“Knowledge is not intelligence.” Heraclitus
The separation and/or difference between
teacher and student have been discussed by philosophers aplenty.
Rancière discusses intelligence equality, the
distribution of the sensible, and social emancipation. He pursues an
interrelation between art and the proletariat and effectively attracts the distinction
between knowledge and intelligence while abolishing the hierarchy between
teacher and student. For Rancière intelligence is equal for all. People can
equally gain intelligence by defining and recognizing signs. Everyone has the
same potential of gaining intelligence. The schoolmaster is ignorant if he
believes inequality of intelligence to be inherent.
Kierkegaard makes a similar argument in
describing the essence of the teacher as a learner. “To be a teacher does not mean simply to affirm that such a thing is so,
or to deliver a lecture, etc. No, to be a teacher in the right sense is
to be a learner.” The Point of View for My Work as an Author (1848).
In addition, Heraclitus wrote in 5th
century BC “Let us therefore notice that understanding is common to all
men. Understanding is common to
all, yet each man acts as if his intelligence were private and all his own.”
This quote may be easily compared to Rancière’s 2009 quote “He does not teach
his pupils his knowledge, but orders
them to venture into the forest of things and signs, to say what they have seen
and what they think of what they have seen, to verify it and have it verified.”
There seems to be a similar philosophy amongst
Ancient Greece to 19th Century Denmark to Modern-day France, where
intelligence is on an equal playing field and all are capable of accessing it. Godard, however, challenges this idea. As
a Maoist, Godard is in favor of the proletariat. However his art attracts the
educated because his references are literary as well as philosophical and this
can isolate the worker. A differentiation exists in the way these philosophers
describe intelligence and Godard’s exclusivity. Intelligence may be equal, yet Godard’s
oeuvre contests this philosophy.
-ar
There is some confusion here over Ranciere's argument. You write, "The schoolmaster is ignorant if he believes inequality of intelligence to be inherent," but Ranciere affirms (rather than critiques) what he calls the ignorant schoolmaster. The ignorant schoolmaster is one who doesn't profess to know more than the pupil. He is thus the goal. But, at the same time, to profess equality doesn't mean that one (the schoolmaster) should feign ignorance. Godard reads poetry; he reads philosophy. And he shares these readings with his viewer. He wishes to re-integrate "art" into everyday life, everyday culture, and he believes this art can be experienced by one and all. This is the reverse of elitism.
ReplyDeleteSam