Exam 1: Learning

For Oakeshott, what is the relationship between a culture and the individual within it? How does education influence this relationship? How does Oakeshott's view differ from Krishnamurti's (Reading 2)? Whose view do you agree with more? Why?

If you read the Plato selection (Reading 1), you have (briefly) engaged in the kind of liberal learning that Oakeshott describes. Did it have the effect that Oakeshott hopes for?

Do you think that Oakeshott would characterize your college education as an "adventure in human understanding"? To what extent? Why? Support your answers by citing specific things that Oakeshott says in the reading.

One purpose of education for Krishnamurti is to __________.

How do you think that Oakeshott would characterize a technical or career-focused education? Does his view disregard the economic reasons people might seek education? Is it elitist?

Do you think that Foucault would agree with Plato (Reading 1) about truth? Whose view do you think is most applicable to what you see in society?

Foucault argues that truth is an objective notion, like a unit of measure in the metric system.

Foucault argues that we cannot exercise power except through the production of truth.

What do you think the person could be saying about the relationship between culture and the individual? Does it add a new dimension to what any of the other authors have said in this chapter?

Krishnamurti says that life is complex and broad, but we usually only learn about one small corner of it.

What pressures do you experience that work against participation in the conversation of liberal learning, as Oakeshott describes it?

Do you think it is possible to achieve the ideal kind of knowledge that Plato describes? Why or why not?