Summary: Humanism is a paradigm/philosophy/pedagogical approach that believes learning is viewed as a personal act to fulfil one’s potential.
Key proponents: Abraham Maslow, Carl Rogers, Malcolm Knowles
Key terms: self-actualization, teacher as facilitator, affect
Humanism
Humanism, a paradigm that emerged in the 1960s, focuses on the human freedom, dignity, and potential. A central assumption of humanism, according to Huitt (2001), is that people act with intentionality and values. This is in contrast to the behaviorist notion of operant conditioning (which argues that all behavior is the result of the application of consequences) and the cognitive psychologist belief that the discovering knowledge or constructing meaning is central to learning. Humanists also believe that it is necessary to study the person as a whole, especially as an individual grows and develops over the lifespan. It follows that the study of the self, motivation, and goals are areas of particular interest.
Key proponents of humanism include Carl Rogers and Abraham Maslow. A primary purpose of humanism could be described as the development of self-actualized, automomous people. In humanism, learning is student centered and personalized, and the educator’s role is that of a facilitator. Affective and cognitive needs are key, and the goal is to develop self-actualized people in a cooperative, supportive environment.
Related theories include: Experiential Learning (Kolb), Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, and Facilitation Theory (Rogers).
For more information, see:
DeCarvalho, R. (1991). The humanistic paradigm in education. The Humanistic Psychologist, 19(1), 88-104.
Huitt, W. (2001). Humanism and open education. Educational Psychology Interactive. Valdosta, GA: Valdosta State University. Retrieved September 11, 2007, from the URL: http://chiron.valdosta.edu/whuitt/col/affsys/humed.html.
Rogers, C., & Freiberg, H. J. (1994). Freedom to learn (3rd Ed.). New York: Macmillan.
Wednesday, January 12, 2011
Semiotic.....for Dissertation of Margith Strand/Fielding Graduate University/January 12, 2011
There is a second, concrete goal to the issue: To gather researchers in
applied semiotics who have data to illustrate this bidirectional action from
consciousness to signs, to make new advances in the field of active symbolics
understood as a physical, mind-reality relationship. This gathering of
educational researchers was to demonstrate how consciousness relates to
applied semiotics. It illustrates how, in education, signs can become consciously
active and get symbolic power, creating anomalies in the usual
course of learning and teaching, and educational events. Diverse educational
researchers approached this theme from various perspectives, and a
debate followed.
The concept of “semiotic consciousness” is not really new. It was first
used ten years ago by John Deely, currently president of the Semiotic Soci-
IJAS Vol. 3, No 2 3
ety of America. Deely wanted to addresses aspects of semiosis that relate to
conscious awareness of meaning making processes. There has been a lot of
research on semiotic consciousness and its underlying processes in terms
of what semioticians call semiosis and the type of inference named “abduction”
that represents “insight.” I proposed the concept of semiotic consciousness
as an instrument to study how the variety of signs in the
environment of a learning or teaching or an educational task is dynamically
recomposed towards representing a flow of meaning that supports a symbolic,
interactional process with the world. Consciousness being sensitive
to signs, builds insights that have semiotic features: As Papert would put it,
they are “microworlds” in coherence with how external reality is perceived.
Speaking of “microworld” is to allude to a tridimensional nature of the inner
signs that shape our reality.
In this direction, a semiotic theory of consciousness already exists
within the Peircean triad. While Saussure’s semiology was languageoriented
and dualist, Peircean theories after his Kantian period (1850–
1870) propose a definition of the Sign that is based on a dynamic interplay
of three poles: The ground that appears to immediate perception, the object
to which the sign process refers, and the interpretant that is the function resulting
from the semiosis process. The interpretant defines a second state
of the sign, a plus. It is in the interpretant that semiotic consciousness is revealed
as an active process through creative link-making and the perception
of causation. The relationship between conscious insight and the world has
been studied in Peircean semiotics as the building of a representamen
within a given semiotic triad. Peirce’s theory describes the relationship between
the representamen and the object as serial and unidirectional; in the
articles presented in this issue of International Journal of Applied
Semiotics we show that the building of the representamen is a highly parallel
process and a dynamic feature of consciousness.
Semiosis is the dynamic of transformation constructing
applied semiotics who have data to illustrate this bidirectional action from
consciousness to signs, to make new advances in the field of active symbolics
understood as a physical, mind-reality relationship. This gathering of
educational researchers was to demonstrate how consciousness relates to
applied semiotics. It illustrates how, in education, signs can become consciously
active and get symbolic power, creating anomalies in the usual
course of learning and teaching, and educational events. Diverse educational
researchers approached this theme from various perspectives, and a
debate followed.
The concept of “semiotic consciousness” is not really new. It was first
used ten years ago by John Deely, currently president of the Semiotic Soci-
IJAS Vol. 3, No 2 3
ety of America. Deely wanted to addresses aspects of semiosis that relate to
conscious awareness of meaning making processes. There has been a lot of
research on semiotic consciousness and its underlying processes in terms
of what semioticians call semiosis and the type of inference named “abduction”
that represents “insight.” I proposed the concept of semiotic consciousness
as an instrument to study how the variety of signs in the
environment of a learning or teaching or an educational task is dynamically
recomposed towards representing a flow of meaning that supports a symbolic,
interactional process with the world. Consciousness being sensitive
to signs, builds insights that have semiotic features: As Papert would put it,
they are “microworlds” in coherence with how external reality is perceived.
Speaking of “microworld” is to allude to a tridimensional nature of the inner
signs that shape our reality.
In this direction, a semiotic theory of consciousness already exists
within the Peircean triad. While Saussure’s semiology was languageoriented
and dualist, Peircean theories after his Kantian period (1850–
1870) propose a definition of the Sign that is based on a dynamic interplay
of three poles: The ground that appears to immediate perception, the object
to which the sign process refers, and the interpretant that is the function resulting
from the semiosis process. The interpretant defines a second state
of the sign, a plus. It is in the interpretant that semiotic consciousness is revealed
as an active process through creative link-making and the perception
of causation. The relationship between conscious insight and the world has
been studied in Peircean semiotics as the building of a representamen
within a given semiotic triad. Peirce’s theory describes the relationship between
the representamen and the object as serial and unidirectional; in the
articles presented in this issue of International Journal of Applied
Semiotics we show that the building of the representamen is a highly parallel
process and a dynamic feature of consciousness.
Semiosis is the dynamic of transformation constructing
Sage Publication Book/ Margith Strand's List for Dissertation/Fielding Graduate University/
Saussure’s book A Course in General Linguistics, first published
posthumously in 1915, suggests the possibility of semiotic analysis.
It deals with many of the concepts that can be applied to signs and
that are explicated in this chapter. Saussure (1915/1966) wrote, “The
linguistic sign unites not a thing and a name, but a concept and
a sound-image. . . . I call the combination of a concept and a soundimage
a sign, but in current usage the term generally designates only
a sound-image” (pp. 66–67). His division of the sign into two components,
the signifier (or “sound-image”) and the signified or (“concept”),
and his suggestion that the relationship between signifier and
signified is arbitrary were of crucial importance for the development
of semiotics. Peirce, on the other hand, focused on three aspects of
signs: their iconic, indexical, and symbolic dimensions (see Table 1.1).
4——TECHNIQUES OF INTERPRETATION
Table 1.1 Three Aspects of Signs
Icon Index Symbol
Signify by Resemblance Causal connection Convention
Examples Pictures, statues Fire/smoke Flags
Process Can see Can figure out Must learn
From these two points of departure a movement was born, and
semiotic analysis spread all over the globe. Important work was done
in Prague and Russia early in the 20th century, and semiotics is now
well established in France and Italy (where Roland Barthes, Umberto
Eco, and many others have done important theoretical as well as
applied work). There are also outposts of progress in England, the
United States, and many other countries.
Semiotics has been applied, with interesting results, to film, theater,
medicine, architecture, zoology, and a host of other areas that involve or
are concerned with communication and the transfer of information. In
01-Berger.qxd 6/17/2004 4:46 PM Page 4
fact, some semioticians, perhaps carried away, suggest that everything
can be analyzed semiotically; they see semiotics as the queen of the
interpretive sciences, the key that unlocks the meanings of all things
great and small.
Peirce argued that interpreters have to supply part of the meanings
of signs. He wrote that a sign “is something which stands to somebody
for something in some respect or capacity” (quoted in Zeman, 1977,
p. 24). This is different from Saussure’s ideas about how signs function.
Peirce considered semiotics important because, as he put it, “this
universe is perfused with signs, if it is not composed exclusively of
signs.” Whatever we do can be seen as a message or, as Peirce would
put it, a sign. If everything in the universe is a sign, semiotics becomes
extremely important, if not all-important (a view that semioticians
support wholeheartedly).
Whether this is the case is questionable, but without doubt, all
posthumously in 1915, suggests the possibility of semiotic analysis.
It deals with many of the concepts that can be applied to signs and
that are explicated in this chapter. Saussure (1915/1966) wrote, “The
linguistic sign unites not a thing and a name, but a concept and
a sound-image. . . . I call the combination of a concept and a soundimage
a sign, but in current usage the term generally designates only
a sound-image” (pp. 66–67). His division of the sign into two components,
the signifier (or “sound-image”) and the signified or (“concept”),
and his suggestion that the relationship between signifier and
signified is arbitrary were of crucial importance for the development
of semiotics. Peirce, on the other hand, focused on three aspects of
signs: their iconic, indexical, and symbolic dimensions (see Table 1.1).
4——TECHNIQUES OF INTERPRETATION
Table 1.1 Three Aspects of Signs
Icon Index Symbol
Signify by Resemblance Causal connection Convention
Examples Pictures, statues Fire/smoke Flags
Process Can see Can figure out Must learn
From these two points of departure a movement was born, and
semiotic analysis spread all over the globe. Important work was done
in Prague and Russia early in the 20th century, and semiotics is now
well established in France and Italy (where Roland Barthes, Umberto
Eco, and many others have done important theoretical as well as
applied work). There are also outposts of progress in England, the
United States, and many other countries.
Semiotics has been applied, with interesting results, to film, theater,
medicine, architecture, zoology, and a host of other areas that involve or
are concerned with communication and the transfer of information. In
01-Berger.qxd 6/17/2004 4:46 PM Page 4
fact, some semioticians, perhaps carried away, suggest that everything
can be analyzed semiotically; they see semiotics as the queen of the
interpretive sciences, the key that unlocks the meanings of all things
great and small.
Peirce argued that interpreters have to supply part of the meanings
of signs. He wrote that a sign “is something which stands to somebody
for something in some respect or capacity” (quoted in Zeman, 1977,
p. 24). This is different from Saussure’s ideas about how signs function.
Peirce considered semiotics important because, as he put it, “this
universe is perfused with signs, if it is not composed exclusively of
signs.” Whatever we do can be seen as a message or, as Peirce would
put it, a sign. If everything in the universe is a sign, semiotics becomes
extremely important, if not all-important (a view that semioticians
support wholeheartedly).
Whether this is the case is questionable, but without doubt, all
Try these......
Cognition and Comprehension...difference and variation in activity of self and .....
Self and the "structure of experience"...in the construction of ...versus "experiential."
Boundaries of self...and the limits of knowledge.....construction of "experience."
Self and the "structure of experience"...in the construction of ...versus "experiential."
Boundaries of self...and the limits of knowledge.....construction of "experience."
Margith Strand/ January 12, 2011
Time and Space and Place variations in cultural dynamics....as a comparative study to express the concept of "efficiency" and "time compression." Can we compare "Constantinople" to the United States of America or your sector of society to support or disprove the dynamics of "time compression" in terms of Time, Space and Place?
keywords: societal dynamics, efficiency, and time compression.
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