The Gender Theory and Project of a New Social Pedagogy
Abstract
RESEARCH OBJECTIVE: The aim of the article is to compare gender-based concepts of the human being and their educational implications with classical pedagogical models—axiocentrism and paidocentrism.
THE RESEARCH PROBLEM AND METHODS: The research problem is an attempt to explicate the educational and social postulates of the leading author of the gender theory movement, Judith Butler, and to conduct a comparative analysis with the assumptions of axiocentrism and paidocentrism.
THE PROCESS OF ARGUMENTATION: The fundamental anthropological and educational assumptions of axiocentrism and paidocentrism were presented. Then, the deconstruction of the concept of the human being emerging from the works of Judith Butler and pedagogical consequences resulting from them, were presented.
RESEARCH RESULTS: Butler’s anthropology is characterized by an extreme preference for individualism and processualism, where an individual is not attributed with fixed sexual identity or personal identity. Butler advocates for social development changes by abandoning the binary gender model and multiplying new categories of gender. Their goal would be establishing a new, autonomous individual who would chooses own gender independently of any biological or cultural determinants.
CONCLUSIONS, RECOMMENDATIONS, AND APPLICABLE VALUE OF RESEARCH: Butler’s postulates do not fit into either the axiocentric or paidocentric model; her ideas can be classified as part of the project of a “new social pedagogy.” The main characteristics of this approach include the glorification of individualism, the multiplication of “gender roles” to relativize traditional binary distinctions, the rejection of biological determinism in development, and complete freedom in choosing gender roles—both biological and cultural. Traditional models of marriage and family are rejected as outdated and overly restrictive of individual expression. Equal recognition is granted to homosexual and polyamorous relationships. These concepts appear as the polar opposite of the assumptions of Christian anthropology and pedagogy.
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