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Transindividuality and Philosophical Enquiry in Schools: A Spinozist Perspective
Author(s) -
MERÇON JULIANA,
ARMSTRONG AURELIA
Publication year - 2011
Publication title -
journal of philosophy of education
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.501
H-Index - 41
eISSN - 1467-9752
pISSN - 0309-8249
DOI - 10.1111/j.1467-9752.2011.00797.x
Subject(s) - individuation , epistemology , perspective (graphical) , relation (database) , action (physics) , philosophy of education , focus (optics) , process (computing) , sociology , affect (linguistics) , psychology , philosophy , higher education , psychoanalysis , law , political science , physics , optics , communication , quantum mechanics , database , artificial intelligence , computer science , operating system
We suggest in this paper that the practice of philosophy with children can be fruitfully understood as an example of a transindividual system. The adoption of the term ‘transindividuality’ serves two main purposes: it allows us to focus on individuation as a process and at the same time to problematise some of the classical antinomies of Western philosophy that continue to inform our understanding of the relation between individuality and community. We argue that the practice of philosophical inquiry with children, when interpreted in terms of Spinoza's conceptions of relational individuality and affective reason, offers a compelling example of how shared thinking operates as an individuating process in that knowledge and affect, interiority and exteriority, individuality and collectivity can be experienced in action and thought as complementary aspects of the same process.