UNIT 1

INTRODUCTION TO SOCIETY, COMMUNITY AND EDUCATION

DEFINING BASIC CONCEPTS

Society may be viewed as a system of interrelated mutually
dependent parts which cooperate (more or less) to preserve a
recognizable whole and to satisfy some purpose or goal. Socialsystem
refers to the orderly arrangement of parts of society and plurality
of individuals interacting with each other. Social system presupposes
a social structure consisting of different parts which are
interrelated in such a way as to perform its functions.
Image Courtesy : media.licdn.com/mpr/mpr/p/1/000/21d/0f9/03716e6.jpg

To perform its functions every society sets up various institutions. Five major complexes of
institutions are identified: familial institutions, religious institutions, educational institutions,
economic institutions and political institutions. These institutions form sub-systems within social
system or larger society.

Education as a Sub-System:
Education is a sub-system of the society. It is related to other sub-systems. Various
institutions or sub- systems are a social system because they are interrelated. Education as a sub-
system performs certain functions for the society as whole. There are also functional relations between
education and other sub- systems. For example, Education trains the individuals in skills that are
required by economy. Similarly education is conditioned by the economic institutions.

The effectiveness of organised activities of a society depends on the interaction and inter
relationships
Of these institutions which constitute the whole. Now we will examine the role of education for the society
and the relationship between education and other sub-system of society in terms of functionalist
perspective. The functionalist view of education tends to focus on the positive contributions made by
education to the maintenance of social system.
Emile Durkheim says that the major function of education is the transmission of society’s norms
and values. He maintains that, “society can survive only if there exists among its members a
sufficient degree of homogeneity; education perpetuates and reinforces this homogeneity by fixing in
the child from the beginning the essential similarities which collective life demands”. Without these
essential similarities, cooperation, social solidarity and therefore social life would be impossible. The
vital task ofall society is the creation of solidarity.
This involves a commitment to society, a sense of belonging and feeling that the social unit is more
important than the individual. Durkheim argues that to become attached to society the child must feel in
it something that is real, alive and powerful, which dominates the person and to which he also owes the
best part of himself.

Education in particular the teaching of history, provides this link between the individual and society.
If the history of his society is brought alive to the child, he will come to see that he is a part of
something larger than himself, he will develop a sense of commitment to the social group.

Functional Relationships between Education and other Sub-Systems:

What are the functional relationships between education and other sub-systems of society. Many
functionalists have argued that there is functional relationship between different sub-systems. For
example there is a functional relationship between education and economic system. Skills and values
learned in education are directly related to the way in which the economy and the occupational structure
operate. Education trains the individuals in skills that are required by the economy. Similarly,
educationis also influenced by economy.

Throughout the twentieth century, the rapid expansion of the tertiary occupation in industrial societies
has produced an increasing demand for clerical, technical’, professional and managerial skills. Education
reflects these changes in the economy.

In this context Halsey and Floud argue that, the educational system is bent increasingly to the service
of the labour force. This can be seen from the steady increase in the school leaving age, the increasing
specialisation of educational provision and the rapid expansion of higher and vocational education.

Various institutions or sub-Systems – familial, political, economic, educational institutions – may be

viewed as a ‘whole cluster of institutions’. These institutions are social system because they are
interrelated. A social system reveals a balance between its parts which facilitates its operation.
Occasionally it may reveal imbalance, but it tends towards equilibrium.

In a changing society the interdependence of social institutions has a good deal of significance, to quote
Ogburn and Nimkoff, for a change in one institution may affect other institutions”. For example, when a
country changes its Constitution, the change is never confined to its political institutions.
Corresponding changes take place in economic relationships, in the educational system, in the class
structure and soon. All the social institutions would be in balance, each being adjusted to other, forming
a single unified scheme.
SOCIETY AND EDUCATION

Philosophical Perspectives

A. JOHN LOCKE (632-1704): The Empericist Educator

 Acquire knowledge about the world through the senses – learning by doing and by
interacting with the environment
 Simple ideas become more complex through comparison, reflection and generalization-
the inductive method
 Questioned the long traditional view that knowledge came exclusively from literary
sources, particularly the Greek and Latin classics
 Opposed the “divine right of kings” theory which held that the monarch had the right to
be an unquestioned and absolute ruler over his subjects
 Political order should be based upon a contract between the people and the government
 Aristocrats are not destined by birth to be rulers. People were to establish their own
government and select their own political leaders from among themselves; civic education
is necessary
 People should be educated to govern themselves intelligently and responsibly (Ornstein,
1984)
Comments:
 For John Locke education is not acquisition of knowledge contained in the Great Books. It
is learners interacting with concrete experience, comparing and reflecting on the same
concrete experience, comparing. The learner is an active not a passive agent of his/her
own learning.
 From the social dimension, education is seeing citizens participate actively and
intelligently in establishing their government and in choosing who will govern them from
among themselves because they are convinced that no one person is destined to be ruler
forever.

B. HERBERT SPENCER ( 1820-1903): The Utilitarian Education

 Spencer’s concept of “survival of the fittest” means that human development had gone
through an evolutionary series of stages from the simple to the complex and from the
uniform to the more specialized kind of activity.
 Social development had taken place according to an evolutionary process by which simple
homogeneous societies had evolved to more complex societal systems characterized with
humanistic and classical education.
 Industrialized society require vocational and professional education based on scientific
and practical (utilitarian) objectives rather than on the very general educational goals
associated with humanistic and classical education
 Curriculum should emphasize the practical, utilitarian and scientific subjects that helped
human kind aster the environment.
 Was not inclined to rote learning; schooling must be related to life and to the activities
needed to earn a living.
 Curriculum must be arranged according to their contribution to human survival and
progress.
 Science and other subjects that sustained human life and prosperity should have
curricular priority since it aids in the performance of life activities.
  Individual competition leads to social progress. He who is fittest survives. (Ornstein,
1984)
Comments:
Specialized Education of Spencer vs. General Education
 To survive in a complex society, Spencer favors specialized education over that of general
education. We are in need of social engineers who can combine harmoniously the findings
of specialized knowledge. This is particularly true in the field of medicine.
 The expert who concentrates on a limited field is useful, but if he loses sight of the
interdependence of things he becomes a man who knows more and more about less and less.
We must not prefer the other extreme, the superficial person who knows less and less
about more and more.
Spencer’s Survival of the Fittest
 He who is fittest survives. Individual competition leads to social progress. The
competition in class is what advocaes of whole-child approach and Socio-emotional
Learning (SEL) atmosphere negate. The whole child approach a powerful tool for SDELF-
focused schools has as tenets – “each student learns in an environment that is physically
and emotionally safe for students and adults” and “each student has access to
personalized learning and is supported by qualified and caring adults…” (Frey, N., 2019).
The highlighted words point to no competition for competition works against an emotionally
safe environment.

C. JOHN DEWEY (1859-1952): Learning through Experience

 Education is a social process and so school is intimately related to the society that it
serves.
 Children are socially active human beings who want to explore their environment and gain
control over it.
 Education is a social process by which the immature members of the group, especially the
children, are brought to participate in the society.
 The school is a special environment established by members of society, for the purpose of
simplifying, purifying and integrating the social experience of the group so that it can be
understood, examined and used by its children.
 The sole purpose of education is to contribute to the personal and social growth of
individuals.
 The steps of the scientific or reflective method which are extremely important in Dewey’s
educational theory are as follows:
- The learner has a “genuine situation of experience,” involvement in an activity in
which he/she is interested.
- Within this experience the learner has a “genuine problem” that stimulates thinking.
- The learner possesses the information or does research to acquire the information
needed to solve the problem.
- The learner develops possible and tentative solutions that may solve the problem.
- The learner tests the solutions by applying them to the problem. In this one way one
discovers their validity for oneself.
 The fund of knowledge of the human race ideas, discoveries and inventions was to be used
as the material for dealing with problems. This accumulated wisdom of cultural heritage
has to be tested. If it served human purposes, it becomes part of a reconstructed
experience.
 The school is social, scientific, and democratic. The school introduces children to society
and their heritage. The school as a miniature society is a means of bringing children into
social participation.
  The school is scientific in the sense that it is a social laboratory in which children and
youth could test their ideas and values. In here, the learner acquires the disposition and
procedures associated with scientific or reflective thinking and acting.
 The school is democratic because the learner is free to test all ideas, beliefs and values.
Cultural heritage, customs and institutions are all subject to critical inquiry,
investigation and reconstruction.
 School should be used by all, being a democratic institution. No barrier of custom or
prejudice segregate people. People ought to work together to solve common problems.
 The authoritarian or coercive style of administration and teaching is out of place because
they block genuine inquiry and dialogue.
 Education is a social activity and the school is a social agency that helps shape human
character and behaviour.
 Values are relative but sharing, cooperation, and democracy are significant human values
that should be encouraged by schools. (Ornstein, A. 1984)
Comments:
The Fund of Knowledge of the Human Race
 Dewey does not disregard the accumulated wisdom of the past. These past ideas,
discoveries and inventions, our cultural heritage, will be used as the material for dealing
with problems and so will be tested. If they are of help, they become part of a
reconstructed experience. If they are not totally accurate, they will still be part of a
reconstructed experience. This means that the ideal learner for Dewey is not just one
whocan learn by doing, e.g., conduct an experiment but one who can connect accumulated
wisdom of the past to the present.
Schools are For the People and By the People
 Schools are democratic institutions where everyone regardless of age, ethnicity, social
status is welcome and is encouraged to participate in the democratic process of decision-
making. Learners and stakeholders practice and experience democracy in schools

D. GEORGE COUNTS (1889-1974): Building a New Social Order

 Education is not based on eternal truths but is relative to a particular society living at
agiven time and place.
 By allying themselves wit groups that want to change society, schools should cope with
social change that arises form technology.
 There is a cultural lag between material progress and social institutions and
ethicalvalues.
 Instruction should incorporate a content of a socially useful nature and a problem-
solvingmethodology. Students are encouraged to work on problems that have social
significance.
 Schools become instrument for social improvement rather than an agency, for preserving
the status quo.
 Teachers should lead society rather than follow it. Teachers are agents of change.
 Teachers are called on to make important choices in the controversial areas of economics,
politics and morality because if they failed to do so, others would make the decisions for
them.
 Schools ought to provide an education that affords equal learning opportunities to all
students. (Ornstein, A. 1984)
Comments:
Schools and Teachers as Agents of Change
 For George Counts, schools and teachers should be agents of change. Schools are
considered instruments for social improvement rather than as agencies for preserving
the status quo. Whatever change we work for should always be change for the better not
justchange for the sake of change.
  Teachers are called to make decisions on controversial issues Not to make a decision is to
actually making a decision.
 Like Dewey, problem solving should be the dominant method for instruction.
Lag Between Material Progress and Ethical Values
 Counts asserts that “there is a cultural lag between material progress and social
institutions and ethical values.” Material progress of humankind is very evident but moral
and ethical development seems to have lagged behind. A friend once wrote: “TheEgyptians
had their horses. Modern man has his jets but today it is still the same moral problems
that plague humankind.” Indeed with science and technology, we have become very
powerful and yet powerless. We have conquered a number of diseases and even postponed
death for many, we have conquered aging, the planets, the seas but we ave not conquered
ourselves.

E. THEODORE BRAMELD (1904-1987): Social Reconstructionism

 As the name implies, social reconstructionism is a philosophy that emphasizes the
reformation of society. The social reconstructionists contend that:
…humankind has moved from an agricultural and rural society to an urban and
technological society… there is a serious lag in cultural adaptation to the realities of
a technological society. Humankind has yet to reconstruct its values in order to catch
upwith the changes in the technological order, and organized education as a major role
to play in reducing the gap between the values of the culture and technology.
(Ornstein, 1984)
 So the social reconstructionism asserts tat schools should:
- Critically examine present culture and resolve inconsistencies, controversies and
conflicts to build a new society not just change society… do more than reform the
society and educational status quo. It should seek to create a new society…
Humankind is in a state of profound cultural crisis. If schools reflect the dominant
social values… then organized education, will merely transmit the social ills that are
symptoms of the pervasive problems and afflictions that beset humankind… The only
legitimate goal of a truly human education is to create a world order in which people
are in control of their own destiny. In an era of nuclear weapons, the social
reconstructionism see an urgent need for society to reconstruct itself before it
destroys itself. (Ornstein, A., 1984)
 Technological era is an era of interdependence and so education must be international in
scope for global citizenship.
 For the social reconstructionists, education is designed “to awaken students’
consciousness about social problems and to engage them actively in problem solving.”
(Ornstein, 1984)
 Social reconstructionists are firmly committed to equality or equity in both society and
education. Barriers of socio-economic class and racial discrimination should be eradicated.
 They also emphasize the idea of an interdependent world. The quality of life needs to be
considered and enhanced on a global basis. (Ornstein, A., 1984)
Comments:
 Like John Dewey and George Counts, social reconstructionist Brameld believe in active
problem-solving as the method of teaching and learning.
 Social reconstructionists are convinced that education is not a privilege of the few but
aright to be enjoyed by all.
 Education is a right that all citizens regardless of race and social status must enjoy.

F. PAULO FREIRE (1921-1997): Critical Pedagogy

Critical Pedagogy and Dialogue vs. the Bamking Model of Education
 Paulo Freire, a critical theorist, like social reconstructionists, believed that systems
mustbe changed to overcome oppression and improve human conditions.
 Education and literacy are the vehicle for social change. In his view, humans must learn
to resist oppression and not become its victims, nor oppress others. To do so requires
dialogue and critical consciousness, the development of awareness to overcome
domination and oppression.
 Rather than “teaching as banking,” in which the educator deposits information into
students’ heads, Freire saw teaching and learning as a process of iquiry in which the child
must invent and reinvent the world.
 Teachers must not see themselves as the sole processors of knowledge and their students
as empty receptacles. He calls this pedagogical approach the “banking method” of
education.
 A democratic relationship between the teacher and her students is necessary in order for
the conscientization process to take place.
 Freire’s critical pedagogy is problem-posing education.
 A central element of Freire’s pedagogy is dialogue. It is love and respect that allow us to
engage people in dialogue and to discover ourselves in the process and learn from one
another. By its nature, dialogue process, and it is only when we come to tolerate the
points of view ad ways of being of others that we might be able to learn from them and
about ourselves in the process. Dialogue means the presence of equality, mutual
recognition, affirmation of people, a sense of solidarity with people, and remaining open
to questions.
 Dialogue is the basis for critical and problem-posing pedagogy, as opposed to banking
education, were there is no discussion, only the imposition of the teacher’s ideas on the
students. (Ornstein, 1984)
Comment:
 All of these education philosophers, point to the need of interacting with others and of
creating a “community of inquiry” as Charles Sanders Peirce put it. The community of
inquiry is “a group of persons involved in inquiry, investigating more or less the same
question or problem, and developing through their exchanges a better understandingboth
of the question as well as the probable solutions.” (Lee, 2010) A community of inquiry will
engage learners in active problem-solving.