Ivan Illich Never Fails Me

Last updated on: February 9, 2016 at 5:00 am by Daniel Schwindt

Ivan Illich Never Fails Me 2016-02-07T11:56:33-05:00 Daniel Schwindt

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whats-the-point-of-education1 Ivan Illich is a writer I frequently return to, not only for information and argument, but just for entertainment. Where else can I find a book of research on modern medicine, riddled with statistic and references, that calls doctors “rash artery-plumbers?”[1] And it is a rare spirit who can sardonically refer to his own cancerous tumor as “my mortality.”

At any rate, the book I picked up this week was Deschooling Society. I was drawn to it because I wanted some lively, engaging reading material, but I will continue through it to the end because, like all of his work, it is far too relevant to put down:

School has become the world religion of a modernized proletariat, and makes futile promises of salvation to the poor of the technological age. The nation-state has adopted it, drafting all citizens into a graded curriculum leading to sequential diplomas not unlike the initiatory rituals and hieratic promotions of former times. The modern state has assumed the duty of enforcing the judgment of its educators through well-meant truant officers and job requirements, much as did the Spanish kings who enforced the judgments of their theologians through the conquistadors and the Inquisition.[2]

As someone who has spent significant time in a variety of learning environments—homeschool, private elementary school, public school, juco, state university, private Christian university, tech school—I find Illich’s critique fascinating, and, needless to say, spot on. In light of my own momentary rediscovery of Ivan Illich, I’m working up a more comprehensive overview of his work for a The Dorothy Option, and you can expect to see it here in the next couple of weeks. But for now I just want to say that if you’ve never heard of this guy, you’re missing out.

[1] Limits to Medicine, p. 26.

[2] Deschooling Society, p. 15.

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