The Richard Causton Lectures
A UNIQUELY HUMAN PRIVILEGE
ROBERT SAMUELS
Education for Happiness and Peace
It is my honour and pleasure to give this second Richard Causton memorial lecture. Dick Causton was, to me, a great teacher. In the term teacher, I include the fact that he was a great friend, a great guide, and a great support. He was not a teacher in the classroom, but wherever he was, he exerted himself to encourage and inspire everyone with whom he came into contact. He often talked about the importance of education and he inspired the creation of an Educators Group in SGI-UK in 1978, which he went on to encourage with his whole life.It is appropriate therefore that this lecture is about education. It is also appropriate, because an educator - Tsunesaburo Makiguchi - founded the lay Buddhist society, the Soka Gakkai, to which Dick Causton dedicated the last two decades of his life.
EDUCATION FOR SELF RELIANCE
I would like to begin by introducing you to Tsunesaburo Makiguchi. He became a teacher in northern Japan in 1893. Ten years later he published the first of his books on education, Geography of Human Life, written as a guide for teachers. Makiguchi had viewed the problems in education through the study of geography. Discarding rote-learning, the form of education then in use, he concentrated on the relationship between the inhabitants of an area and their environment, and the effect of the environment on them. In this book he proposed an approach whereby geography forms the basis for teaching primary school children. He was interested in life-based knowledge - knowledge that was rooted in everyday life and that could be applied to daily living.
The model of the teacher that Makiguchi presents is of one who prepares the learning environment and the opportunities for the learner, encouraging spontaneous learning and self-reliance in the learner. This is why he based his teaching programmes first on geography and then, with the publication of his second book in 1912, on community studies. He saw community studies as a core subject, which, through observation and interaction with all sorts of people and institutions in the community, would foster children's abilities whilst they gained knowledge that made sense to them. He wanted them to think about society and the complex of relationships in the place where they lived. He especially valued learning and skills that were necessary for self-reliance. Throughout his own life he stood up against authoritarianism and he saw education as the process through which ordinary people could become emancipated. Many of Makiguchi's battles with authority were because he was defending people without privilege against vested interests. He was a man who spent his life working for the happiness of ordinary people.
By the beginning of the twentieth century, the Japanese government had established a clear goal for education, which was that it should fulfil national interests - as decided by the government. Firstly these were military. After the Second World War they became economic. Makiguchi totally disagreed with government direction and control of education. He advocated that education does not exist for the government, but for the people. A number of scholars have noted that Makiguchi's ideas were far ahead of their time, and I believe that this is true in this respect also. I am not sure that the idea that education exists for the people is generally accepted in this country even as we approach the twenty first century, which makes me a little uneasy about making these remarks in this place today! At the first SGI World Educators' Conference that was held in Hiroshima in 1985, a declaration was made which included 5 pledges. One of these was to work towards the establishment of a 'United Nations of Education', an international forum to discuss the education of humanity, based on the concept of a fourth branch of government independent of the present three branches, legislative, executive and judiciary. Just as these three powers are needed to balance each other, so education can have a similar role, independent of these three.
As we proceed through this talk, I would like to introduce you to three of the eight teachers who are featured in a booklet called The Quiet Peacemakers, a tribute to teachers produced by UNESCO and Education International. First is Zohra T. a teacher in a school in Algeria, whose experience shows the power of education in a situation where the three branches of government have all but broken down. She has said that she will stay with her pupils even if it costs her life.
Lessons in resistance - Zohra T.
Algeria plunged into an unprecedented nightmare in 1994 following the cancellation of the second round of its first-ever democratic general elections, of which the first had been won by the radical Islamic Salvation Front (FIS) party.
A wave of assassinations began which targeted all social groups: the elite, the police, journalists, teachers and ordinary citizens. Massive terrorist attacks and car bombs were used to terrorise Algerians in the name of religion, although Islam has never called for barbaric acts.
The isolated and defenceless inhabitants of Rais, Bentalha, Sidi Hamed and many other villages were subjected to massacres which left thousands dead, including children. In 1997, eleven women teachers and sixteen pupils were murdered in A'jn Adden. Villagers now live in terror of going about their everyday activities, as the extremists issued orders against going to work or school, on pain of death.
For teachers in Algeria today, holding class is in itself an act of peace. It maintains a "normal" routine for children and provides them with the education that is their right. In a bullet-scarred school in the heart of the region known as "the triangle of death" is one such teacher Zohra T.
Zohra has narrowly escaped death several times, notably during the massacre at Bentalha, where she lives. "That night," she remembers, "I thought my hour had come, but it hadn't. I will never forget the cries of my neighbours as they were tortured with knives or the screams of the children who were rounded up and burned alive." Thankfully, the neighbour's house where she and her family took refuge was spared. She was profoundly touched when her pupils risked the journey the next day to see if she had survived.
As teachers are on a hit-list, Zohra's journey to and from school is especially hazardous. She has been physically attacked twice. Despite a poster campaign warning teachers to stop working, she continues to do her job in a setting that resembles a battlefield. The school has been shot at and home-made bombs have caused fires. "God gave me life, and he will take it away again," she says resignedly "So why be afraid?" She is encouraged by the fact that her pupils continue to attend, just as they in turn are encouraged by her presence. "My pupils need me and I must admit I get my courage from them. We need each other There is a sort of complicity between us.
Zohra needed all her courage when one of her pupils, Mouloud, was stabbed to death. "when his classmates heard the news, they were uncontrollable," she recalls. "We all cried for two days." With her colleagues, she made a point of cancelling classes so they could all attend the funeral "There was a very real fear of reprisals at such a large gathering," she remembers, "but we wanted to express our support and our anger."
Almost every child in Zohra's class has a horror story to tell. One lost his parents in a massacre; another is waiting for news of his father who was kidnapped; yet another is temporarily housed with relations. Many have suffered injuries. She listens to each one, offering consolation and encouragement. Other pupils are brothers and sisters of known terrorists, but Zohra treats these children the same as all the others when giving class.
"Peace is an ideal for me," she explains, "Just giving my lessons as though everything were normal is my way of achieving it. There is a plot to bring Algeria to its knees by terrorising the population. The children understand that they must meet this challenge, which is why they continue to brave danger and come to class."
EDUCATION FOR HUMAN HAPPINESS
Let's return to the thought of Tsunesaburo Makiguchi, another courageous human being. He worked in education to create a world in which atrocities such as those we've just heard about would not happen. In all of his works his fundamental concern is that education should result in human happiness. Naturally therefore, he had to address the question of what kind of knowledge is important to help people live a fulfilled life - what is good knowledge and what is a good life? In his early works this seems to come down to the question what will be of use, or to use Makiguchi's term, what will be of benefit? He took this further in his final work and concluding thoughts on education, The System of Value-Creating Pedagogy, published in 1930, (translated into English in 1989 and published as Education for Creative Living.)
I would like now to address the question of what Makiguchi said should be the goal, purpose or end product of education. Makiguchi asserted that the purpose of education must be the lifelong happiness of learners. In talking about happiness he was not talking about the satisfaction of selfish desires, or the creation of a barrier between oneself and the painful realities of existence, or about escapism. He attempted to define happiness in terms of the creation of value. He believed that true happiness is to be found in a life of value creation. (In Japanese 'value creation' translates as 'soka'.) Value creation has been said to be the capacity to find meaning so as to enhance one's own existence and bring happiness to others, under any circumstances. Makiguchi outlined three types of value: economic value - being personal or private gain; moral value - which he says is benefit to society, or that which is good; and aesthetic value - that which is beautiful. So his three categories of value are good, beauty and gain, as opposed to the traditional three values posited by Immanuel Kant and others of good, beauty and truth. To explain this more fully, using the example of an apple, our perception of that object as a fruit is a function of truth: its taste and the benefits from eating it, how it affects human beings, is the function of value.
Happiness as used here as the goal of education does not imply a selfishness or self-centredness. It is an illusion that an individual can become happy by concentrating only on his own gain, and happiness built on illusion is a temporary and relative happiness. An individual lives in a social network, and any action that an individual takes, even that of simply ignoring others, affects those around him or her, and how they are affected will have its result. For example, the actions and words of a teacher will affect that teacher's pupils. On a larger scale, what we do and what we fail to do in schools will deeply affect the future. If the teacher's or society's interest is short term and selfish, any gains in relative happiness will be short lived. In The System of Value-Creating Pedagogy, Makiguchi makes clear a hierarchy of value in which good - social value, comes above benefit - personal value.
To take this deeper, there is a Buddhist concept that illustrates how concentration on self is an illusion. This is the concept of dependent origination. This concept holds that all beings or phenomena exist or occur in relation to other beings or phenomena - everything is linked in an intricate web of causation and connection and nothing can exist or occur solely of its own accord. Awakened to this, we have the power to create greater value - for others and ourselves - than if we viewed our life as completely separate from the lives around us.
In 1930 Makiguchi founded the Value Creating Education Society or Soka Kyoiku Gakkai. He put his whole life into the society. Its magazine, Value Creation, was launched in 1941, and in it, he spoke out against the war and against the religious framework the government had imposed to support and justify its war effort. In 1942, the ninth issue of the magazine was its last, by government order, and in 1943, many of the leaders of the society were arrested. Makiguchi was imprisoned and he died in detention in November 1944. After the end of the war, Josei Toda, who had been Makiguchi's closest associate for about twenty five years and had been imprisoned at the same time as him, resurrected the society, re-naming it the Value Creation Society or Soka Gakkai.
THREE PRINCIPLES FOR EDUCATIONAL REFORM
Josei Toda's follower as President of the Soka Gakkai, from 1960 through to the present day, is Daisaku Ikeda. I would like to say something now about Daisaku Ikeda's development of Makiguchi's work. Daisaku Ikeda has founded a number of Soka schools from kindergarten through to High Schools and Soka University, which seek to implement Makiguchi's principles. He is a prolific writer and has conducted dialogues with numerous scholars, writers and thinkers as well as having spoken at numerous universities around the world. In addition, he has proposed three guiding principles for educational reform: totality or synthesis, creativity and internationalism. These are all principles that are needed if education is going to contribute to developing people who will create a better society in the next century. It is these principles which I would like to speak about now.
Firstly, totality harks back to the concept of interconnectedness. At present in our education system, not only do subjects tend to be studied in isolation from one another, and expertise encouraged in ever narrower areas, but even knowledge itself has become separated from the end of human happiness and is pursued for its own sake. The value a student's studies have to his or her own life can become lost; the learned person becomes informed about things but not about the connections between them. Certainly great developments in science are the fruit of this approach - as are equally the development of nuclear weapons and environmental pollution. I would suggest that education means cultivating human beings who are aware of, and care about, the wider implications and ramifications of their actions.
Secondly, creativity comes from within. Knowledge can be obtained from without, but creativity and imagination must be stimulated from within. Creativity is nurtured in the exchange between human beings; this is one of the reasons why the teacher is so crucial in education - which might sound like a truism, but I believe it needs stressing. Technology, particularly computers, can be used to make the gaining and using of knowledge more efficient and convenient, but the living relationship between teacher and pupil is essential in the development of creativity. Of course, this can only happen if the teacher herself is constantly creative. One of the greatest teachers in history was Socrates. Socrates' powers to move others were compared to the shock of a stinging ray. When this simile was put to him, Socrates said that the ray stings others because he himself is stung. I know that the call to teachers to detonate their creativity may not seem a reasonable one at this time, when some find it an effort simply to get through to Friday afternoon. But I am not directing this point primarily to teachers. Rather, it is important that society as a whole begins to reappraise the role of the teacher, so that it can begin to be understood why teachers might need to finish their teaching day at 4.OOp.m. and have some 12 weeks holiday a year. An understanding of the role of the teacher as I am presenting it here might mean that teachers can be supported in their extraordinarily important task - and not hounded.
The third principle, internationalism, Daisaku Ikeda proposes is the cultivation of people with an international outlook. The UK is not famous for the linguistic accomplishment of its people, and I believe that this is something that is slowly beginning to change. But linguistic proficiency alone is not enough. A truly world citizen will have a deeply ingrained understanding of their own culture and tradition as well as of the culture and traditions of others. I say deeply ingrained because I believe that Mr Ikeda does not refer only to the accretion of knowledge here, but to a deep cultivation that manifests itself in a person's behaviour. By some definitions this is what education is anyway. If the process does not result in changes in conduct, it isn't education. Raising in young people the awareness of being world citizens is important for a number of reasons, but perhaps most importantly for peace. Military installations are one method nations use to maintain peace. Another, possibly slower, but I would suggest far more effective approach, is through culture and cultural exchange.
As I said, one of the significant things about these three principles is that together they are essential if we are to move towards a peaceful world. Exchanges between people should be based upon a deep understanding of our interdependence. And creativity is essential if we are to tackle the huge global problems that confront us as we enter the 21st century.
I would like now to introduce the words of Sister Therese Ranee, a teacher in Sri Lanka, who is working through cultural exchange to create peace in her community.
Lessons in love - M. Therese Ranee, A.C.
On the road from Colombo, the Sri Lankan capital, to the north-east of the country, lies a region where armed struggle has been raging for fifteen years. War between government armed forces and Tamil freedom fighters as well as frequent clashes between Tamils and Muslims have cut the area off from the rest of the country. Thousands of children have lost their parents in the fighting.
Sister Therese Ranee is the principal of Saint Mary's College in the picturesque town of Thincomalee - a multi-racial, multi-religious and multi-lingual community of 10,000 inhabitants. In the aftermath of violent outbreaks, the pupils from the different ethnic groups tend to avoid each other. "These situations require careful handling," says Sister Therese. "After one such outbreak, a few Muslim children wanted to leave the school but I persuaded their parents to let them stay on."
"The tense climate in which the children live sometimes makes them moody," says Sister Therese. "To relax the atmosphere, I organise friendly netball tournaments for the community. At first, the Sinhalese and Tamils remain totally apart but by involving the teachers and serving refreshments, I bring them together. "Muslims, Sinhalese and Tamils now meet on occasions such as sports day or parents day and Sister Therese is optimistic about integration. "The Sinhalese used to think that all Tamils were 'terrorists'. Now this feeling is slowly disappearing. There is not as much bitterness as ten or fifteen years ago," she says.
"I believe in the vibration of hearts," declares Sister Therese. "The heart is the seat of love or hatred." She herself tries to achieve inner peace every day before going to school. She is then ready to help people make peace with themselves and others.
"The teacher sets the tone of the class and its surroundings and if he or she is peace-loving then the surroundings and people will be peaceful"
Sister Therese had her Tamil students learn Sinhalese to improve interaction between the communities. "Knowing their language, Tamil pupils can converse with Sinhalese children and express their aspirations and longings," she claims. "The more they interact with each other the more feelings they will share and the easier it will be to live as neighbours in the same place."
To further build up broken relationships, Sister Therese encourages her Tamil students to learn the traditional Sinhalese dances, which they perform on parents day in costumes borrowed from the Sinhalese school. "It is an ideal occasion for the parents to appreciate the value of other cultures."
In her most daring initiative, Sister Therese takes her pupils for a few days at a time on 'exposure programmes' to Sinhalese districts in Colombo. "My colleagues feel I'm taking risks, but I know that the school visits, the dance performances and sports activities transform their minds and the bitterness of the past becomes less or is forgotten."
THE IMPORTANCE OF THE TEACHER
I have already alluded to the importance of the teacher and I would like to return to this now. At this point in history it is natural to look back at the century we are leaving and look forward to the century that approaches and beyond. Materially, human beings have come a long way in the last 100 years. But at the same time we must not avert our eyes from the blood that was shed in that same century and the abuse of human rights. I believe that the only way that we will change this pattern is through bringing into being a generation imbued with a profound respect for human life. I don't believe that this is something that can simply be achieved by being put on the curriculum. Certainly it means education in a broader sense than school education alone. But it is essential that schools support and embody this ideal. And within the school, it is the teacher who will or will not transmit this education.
A profound respect for human life is not something that will just develop by itself without any effort. It has to be actively cultivated and defended. For this reason teachers must fight to develop this respect in their own lives. I say fight because I believe that it is a battle to discover this respect for the dignity of life, which exists within all people, and a continuous baffle to nurture and encourage it. This respect has to be manifest in our own actions as human beings. The fight is between the positive and negative within our own lives. Mr Causton often used to say that there are no grey zones or neutral zones - we are either creating value or anti-value, we are either engaged in construction or destruction.
I would like now to introduce a third reading from The Quiet Peacemakers the words of Olwin Frost, a teacher in Northern Ireland. She had to face prejudice within herself that she didn't even realise she had, in the process of the work she is doing in the Belfast school of which she is principal.
Lessons in dialogue - Olwin Frost
The Catholic and Protestant communities in Northern Ireland live totally segregated lives, in separate areas, with separate schools and separate churches. Only 2 per cent of pupils attend mixed schools. One of them is Oakwood Integrated Primary School in Belfast
"Our site is right at the interface of Protestant and Catholic areas so we get a good cross-section of children," explains Olwin Frost, the principal of Oakwood. Like the pupils parents, Olwin believes that integrated education can remove the distrust between the communities that has fuelled thirty years of sectarian violence and claimed over 3,000 victims. The annual marching season when Protestant marching bands attempt to parade through Catholic areas, is still a source of community tension. More positively, in 1998, over 70 per cent of voters approved a historic Peace Agreement and the creation of an all-party Northern Ireland Assembly, developments which augur well for integrated education.
"The youngest children sometimes use pejorative terms like 'Taig' (Catholic) or 'Prod'(Protestant). But they learn very quickly not to," remarks Olwin. "We try to bring out the children's own ideas of acceptable behaviour." Together teachers and children develop techniques to deal with conflict, with emphasis on respecting others' feelings. "If they experience violence in word or deed, they say "Stop. That hurts me.", or "That hurts my feelings." "Then the other child must take responsibility for the incident, explain what happened or apologise if it was deliberate."
The children make their own rules for classroom and playground, Olwin explains. "They discuss and agree on them in their own language - 'Be kind to each other' or 'Work quietly in class time'. So if they transgress, they are breaking their own rules." According to parents, some children apply these rules at home as well, with comments like "you shouldn't use that word because it hurts my friends 'feelings!"
Differences between Catholics and Protestants - indistinguishable to outsiders - are addressed as and when children bring them up. "Take the letter 'H'. One child said to his Catholic teacher "Miss, you don't pronounce the letter 'H' properly. You should say 'aitch' (the way Protestants pronounce it). So she replied, "You can say it two ways: aitch or haitch", and he accepted that."
Olwin formerly taught in an all-Protestant school and admits having had to question her own attitudes. "I thought I was a tremendous liberal. But my father was very right wing and anti-Catholic and, although I hadn't realised it, I had carried some of that baggage with me." Nevertheless, she says her happiest moment was at a recent Catholic first communion ceremony - "the only one in Belfast where a Protestant played the keyboard and another, myself, sang the songs. That had never happened in this area before."
Running Oakwood is time-consuming. "It has taken over my life," Olwin admits. "I don't have time to see friends or family I do feel discouraged at times, but I am buoyed by the commitment of the parents." She is also aware of the value of her work "We are dealing with issues that the rest of the country hasn't even thought of yet."
Olwin Frost had to face and overcome the prejudice in her own life. The reason why I believe teachers must fight to deepen their own respect for the dignity of life is because respect for life, like other humanistic values, is communicated life to life. No real education can be conveyed in a high handed manner from above. Daisaku Ikeda has observed that "The true value of education lies in its role as the force for the weaving of beautiful human relationships." My own greatest memories as a teacher are all linked to relationships with my students. They are the greatest memories probably because they are the times when I was most directly educating, whether co-directing a school play with sixth formers, supporting a group involved in a model United Nations activity, or trying to understand the root of study difficulties with students as their senior tutor It is odd how few of the best memories have me standing in front of a class - although there were good classroom moments.
The idea that no true education can be handed down from above reminds us of the importance that Makiguchi attached to developing the self-reliance of the learner. As with many of his ideas, this concentration on the self-reliance of the learner has perhaps even greater meaning today than when he wrote. Education for self-reliance - which might be opposed to knowledge passed down from above - amounts to a denial of authoritarianism.
If the twenty first century is to be a century of humanity, a century of life, a very different century from the one that preceded it, I believe that this will not be the result of any new economic, political or even educational system. It will not be the result of ideology. It will be an expression of the desire and determination of the people. In this sense, what Makiguchi was suggesting in the 1930s meets exactly with what SOT stands for today: a peaceful society created by people who have been educated to be self reliant and responsible for both themselves and others. These are people who are at present in school and those who will be going to school in the next few decades. Let us make every effort we can to ensure that the education that they receive will help them to develop fulfilling lives and the ability and will to contribute to the happiness of the wider community and the world. Education is a uniquely human privilege; we squander this privilege at our peril but if we use it wisely it is the source of inspiration that enables us to become fully and truly human.
Excerpts from The Quiet Peacemakers are reproduced with the kind permission of UNESCO and Education International.
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