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Imagination and Educationlocked

Imagination and Educationlocked

  • Moira von WrightMoira von WrightÅbo Akademi University

Summary

The concept of imagination, with its potential to contribute to education, is attracting increasing interest as humanity faces major challenges such as migration and climate change. Imagination is expected to enlarge the mentality of human beings and help to find new solutions to global problems. However, educational thinkers have different understandings of what imagination and imaginative thought can actually contribute to.

Imagination is the mental ability to visualize what may lie beyond the immediate situation and to “see” things that are not present. It is a central element of meaning creation in education—in the relationship between mental pictures and reality, between humans and the outside world, and between the past and the future. Imagination is a way of seeing, a happening in the here and now. No single specific definition of imagination exists, and this term is used in a variety of ways. Because it is so evasive, the idea of imagination has been contested and questioned, so its meaning depends on the theory and context with which it is associated. Many educational theories simply neglect the concept of imagination, or limit its meaning to common fantasizing and playfulness, whereas others give imagination a central role in the processes of understanding and learning. The socially and politically emancipating dimension of imagination has been emphasized, as has its moral significance and relation to self-formation and education. Some thinkers argue that education should not be satisfied with developing students’ ability to think imaginatively, create a narrative and develop social imagination; rather, it needs to intentionally raise young people to “live imaginatively”—that is, to live a rich life with an open mind, being ready to think in new ways and change their habits when former ways of thinking prove untenable for moral and ethical reasons. Despite these differences of opinion, the value of imagination in education is undeniable. Yet questions remain: How does “bad fantasy” differ from “good imagination,” and what are the educational consequences of such a distinction? How can imagination be a common ground in education, and how can it be a liminal space or topos for the different perspectives of children and adults in that area? How can imagination be part of a greater social responsibility and a way of life?

Subjects

  • Education, Change, and Development
  • Educational Purposes and Ideals
  • Educational Theories and Philosophies

The Scope of Imagination

Imagination is the ability to see things that are not obviously there, at hand. It is the capacity to reflect upon things that are not present to the senses; the ability to imagine that things could be different, and to see possibilities from a multitude of perspectives. Imagination is thus a tool that can be used to challenge habitual ways of thinking about the future, and which is neither fixed nor predetermined (Moon et al., 2013, p. 232). In this way, imagination is connected to our ethical concerns; this is also a reason why imagination has a normatively important relation to education. It is also a central activity in free play and in the performative arts. Thus the concept of imagination can signify many different things with relevance to this field. Throught creative and imaginative activities human beings can create visions, stories, objects of art, texts, and the like, but imagination can also simply be understood as a necessary part of the process where one takes the perspective of the other.

Imagination appears as a concept in the thought of many 20th-century educational thinkers and philosophers in the Anglo-Saxon tradition, including John Dewey (1980), Iris Murdoch (2001, 2003), Maxine Greene (1988, 1995), and Martha Nussbaum (1998), all of whom acknowledge the creative, educative and cultivating potential of imagination, albeit in different ways. These thinkers share an interest in making the world a better place, and trust that education is an important part of that democratic project. Murdoch and Nussbaum emphasize the personal transformation of the individual human being, while Greene’s interest in imagination centers on freedom and reciprocity in social relations and in the public sphere. Imagination is understood as an integral part of teaching and learning, ranging from those activities where the teacher orchestrates a situation of imagining together, to the ability of each learner to make present in their thoughts things that are not there, at hand.

Imagination releases creativity and enlarges one’s thinking and judgmental ability. Yet not all imagination is necessarily good; there can be destructive forms of imagination. Literary critic and poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772–1834) proposed a distinction between imagination and fancy that has inspired many thinkers, because it enables us to distinguish between the imagination that draws us to reality and the world, and the fancy that keeps us locked within our own fantasies.

Murdoch (2003) develops this morally significant distinction between good and altruistic imagination on the one hand, and egoistic imagination on the other. She talks about the enduring traces of imagination—the moral and formative transformation that imagination can cause in the human person. Murdoch distinguishes between fantasy, which contributes to an escape from real life, and imagination, which contributes to positive self-development and to problem solving that extends beyond one’s own abilities. For Murdoch, imagination is an ability that affects all of our cognition and perception, and that is a continually important part of our lives, especially when it comes to shaping and changing how we act as humans and as selves. Thereby Murdoch establishes a connection between education and imagination, where the adult world has a duty to support the development of a sound imagination in children, and offer young people experiences—for instance, literary experiences—that strengthen their imagination and ability to make judgments. In addition, each human individual has a responsibility to use their imagination in a socially thoughtful way.

On the same note, Nussbaum (1998) develops the concept of narrative imagination and holds that narrative imagination ought to be cultivated through education and literature in order to foster democratic citizens. The concept of narrative imagination implies that reading fiction promotes compassion and the ability to understand and appreciate the perspective of others, including those with diverse experiences who live under different circumstances than we do.

Greene (1988, 1995) focuses on the social and common aspects of education and combines an idea of social imagination with thoughts about overall goals for education. She describes how imagination can strengthen education for citizenship, and underlines the social context of imagination and its importance in understanding education as part of human growth and the construction of our future society. Liberating or “releasing” social imagination in education is important because imagination is crucial for learning, and for developing, ethical judgment and social responsibility (Spector, 2017). In this way, social imagination is another normative conception that captures the central relation between imagination and education. In a continuation of this tradition of viewing imagination as a part of how humans think and act in the world, some educationists suggest that imagination should not only be seen as a faculty that is important for creativity, moral judgment, and understanding the perspective of others; rather, considering how imagination works differently at different ages, imagination can also be understood as a liminal space or topos where the perspectives of children and adults can merge (Von Wright, 2018).

In educational relations, narratives and imaginations can function as a common ground, and as a liminal space between different perspectives. For example, people can use their imagination to understand the perspectives of others. Another example is when an encounter takes place within the imagination or in an imaginative situation, allowing persons to meet within a mutual topos. This can happen between a child and an adult. Children’s imagination is often wrongly understood as just fantasizing and creatively making things up; however, among children there is a connection between imagination and reality. In educational relations, adults—that is, educators—need to take this connection into account. In the practice of education, communication and interaction tend to be more central than theoretical deliberations over the mind or the brain and possible faculties and abilities: the educational situation and the phenomena that are tied to it are part of the make-up of the educational reality in which imagination plays out. The distinction between “bad fantasy” and “good imagination” in education has consequences for what can be considered to be good educational practices, as distinct from “bad” ones. However, it is necessary to remember that “Certain acts of imagination have a distinct phenomenology, which others do not” (Honderich, 2005, p. 422).

The Distinction Between Fantasy and Imagination, and Its Moral Consequences

According to Dewey (1980, p. 267), although imagination is “a way of seeing and feeling,” it is not necessarily a good thing. To discern different qualities in imagination, Coleridge distinguished between disciplined storytelling and an undisciplined flight from reality (Scruton, 2005, p. 215). This distinction has been developed and is discussed in 20th- and early-21st-century in terms of fantasy and imagination: fantasy is guided directly by passions and feelings, while imagination shapes and renews our responses (Scruton, 2005, p. 2012ff).

Simone Weil (2002) suggests that emotional content and its variations have a bearing on imagination: not all imagination is necessarily good in its emotional content, or even benefits the imagining person. For example, there is a risk that imagination will be used to fill the emptiness of life, and the imagination that fills the emptiness is to its essence lying, Weil (2002) claims. Weil’s reflection has had an impact on Murdoch’s development of the link between imagination and goodness. Implicit in Murdoch’s thinking is the requirement that a “good” person is a conscious person who takes into account the outside world and the perspectives of others. Another point is that imagination may not flow freely from attention and will.

Murdoch takes a stand on and values the two different fantasy modes, and argues that there is a difference between “better” and “worse” fantasy and imagination. Fantasy embraces our egocentric interest in ourselves—interest that tends to be based on or derive from unrealistic depictions and wishful thinking. The problem with fantasy, it is argued, is that there is a risk of it locking up a person and hindering change and development in that person. Imagination, however, is expected to lead a person toward reality and contribute to a positive transformation of personality (Murdoch, 2003; Olsson, 2015). This distinction has a direct bearing on education and on the choice of form and content when reading literature, for example, because not all texts support the second mode of fantasizing—the “good imagination.” In “good imagination,” a person brings the outside world (i.e., the common reality) into the imagination, which can lead to new insights—often without that person being able to clearly account for the process. However, the value of imagination cannot be determined in advance. Murdoch (2001, p. 3) points out that the reason why the good cannot be determined is related to the fact that value ratings depend on the will and choices of individuals. Murdoch’s concept of good does not include an absolute good, but rather views the good as an ongoing moral process or direction.

Imagination is commonly described as a mental ability, capacity, or faculty. However, it is difficult to specify a definition; since it is an ability, imagination is tied to an emotional content and is situated within a context, although imagination itself can throw a person into other imaginative worlds. Imagination is related to, yet different from, cognition and perception. Imagination can contribute to cognition with a multiplicity of perspectives and an enlarged thinking that are relevant to our knowledge and judgments (Arendt, 1992, p. 241).

One cannot force another person to imagine a specific thing, although one may inspire images in another. Robert Scruton (2005) emphasizes this voluntary aspect of imagination, or imaginative perception (Scruton, 2005, p. 216), which is of particular interest to aesthetics and in regard to the perception of imaginary objects. A person must be voluntarily engaged in the imaginative process and must engage imagination in perception, such as when listening to music. Imagination plays a crucial role in understanding literature and subtle aspects of language such as metaphors.

Imagination tends to be thought of as essential to the production and enjoyment of aesthetic understanding and art. In the sense of seeing things otherwise than they are given, imagination can influence and even radically change one’s conceptions, images, and judgments, even in spheres of life that do not involve art or aesthetics.

As a technical term of philosophy, imagination has at least two senses: “first, the capacity to experience mental images, and second, the capacity to engage in creative thought” (Scruton, 2005, p. 212). A mental image is not the same as imagination, although such images may occur when we imagine things. An image contrasts with the real. It is sometimes thought that imagination obtains its power through the senses, and consists of elements that have been brought into the mind through the senses:

On account of thinking in the tradition of empiricism, imagination has been implicated through the role of imagery in all thought, the limits of imagination becoming the limits of thought. Berkeley notoriously argued for idealism by claiming that it was impossible to conceive of objects existing independently of us.

(Honderich, 2005, p. 422)

Mental imagery has become the focus of discussion, since it is suggested that imagery is involved and used in different kinds of reasoning and that it is an important part of learning and a kind of cognitive tool (Egan, 2005). There is a discussion in education, psychology, and philosophy over the nature of the imagery involved in learning and thinking, with a particular focus on whether there are distinct forms of representation within the brain. However, “it is not clear whether this new debate is continuous with the more traditional debates about imagery and imagination” (Honderich, 2005, p. 422).

The Power of Imagination

Imagination is neither perception nor cognition, but is related to both. However, educationists, philosophers, and psychologists have assigned to imagination a central role in explaining the mind’s ability to represent reality and to think. Immanuel Kant tried to understand how objective thought or experience was possible, and was drawn to imagination in his explanation. Dewey holds that “when old and familiar things are made new in experience, there is imagination” (Dewey, 1980, p. 267). He is, however, somewhat hesitant to use the term imagination, and questions the tendency to treat imagination “as a special and self-contained faculty, differing from others in possession of mysterious potencies.” Dewey argues that imagination is a way of seeing and feeling things as they compose an integral whole (Dewey, 1980, p. 267). Imagination happens, he argues, when the mind comes into contact with the world: “There is always some measure of adventure in the meeting of mind and universe, and this adventure is, in its measure, imagination” (Dewey, 1980, p. 267). In this way, Dewey emphasizes that imagination differs from intuition, which is when “old and new jump together, like sparks when the poles are adjusted” (Dewey, 1980, p. 266).

With the help of our imagination, we can transform ourselves as sensing and moral beings in the world. Meanwhile, Murdoch stresses that it is not possible to grow morally through fantasy, because in order for transformation to occur, imagination must include the reality of the outside world within its process; only then are we dealing with true imagination. The difference between fantasy and imagination thus becomes clear and, according to Murdoch, becomes particularly so in its consequence: with fantasy, one can escape reality, but with imagination, one deals with it fruitfully and allows oneself to be transformed by what one faces (Murdoch, 2003; Olsson, 2015, 2018).

The question of whether imagination involves one or several mental capacities is not yet fully settled. Imagination “always involves the summoning or creating of mental contents that are not otherwise given (as they are given, for example, in perception and judgment)” (Scruton, 2005, p. 214). Imagination does not strive for results or truths in the way that cognition—particularly scientific thinking—does. Although it is neither good nor bad in itself, its emotional content affects the imagining person in ways that can have helpful or harmful consequences. The point is how imagination is used: “We use our imagination not to escape from the world, but to participate in it,” Murdoch (2001, p. 88) says, thereby emphasizing the positive and creative power of imagination.

The power of imagination turns it into a strong element in education. At all levels, personally and socially—the learner’s ability to imagine, and the teacher’s ability to give space for and to release imagination, is important. In early childhood education, imagination and play tend to be closely related; imagination may keep the mutual play going on, without the children necessarily having the same fantasies and imaginations. However, they may agree upon made-up things and roles in their play. In higher education imagination is a capacity tied to framing new problems and solving them in innovative ways, and here imagination is part of thinking creatively without losing the relation to scientific knowledge.

The Concept of Imagination in Other Areas of Research

Imagination is and has been a contested and problematic conception in philosophy. The philosophical tradition tends to either overemphasize its possibilities or question it as unclear and mysterious. Imagination contrasts with both perception and cognition in the same way as it contrasts with the real. Imagination has been conceived and discussed in vastly different ways over the course of history. Hannah Arendt (1998) remarks that there is a difference between the role imagination played for the ancients and the role it plays in modern times: The ancients, she writes, “relied upon imagination and memory, the imagination of pains from which they were free or the memory of the past pleasures in situations of acute painfulness” (Arendt, 1998, p. 310), whereas “the moderns needed the calculus of pleasure or the puritan moral bookkeeping of merits and transgression to arrive at some illusory mathematical certainty of happiness or salvation” (Arendt, 1998, p. 310).

There are various different understandings of imagination, whose definitions are tied to the theoretical underpinnings. Thus, some perspectives are more likely to appreciate concepts such as imagination and mental imagery than others: “Those with leaning towards behaviourism often show most hostility to the idea of mental imagery” (Honderich, 2005, p. 422).

In education, however, imagination is commonly treated as a counterpart of creativity, and is valued for its appearances and results. Therefore, it tends to be easier in education to encircle this concept and to either accept or dismiss it. The problems that are raised around imagination in an educational context tend to be tied to the normative expectations of education, which revolve around two extremes: creativity and compliance. A question for education, then, is: to what extent should it embrace and foster originality, and to what extent should it train systematic thinking and establish a ground for technical and scientifically based work? Imagination plays into both creativity and compliance—but there is a risk that the imagination of a person, in particular of a child, could flow into fantasies and lose its connection to reality, and so to the content and purposes of education.

Education: Soil For Imagination to Grow In

Given that education is understood as the way in which a society reconstructs and renews itself, it is possible to discuss what role imagination might play in education. Education strives for clarity, true knowledge, the formation and cultivation of rational individual human beings, and—at best—for human flourishing. Where is the space for imagination?

This topic can be considered from several different angles. First, there is the overall understanding of what the mental capacity engendered by imagination might add to education, and what role imagination might play in the process of teaching and learning. Second, once a definition of imagination has been established, this form of imagination can be expected to influence and support self-formation and learning in different ways (e.g., by promoting motivation, curiosity, and creativity). What is needed for imagination to serve social and common purposes, rather than just serving the individual? A “good” imagination is commonly defined as something that connects us to reality and creates new emotions within us toward the world. This definition brings up possible negative, unwanted, or questioned aspects of imagination: for example, what sort of imagination might be harmful—either morally or socially?

What is the connection between education and imagination? What is the role of education in cultivation and training imagination? Does education benefit from imagination? Is the learner who uses imagination better off? Is education a ground for the cultivation or training of imagination, or is imagination a problem in education?

In order to see how imagination plays into education, it is appropriate to define what education might mean. Both concepts, imagination and education, are vast and thus have several meanings. They also designate different types of phenomena. Whereas imagination stands for an ability that is possessed by human individuals, education stands for a larger social phenomenon that concerns both individuals and society. Education can be understood from an institutional aspect, from a scientific aspect, from an aspect of human growth, from an aspect of the individual learner, and from an ethical and moral aspect—just to mention a few of the different angles from which education can be viewed.

Education designates an overall social phenomenon. Every human being has some kind of education, or some experience of it, and thus also has a relation to it. Education can be generally defined as the way in which the reconstruction and renewal of society is organized. However, within this conception, education can describe several different things, such as subject content and curriculum, the practice of teaching and learning, or the very formation and cultivation of human selves; and from the viewpoint of the individual, education is also about deepening one’s knowledge and understanding, and getting to know new areas and perspectives. Depending on how one views education, its relational and normative aspects may come to the forefront. Depending on how one views educational relations and the learning human subject, abilities such as imagination can be seen as more or less important.

In education, within the praxis of educational relations and educational activities, imagination can play an important part in the process of learning by enabling the student to see things from different perspectives and consider possibilities that may not be obvious. However, imagination is not cognition, and the process of imagination does not search for truth but for plurality. Imagination can be used for “dark purposes, as well” (Spector, 2017, p. 40). Therefore, educationists like Greene speak of the need to “release” imagination and cultivate it into social imagination, so that the young can imagine worlds that may not be present yet, but are in the making. Here, imagination is expected to open a path for critical thinking and ethical reflection.

The ability to imagine must be sophisticated in order for it to fully contribute to thinking, willing, judging, and learning. If not used, imagination will become inactive, and will ultimately fade away. However, when properly used, the different forms of imagination can contribute to creativity, curiosity, problem solving, social responsibility, and human growth in unexpected ways.

Connections Between Education and Imagination

Education aims for a (better) future. Cognition and knowledge acquisition in schools aim for factual knowledge, informed judgments, and scientific thinking, in addition to creativity, in some cases. Modern education—that is, education in our time—tends to rely more upon objective documentation than upon memory or imagination, and this is also true for a wider understanding of human action.

Imagination does not aim at truth, as belief aims at truth. On the contrary, it aims, in a sense, to avoid truth. And yet it is governed by the attempt to understand its own creations and to bring them into fruitful relation with the world that is.

(Scruton, 2005, p. 215)

The potentially fruitful connection between imagination and education is not always considered, nor are the power of images in teaching and learning much discussed.

Images play an important part in language development, whereby children gradually learn to evoke mental images of what is not present. Egan (1997, p. 61) emphasizes that the capacity to think and feel in terms of mental images has consequences for early education, and suggests that the educator should be more consistently conscious of the vivid images that are part of every topic and, so to speak, guide the imagery. For example, when people invent a happening, their image and thoughts “go beyond what is given to [them] and lie within the province of [their] will” (Scruton, 2005, p. 214). The connection between imagination and the will entails that “the will prepares the ground on which action can take place” (Arendt, 1978, p. 101). The task of the educator is thus manifold; she or he must ensure that space is given for imagination and deliberation, and must provide soil for such experiences. Like other human capacities, imagination must be used and trained; otherwise, it may simply slip away, as a forgotten ability.

Narrative Imagination and Taking the Perspective of Others

Narrative not only weaves consensus into the social world, but also largely creates and recreates our sense of self, in dialogue with the outside world (Taylor, 1997). As Julia Kristeva (2001) writes, life is a story, and to live is to live one’s story; furthermore, life and thinking belong together and are on the same plane. The important thing in this context is that thinking must be accompanied by life; otherwise, thinking will be egocentric and will only happen for its own sake.

Hardly anyone would claim that a narrative or story is an exact representation of a particular sequence of events. In fact, a narrative inherently includes value ratings and a variety of perspectives. A fairy tale is not just any story; it is typically a story that it is explicitly not true, although it can be an allegory. A fairy tale can be close to reality and can awaken strong feelings and sensations in the reader or listener. Nussbaum (1998) argues that becoming an educated citizen and being an intelligent reader of another person’s story ought to be goals for education. Educational practices such as studying philosophy and literature, and undergoing Socratic self-examination, are thus considered to be important means of developing the imaginative ability. Nussbaum holds that cultivating a narrative imagination will enable people to understand the situations of others and see what it is like to be in other people’s shoes; ultimately, narrative imagination has a democratic potential.

In education—and particularly in instruction—teachers deal with images as they try to motivate students and engage them in creative and productive thinking, for instance in role-playing games and drama exercises. However, such images need not be part of what we mean when we speak of imagination. For example, although a teacher may try to inspire students to imagine something, such as a red boat, this is not the same as the students using their own creative imagination. Scruton argues: “The work of imagination involves the construction (or, for a realist, the discovery) of possibilities—the purpose being, perhaps, to set the actual world in the context of these possibilities” (Scruton, 2005, p. 215).

Social Imagination

An educationally relevant aspect of imagination is the potential to challenge habitual ways of thinking. Such ways of thinking can be about the past or the future; however, imagination as a phenomenon always happens in the here and now. Furthermore, whether it is good or bad, imagination has a voluntary aspect and cannot be commanded. Hannah Arendt writes that the “constant question is whether your will is strong enough not merely to distract your attention from external things but to fasten your imagination on different impressions in pain and misfortune” (Arendt, 1978, p. 79). Therefore, imagination must be cultivated and the ability to imagine must be trained.

Greene develops the concept of social imagination, in which imagination is not directed to the self but to the social reality—and preferably to the reality of others or to the potential future. She emphasizes that developing social imagination can and will make the world a better place. Greene (1988) sees imagination as being the catalyst to creative thinking, and believes that creativity opens up new possibilities. She argues: “Imaginative openness can make people more sensitive to untapped possibilities in their own lives. Imagination has been conceived as the capacity to look at things as if they could be otherwise” (Greene, 1988, p. 1). According to this view, then, imagination is an important capacity for the educator. However, it is social imagination rather than just imagination that is the key aspect of education. Social imagination is about being imaginative in a social context. It is the capacity “to invent visions of what should be and what might be in our deficit society, on the streets where we live, in our schools” (Greene, 1995, p. 5 in Moon et al., 2013).

Imagination serves as the vehicle for opening up possibilities and to begin the separation from normative thinking. Therefore, art and the aesthetic experience are important vehicles for looking at things and imagining reality as if it were different.

(Greene, 1995, quoted in Moon et al., 2013, p. 232)

Social imagination is a central capacity for educators in their work, because possibilities must be considered over and over, and new possibilities must be imagined when new situations arise.

Educational Relations and the Need for Reality

Imagination is a counterpole rather than a complement to the efficiency and generalizations of educational formalism. Imagination should be taken seriously as a force that can positively change people and that can serve as a common ground where adults and children can meet. The notion of the child and childhood is contested in education, and the ways in which children are understood affect how the educational relation between adults and children is understood.

Murdoch’s (2001, 2003) thoughts on the difference between fantasy and imagination contribute to an understanding of the role of imagination in developing the meaning of children’s perspectives. Through the connection between imagination and reality, as well as the perception of “good” as a direction rather than as a given content, Murdoch shows how significant imagination is for a sound and moral development, but also how unpredictable and demanding it can be.

If the work of imagination brings a person too far from reality it brings the student into fantasy—and perhaps even further, into merely making up nonexistent and wholly unrealistic things. The line between imagination and fantasy is indistinct.

Children’s Perspectives

Imagination is an ability to consider and visualize what is not present to the senses; it is also a force that helps shape our lives and gives them meaning in the moment. However, imagination as a phenomenon is elusive: it is situational and playful, and its effects can be for better or worse. It can be a driver for action; however, as it is unpredictable, imagination is also unreliable. One cannot trust imagination alone. Is it reasonable to give imagination a central place in teaching and learning? To what extent should the educator and adult respect children’s perspectives if they are embedded in imaginative creativity?

The adult world has a craze for predictability, efficiency, and simplicity, but young people do not always have the same longing. When problems arise in school, the adult world often looks to the ability of science to define the problem. Diagnostics are expected to provide solutions that traditional pedagogy is no longer perceived as being able to deliver. An understanding of what a child’s perspective implies cannot be based on efficiency requirements, because the pace of efficiency is rapid, and efficiency does not permit interruptions or deviations. An approach that does not acknowledge the ethical aspects of a daily, lived reality risks relying on diagnostics and calculations, and ruling out the variety of perspectives that imagination can offer. There is a risk that diagnostics will have a crippling impact on the imagination, as some even suggest them as a more truthful replacement for that capacity that can actually “spare” children from wild and unrealistic fantasizing. However well meant, “sparing” children from their imagination can hardly make up for the loss of benefits that experiencing the power of imagination can bring.

With the help of a richer understanding of imagination, the adult world might be able to develop a child’s perspective, without a formal approach to it, and without expecting the same realistic insight and responsibility as from an older person. What does an imaginary and realistic “child’s perspective” require? When does the adult world risk falling back into adults’ own fantasies, including a fantasy about children in which children’s perspectives are unnecessary for anything but to confirm the presumed perceptions of adults?

Taking on a child’s perspective means taking children seriously. It requires both imagination and ability for an adult to consciously take on another person’s perspective. Taking on a child’s perspective does not mean that an adult is abdicating from his or her adult responsibilities; rather, it involves listening with love and respect and taking the actual child’s point of view into account at a given moment. Arendt (1993, p. 241) describes this ability to expand one’s thinking in a way that provides a basis for the power of judgment as “being and thinking in my own identity where actually I am not.” That moment requires imagination and the ability to imagine what is not available. An adult who has lost her creativity and limited her imagination to an egocentric perspective will obviously find it difficult to put herself in another person’s situation and gain the ability to judge that is required by moral responsibility.

For children, imagination is an important part of free play. In the eyes of adults, children’s imagination can sometimes seem foolish, demanding, or even frightening. Younger children occupy a seemingly sliding scale between playfully imagining things and experiencing them realistically. In a real life situation, boundaries can be exceeded in ways that, for example, a game does not allow. The imagination can bring great joy, but it can also give rise to fear and anxiety and can arouse emotions that may be difficult to manage, for both children and adults. Children can perceive fantasy experiences as utterly true. It is therefore not uncommon for clashes to occur between children’s imaginations and the common world’s careful pursuit of realistic perceptions. Such clashes require both imagination and judgment from adults.

A situation like this was described by an acquaintance of the author, who told of an incident that occurred while traveling on a tram with his daughter. At a stop, the daughter suddenly pulled at her father’s arm. “Come on, Dad! We have to leave!” she shouted furiously. It turned out that her invisible friend had gotten off the tram at that stop. The father briefly pondered, and then suggested that they get off at the next stop and go back. Then they would be likely to meet the invisible friend, who would surely understand that they would come back because they had not had time to get off at the “right” stop. Indeed, after a moment’s walk back from the next stop, where they got off, they met the invisible friend and were able to continue their journey, all three. The father said that he was relieved but was a bit worried that his daughter lacked a sense of reality and was too occupied with fantasizing (Von Wright, 2018).

This particular story has a happy ending. However, the anecdote suggests a contrast between the young girl’s creative imagination and the father’s longing for predictability and plausibility. The father entered the liminal space and managed to successfully resolve the potential crisis. The girl showed a remarkable ability to create not only inner images and imaginary characters, but an entire world. Children can use such imaginary worlds to give personal meaning and richness to games, without necessarily owning the logic, reality anchoring, and texture that adults are expected to muster—and perhaps hope that children will also gain.

Reality, Risks and Possibilities

Children’s sometimes very creative and surprising imaginations can leave adults uncertain of the actual situation. One might wonder, who had the true understanding, the daughter or the father—or were both right in some sense? For the father, the daughter’s fantasizing was a real fact, although he may have thought that the content of her imagination (the invisible friend who got off the tram) was entirely made up.

Creative imagination is not a matter of illusion or false beliefs:

. . . the voluntary nature of imaginative acts gives a clue to creative imagination. For, whether or not it involves imagery, imagination always involves the summoning or creating of mental contents which are not otherwise given (as they are given, for example in perception and judgment).

(Scruton, 2005, pp. 213–214)

An educator will have to deal with students’ multiplicity of mental images. An educator will also have to anchor the creative processes of imagination in education, in reality, and in the common social world. She or he will also have to invite students to turn their attention towards the world; to nurture their curiosity; and to give them experiences with which they can couple their imagination.

Imagination is central to judgment and perspective, so the imagination always represents an important aspect of morality. In adults, imagination can manifest itself in creative power and narrative ability, but it often tends to be obscured by a rational and instrumental mindset. Memory pictures can also lie like wet blankets over the imagination, so that “the magic disappears.” In children, however, imagination often takes on different expressions than in adults. Children and young people generally exhibit an imaginative ability that far exceeds what an adult can produce, and here the creative imagination works as a strength because personal experience and values have not yet taken over judgments.

Weil (2002) has stated that the fantasy that fills the emptiness of one’s being is lying. What happens to the transformative ability of imagination if we never dare to see reality when it does not fit, or when it gives us discomfort? The potential of a narrative lies in its entirety. If we cut a narrative apart, we may relieve our pain, but we simultaneously renounce the possibility of moral development and transformation, and the opportunity to contribute something good. To change direction or break patterns, a solution-oriented imaginative sensitivity is needed that does not allow itself to be tied up by norms and beliefs. In the early 21st centrury, therefore, it is justifiable not only to talk about imagination, but to discuss a radical form of fantasy that includes courage and the ability to realize that the world can and must change. Furthermore, we need the ability to imagine different kinds of future, and to “bring back these thoughtful futures so that they can influence the present, [and] inspire action and new forms of solidarity today” (Haiven & Khasnabish, 2014, p. 3). Imagination ought to be part of a greater social responsibility; a way to live.

Living Imaginatively

Innovation is required to address major challenges, but such innovations must keep pace with the reality of today. The importance of a radical imagination is all the more important in the face of the pressing issues of growing nationalism and climate change. These big issues require both innovation and imagination.

In his book titled “Not to Escape the World but to Join It”: Responding to Climate Change with Imagination Not Fantasy, Andrew Davison (2017) writes of the power of imagination. Davison argues that although imagination tends to be thought of as part of the creative arts, he wants to turn things around and view it as an integral part of all meaning-making and decision-making. Referring to Coleridge, Davison argues that every sense of mind, every moment of understanding, and every incipient act is a creative issue. Davison also leans on Murdoch’s reasoning about fantasy versus imagination. Fantasy can serve as a resource for those who want to deny climate change, Davison argues, while imagination can help us evaluate actions and behavioral patterns in relation to a larger whole, thus supporting a change for the better in addressing this issue.

To live imaginatively is fulfilling and that is precisely what the challenges of climate change require.

(Davison, 2017, p. 1)

Living imaginatively means living a rich life with an open mind, while being ready to think new thoughts and change one’s habits when they prove untenable for moral and ethical reasons. Anna-Lova Olsson sees connections between imagination and the process of “unselfing” in the work of Murdoch: “unselfing is dependent on humility, love, attention and imagination, and these qualities are cultivated in the very process of experiencing them” (Olsson, 2018, p. 168). Every individual must take personal responsibility for moral transformation. The task of higher education, therefore, is not so much to transform students as it is to encourage curiosity and support self-transformation. This perspective implies that students require access to a space in which imagination can be encouraged, and where attention can be directed to new and unexpected paths:

. . . a space in which unselfing can be made possible. In institutionalized higher education this means that something must be sacrificed. The result of a process of learning then becomes difficult to predict, and control and regulation must to some extent give way to imagination, challenge and resistance.

(Olsson, 2018, p. 174)

What if we educators, politicians, parents, and researchers could bring the imagination as a force into the conversation about the future and school? What if imagination could be a place that contains both children’s perspectives and adults’ responsibilities, while leaving space for playfulness and unexpected innovation? A (good) imagination transcends what has been given; when we allow our imagination to be tied to reality, it tells us who we can be. For all of us, both children and adults, fantasizing and living imaginatively can be a way of responding to the world and engaging in it.

Further Reading

  • Arendt, H. (1992). Imagination. Seminar given at New School for Social Research, fall 1970. In H. Arendt (Ed.), Lectures on Kant’s political philosophy: Edited and with an interpretive essay by Ronald Beiner (pp. 79–85). Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press.
  • Egan, K. (2005). An imaginative approach to teaching. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
  • Greene, M. (1995). Releasing the imagination: Essay on education, the arts, and social change. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
  • Haiven, M., & Khasnabish, A. (2014). The radical imagination. London, UK: Zed Books.
  • Nussbaum, M. C. (1998). Cultivating humanity. A classical defence of reform in liberal education. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

References

  • Arendt, H. (1978). The life of the mind: Willing. San Diego, CA: Harcourt Brace & Co.
  • Arendt, H. (1992). Lectures on Kant’s political philosophy: Edited and with an interpretive essay by Ronald Beiner. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press.
  • Arendt, H. (1993). Between past and future. New York, NY: Penguin Books.
  • Arendt, H. (1998). The human condition. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press.
  • Cooper, D. (Ed.). (1995). A companion to aesthetics. London, UK: Blackwell Publishing.
  • Davison, A. (2017). “Not to escape the world but to join it”: Responding to climate change with imagination not fantasy. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society A, 375(20195), 11.01.
  • Dewey, J. (1980). Art as experience. New York, NY: Perigee Books.
  • Egan, K. (1997). The educated mind: How cognitive tools shape our understanding. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
  • Egan, K. (2005). An imaginative approach to teaching. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
  • Greene, M. (1988). The dialectic of freedom. New York, NY/London, UK: Teachers College Press.
  • Greene, M. (1995). Releasing the imagination: Essay on education, the arts, and social change. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
  • Haiven, M., & Khasnabish, A. (2014). The radical imagination. London, UK: Zed Books.
  • Honderich, T. (Ed.). (2005). The Oxford companion to philosophy (2nd ed.). Oxford, UK/New York, NY: Oxford University Press.
  • Kristeva, J. (2001). Hannah Arendt: Life is a narrative. Toronto, ON: Toronto University Press.
  • Moon, S., Shawn, R., Black, A., Black, J., Hwang, Y., Lynn, L., & Memoli, J. (2013). Releasing the social imagination: Art, the aesthetic experience, and citizenship education. Creative Education, 4(3), 223–233.
  • Murdoch, I. (2001). The sovereignty of good. London, UK: Routledge.
  • Murdoch, I. (2003). Metaphysics as a guide to morals. London, UK: Vintage Classics.
  • Nussbaum, M. C. (1998). Cultivating humanity. A classical defence of reform in liberal education. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
  • Olsson, A.-L. (2015). Strävan mot Unselfing. En pedagogisk studie av bildningstanken hos Iris Murdoch (Striving for Unselfing. An educational study of Bildung in the work of Iris Murdoch) (PhD dissertation). Örebro Studies in Education 50, Örebro, Sweden.
  • Olsson, A.-L. (2018). A moment of letting go: Iris Murdoch and the morally transformative process of unselfing. Journal of Philosophy of Education, 52(1), 163–177.
  • Scruton, R. (2005). Imagination. In D. Cooper (Ed.), A companion to aesthetics (pp. 212–217). Oxford, UK: Blackwell Publishing.
  • Scruton, R. (2009). The aesthetics of music. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.
  • Spector, H. (2017). Cultivating the ethical imagination in education: Perspectives from three public intellectuals. Review of Education, Pedagogy, and Cultural Studies, 39(1), 39–59.
  • Taylor, C. (1997). Philosophical arguments. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
  • Von Wright, M. (2018). Fantasins kraft (The power of imagination). In M. von Wright & T. Kvernbekk (Eds.), Barn og deres voksne (Children and their adults) (pp. 67–81). Oslo, Norway: Cappelen Damm Akademisk.
  • Weil, S. (2002). Gravity and grace. Routledge.
  • Weil, S. (2005). An anthology (Sian Miles, ed. and trans.). London, UK: Penguin Books.