waldorf school? not a chance.
so I'm starting to look into different educational philosophies and Waldorf keeps cropping up -- I get more exposure to it than I do, say, to Montessori or to Reggio Emilia.
There are a lot of things I like about the Waldorf philosophy, and the fact that it does have a spiritual element to it certainly does not put me off. BUT the more I read about Steiner (father of biodynamic gardening), the less enamoured with him I become. And the more I read about the specifics of institutionalized Waldorf and Steiner schools, the less enthusiastic I become.
Additionally, I realized, through reading a couple of critical articles and sites on him that he lived right around the heyday of the Nazis and, as a result, his philosophy is riddled with white supremacist putrescence.
Consider this section of the Waldorf Watch website:
Racism
This is a terribly sensitive subject, and I certainly hope that Waldorf schools today are not racist. But Steiner himself was a racist. For instance, he said that races should stay put - blacks should stay in Africa, Asians should stay in Asia, and so forth. “On the one side we find the black races, which is earthly at most. If it moves to the West, it becomes [or may become] extinct. We also have the yellow race, which is in the middle between earth and the cosmos [the heavens]. If it moves to the East, it becomes brown, attaches itself too much to the cosmos, and becomes extinct. The white race is the future, the race that is creating spirit.” [47] Whites, in other words, are leading mankind’s spiritual evolution - they are superior - but Steiner said that even whites should normally stay in their allotted geographical locations.
Steiner revealed his racism many times, in many ways. Here are more examples. In the first, Steiner says that some races have evolved more than others, and that lowly races come from “abnormal” humans. “[I]t was the normal human beings that were ... the most capable of evolving. [Abnormal] peoples whose ego impulse [sense of individual identity]was developed too strongly gradually wandered to the West [from Atlantis] and became ... the Red Indians of America. [Likewise, the abnormal] people whose ego-feeling was too little developed migrated to the East, and became the subsequent Negro population of Africa ... [T]hey deposited too many carbonic constituents in their skin and became black. This is why the Negroes are black. Thus both east of Atlantis in the black population and west of Atlantis in the red population we find survivors of the kind of people who had not developed their ego-feeling in a normal way. The human beings who had developed normally lent themselves best to progress.” [48] By “ego impulse” or “ego feeling,” Steiner meant the sense of personal selfhood, which must be balanced with the sense of one’s membership in the cosmic community. The descendants of the normal humans, the ones who could continue evolving properly, are the white race, according to Steiner.
Being white has many advantages, Steiner said. For example: “Blond hair actually bestows intelligence. In the case of fair people, less nourishment is driven into the eyes and hair; it remains instead in the brain and endows it with intelligence. Brown- and dark-haired people drive the substances into their eyes and hair that the fair people retain in their brains.” [49] But, according to Steiner, not all white people are spiritually advanced. “The Jews have a great gift for materialism, but little for recognition of the spiritual world.”[50] Still, Steiner said, being white is better than the alternatives. For example, according to Steiner, blacks are inherently immature: “[A] centre of cosmic influence [is] situated in the interior of Africa. At this centre are active all those terrestrial forces emanating from the soil which can influence man especially during his early childhood ... The black or Negro race is substantially determined by these childhood characteristics.” [51]
At my Waldorf school, racism cropped up in the classroom occasionally. One of my teachers spoke to our class about higher and lower races, and another told us (we were all white) to be sure never to get a blood transfusion from a black person. If there is no racism at the school you are investigating, that is wonderful. But look carefully. Naturally, Steiner did not always say nasty things. He often spoke about love and kindness. Yet he also made the sort of statements I’ve just quoted, and they lie close to the core of his teachings about human evolution.
So yeah... I guess, just like religion is for me, educational theory and philosophy with be a pick and choose system of trial and error.
On to other philosophies!
There are a lot of things I like about the Waldorf philosophy, and the fact that it does have a spiritual element to it certainly does not put me off. BUT the more I read about Steiner (father of biodynamic gardening), the less enamoured with him I become. And the more I read about the specifics of institutionalized Waldorf and Steiner schools, the less enthusiastic I become.
Additionally, I realized, through reading a couple of critical articles and sites on him that he lived right around the heyday of the Nazis and, as a result, his philosophy is riddled with white supremacist putrescence.
Consider this section of the Waldorf Watch website:
Racism
This is a terribly sensitive subject, and I certainly hope that Waldorf schools today are not racist. But Steiner himself was a racist. For instance, he said that races should stay put - blacks should stay in Africa, Asians should stay in Asia, and so forth. “On the one side we find the black races, which is earthly at most. If it moves to the West, it becomes [or may become] extinct. We also have the yellow race, which is in the middle between earth and the cosmos [the heavens]. If it moves to the East, it becomes brown, attaches itself too much to the cosmos, and becomes extinct. The white race is the future, the race that is creating spirit.” [47] Whites, in other words, are leading mankind’s spiritual evolution - they are superior - but Steiner said that even whites should normally stay in their allotted geographical locations.
Steiner revealed his racism many times, in many ways. Here are more examples. In the first, Steiner says that some races have evolved more than others, and that lowly races come from “abnormal” humans. “[I]t was the normal human beings that were ... the most capable of evolving. [Abnormal] peoples whose ego impulse [sense of individual identity]was developed too strongly gradually wandered to the West [from Atlantis] and became ... the Red Indians of America. [Likewise, the abnormal] people whose ego-feeling was too little developed migrated to the East, and became the subsequent Negro population of Africa ... [T]hey deposited too many carbonic constituents in their skin and became black. This is why the Negroes are black. Thus both east of Atlantis in the black population and west of Atlantis in the red population we find survivors of the kind of people who had not developed their ego-feeling in a normal way. The human beings who had developed normally lent themselves best to progress.” [48] By “ego impulse” or “ego feeling,” Steiner meant the sense of personal selfhood, which must be balanced with the sense of one’s membership in the cosmic community. The descendants of the normal humans, the ones who could continue evolving properly, are the white race, according to Steiner.
Being white has many advantages, Steiner said. For example: “Blond hair actually bestows intelligence. In the case of fair people, less nourishment is driven into the eyes and hair; it remains instead in the brain and endows it with intelligence. Brown- and dark-haired people drive the substances into their eyes and hair that the fair people retain in their brains.” [49] But, according to Steiner, not all white people are spiritually advanced. “The Jews have a great gift for materialism, but little for recognition of the spiritual world.”[50] Still, Steiner said, being white is better than the alternatives. For example, according to Steiner, blacks are inherently immature: “[A] centre of cosmic influence [is] situated in the interior of Africa. At this centre are active all those terrestrial forces emanating from the soil which can influence man especially during his early childhood ... The black or Negro race is substantially determined by these childhood characteristics.” [51]
At my Waldorf school, racism cropped up in the classroom occasionally. One of my teachers spoke to our class about higher and lower races, and another told us (we were all white) to be sure never to get a blood transfusion from a black person. If there is no racism at the school you are investigating, that is wonderful. But look carefully. Naturally, Steiner did not always say nasty things. He often spoke about love and kindness. Yet he also made the sort of statements I’ve just quoted, and they lie close to the core of his teachings about human evolution.
So yeah... I guess, just like religion is for me, educational theory and philosophy with be a pick and choose system of trial and error.
On to other philosophies!