Vacillating between Opposing Conceptions of Personhood: individualism and conformism in Turkish educational practices

Abstract

Based on one and a half years of participant observation at Bakis School, this article aims to explore two different sets of educational practices, one which seemingly promotes sameness, obedience and conformity, and the other difference, entrepreneurialism and individualism. By way of discussing the shifting cultural values, beliefs and lifestyles in Turkey as a result of post-1980 capitalist modernization, this article provides an account of the way in which larger macro forces impact the classroom values and educational practices in Bakis School. The ethnographic evidence indicates that teachers were far from fully comprehending the concept of the individual the school aims to promote, and therefore vacillated between opposing perceptions of personhood. From the point of view of comparative education research, this article argues that long-term participant observation provides us with intricate data, and clearly reveals the difficulties of putting educational reforms into practice in cases where the underlying philosophy is not fully comprehended, or maybe even desired by the recipient society.