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| Al-Qarawayyin University |
Fatima’s concept and vision was adopted later in
Bologna, Italy where Catholic monks established the University of Bologna in
1088. Eight years later (in 1096) Oxford University was founded in England.
Over the following 1,000 years universities spread
throughout the world with more than 25,000 now established.
Unsurprisingly, the pace of education has rapidly
expanded during this time.
So too has the pace of technology, a direct result of
accumulated knowledge. Similarly, the pace of the accumulation of knowledge has
expanded, so much so that we can claim that “pace” itself has expanded. With
that has come an accelerating pace of change – something that Alvin Toffler
wrote of and warned of in 19701. Toffler and his co-author (his
wife, Adelaide Farrell) defined Future Shock as a perception of ‘too
much change in too short a period of time.’ Toffler died in 2016, and most likely was
shocked by the acceleration of change that he had seen in the forty plus years
of his life following the publication of Future Shock.
In such a world how can universities respond?
That question can be answered in a variety of ways. We
could say that the vocational education (training) provided by many
universities is out-of-date within just a few years. For example, one of my
degrees conferred in the mid-1970s was in a vocational discipline. Before the
turn of the century, technology had transformed that industry so much that my
learning was no longer relevant.
The question can also be answered by noting that the
research carried out in universities is instrumental in introducing new
technologies to the world. Ironically, this research makes the previous
knowledge obsolete, as my own example above alludes to.
We could also answer the question by noting that the
process of learning itself helps to equip students with knowledge and skills
that prepare them for the future.
Yet, the future is looking more and more bleak the
more knowledge we gain of the workings of the world: its ecosystems, the dynamics
of carbon, water, and other life cycles.
Humans have interfered in these ecosystems and cycles
without fully understanding how they work and interact. Our universities have abetted
this lack of knowledge through a number of means: e.g. by compartmentalising
(and silo-ing) aspects of knowledge, by viewing the world in mechanical terms
and analysing its parts, rather than the whole, by side-lining, and
invalidating indigenous knowledge, by valuing some subjects (such as science,
economics, commerce, medicine, law) over others (such as the arts and
humanities.)
Yet today, some university subjects are discovering
the knowledge of systems, inter-connections, and wholeness – e.g. ecology,
systems analysis, quantum physics, meteorology, anthropology.
Yet, even these subjects are still bound to one of
modernity’s projects – the accumulation of knowledge and learning.
We are still being future shocked, we are still
exploiting and polluting the earth, we are still battling each other, we are
still exterminating other-than-human species.
Perhaps it is time for a new University to be
established.
We need an University of Unlearning.
Such a university won’t be able to guide us to un-know
all the accumulated knowledge of centuries. Such a university won’t be able to
help us un-learn skills.
Such a university may, however, assist us in unlearning
the ways of being that we have learnt over many centuries.
I wonder what courses could be offered at a University
of Unlearning? What would the introductory course of Unlearning 101
consist of?
Do you, dear reader, have any thoughts?
Notes:
1. Alvin Toffler, Future Shock, Random House, New
York, 1970
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