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Posts Tagged ‘ivan-illich’

two pressure points

In economics, politics on 23 June 2008 tagged affirmative action, charity, confusing, ivan-illich, majority, minority, social engineering, social-reform, welfare with 4 comments

Social reforms involving a minority1 approach their task with a mixture of two strategies:

Changing the way those in power perceive those whom you seek to help.
Changing the way those whom you seek to help present themselves to those in power.

This is not as subtle a statement as I’ve made it seem2 . There is [...]

“Unschooling Yourself, Deschooling Society”

In edumication, narrative, slush on 17 December 2007 tagged deschooling-society, iap, iap-2008, ivan-illich, kaleidoscope, mit, schooling, unschooling with no comments

That’s the title of a seminar I’ll be running during IAP:

Unschooling Yourself, Deschooling Society
Alec Resnick, Eric Von Hippel
Thu Jan 10, 17, 24, 31, 03-04:30pm, E51-376
No limit but advance sign up required (see contact below)
Participants welcome at individual sessions (series)
Come take some time out to think about how the assumptions we’ve taken for granted about [...]

“progress” can be a pernicious roadbloack to reform

In edumication, narrative, politics on 29 November 2007 tagged coffee-spoons, education, fixing-things, health-care, illich, ivan-illich, medical-care, medical-nemesis, medicine, progress, propaganda, reform, technology with no comments

It’s essential to keep in mind that when you’re trying to talk to somebody about a field that perceived as rapidly progressing, you need to be more vigilant about securing the timeliness of your credibility. Reading Illich’s Medical Nemesis, I found myself constantly questioning his conclusions, given their foundation upon statements like:

Awe-inspiring medical technology [...]