On critical pedagogy, social constructionism, postmodernism, postcolonialism, and relativism: Where are the Baha'i-inspired universities?

"How to Understand Postmodernism: Postmodernism means literally 'after the modern.' It means many different things to many different people. Postmodernism is not a school, it's an attempt to label many different things going on at the same time.Understand that postmodernism rejects the idea of the autonomous individual and objectivity in favor of the anarchic collective and subjectivity. There is no one theory or perspective that defines everything; there are many sets of ideas (particularly about what is beautiful), all of which are equally valid.Know that, inherently, postmodernism is contradictory and defies definition." Uploaded on March 16, 2006 by ATENCION: on flickr

More on postmodernism and its cousins. Krysta ruminates. -gw

Can we say the following three times fast??

Critical pedagogy, process philosophy, social constructionism, structuralism, poststructuralism, modernism, postmodernism, feminism, postfeminism, colonialism, postcolonialism, relativism . . .

Which leads me to ask why I'm pursuing a second masters degree?

Oh, right, the thesis. . . . .
and the chance to work with fascinating educators and lovely classmates. . . . .
although I spend most days in utter confusion. . . . .
the worst being that I already have an MA in the Humanities (in interpretation and values no less), a program that had already covered half of the above. . . .
and yet, it is becoming wildly apparent that I didn't get it the first time. (;

Oh where, oh where, are the affordable Baha'i-inspired universities?? (do any of them still exist?)

Krysta, "Living in a pre-post-ism world," Krystuccia

A postscript on postmodern relativism. -gw

...one key issue in modern thought, cutting across a wide range of disciplines, from psychology to sociology to neurobiology, is the nature of subjectivity: how do you know what you know.

Post-modern relativists have suggested that we can't really know anything, because of the subjectivity of the human viewpoint.

Dr. Hatcher suggests that this limitation can be overcome by explicitly acknowledging one's viewpoint at the outset of any philosophical discussion -- laying one's cards on the table, so to speak. He traces this idea back to Euclid, who deduced the mathematics of geometry from five basic axioms. ...

Applying that standard to philosophical discourse today, Dr. Hatcher writes, is a key step towards overcoming the split between the scientific materialists and the post-modern relativists on the issue of objectivity. ...

Indeed, Dr. Hatcher, who is himself a Baha'i, said in an interview that much of his inspiration for the development of his method came from studying the Baha'i writings, which uphold a highly rational view of God, religion, and theology -- and also uphold the scientific method as the primary path for understanding physical reality.

Brad Pokorny, "Creating a new school of thought," Baha'i World News Service

{Photo of William Hatcher, BWNS}

{Postmodernism photo licensed by Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.0}