, humility, and profound experience.