each other. This is another aspect of creativity that education should promote. And to achievethis, the peer-matching networks have to

convey as little information about its users as possible – to prevent the communication of overly similar persons, the consequences of

which wouldagain be the stagnation of social order, the canceling out of differences. In short, monologue notdialogue.Here we have an interesting

convergence with Juri Lotman, whose ideas of culturaldevelopment could be of help here. He says that the “idea for a single ideal language to serve

asan optimal mechanism for the representation of reality is an illusion” (Lotman 2009: 2). A plurality of languages is needed to provide

a fairly adequate description of reality, and,significantly, these languages have to beuntranslatable, in order to convey a

multiplicity of viewpoints. But this does not mean that there is not a tendency to unification: a coherent modelof reality is always needed to operate

in the world. “The relationship between multiplicity andunity is a fundamental characteristic of culture” (ibid). The tension

between the two is thesource of cultural dynamic and development – the imposition of a single language of culturewould halt the development

and transformation of culture. This is also one of the main points of critique for Illich: school unifies the language used to describe and form

culture. His peer-matching networks are aimed at bringing creative dynamism back to social interaction. “Theright of free assembly has been

politically recognized and culturally accepted. We should nowunderstand that this right is curtailed by laws that make some

forms of assembly obligatory”(Illich 2004: 93).We have then reached the second aim of education mentioned at the beginning:unmed

iated communication and free association of people. They are underscored by a strong presence of creativity. For Illich, then,

education must be mostly a creative activity, a processthat enables people to achieve their potentialities individually and socially. Here we

haveanother pair of words that cannot be separated from each other, although efforts have of course been made. In fact, reading

Illich, we may infer that school is just that kind of institution thataims to separate individual and social by postulating a pre-

existing society into which studentshave to be integrated. As society would be a thing like any other object. But, following Latour (2005:

241-242), we could say that, “Society is not the whole ‘in which’ everything isembedded, but what ravels ‘through’

everything, calibrating connections and offering everyentity it reaches some possibility of commensurability.” Society would

then be a certain form of associations, active relations between elements; society is a consequence of these associationsand

not the starting point. Schooling, in Illich’s account makes the mistake of confusing thetwo, making Society a starting place for the

formation of Social subjects. 

If we take account of the unification-multiplicity tension that Lotman put at the center of any

cultural development, we might criticize Illich, considering that he focuses all his energy onthe plurality of ways of communication,

association and self-formation through education. Atthe same time he does not bring almost any attention to the problem of how

these freeassociations could work as models for describing the reality people live in in a comprehensibleand coherent way.

This is maybe also the main point why is it so difficult to accept hissuggestions for a deschooled society. We cannot imagine into what should

people be raised.Who would the deschooled individuals become? How do we form a stable society out of all thisfreedom? Illich leaves these

questions unanswered and says simply that we need a human beingthat is better attached, related to the surrounding reality and other individuals. Of

course, givingdefinite identities for people, definite forms of relations and types of communication is not hisobjective. He tries to rid us

of this kind of framing thought, focused on fixing identities andassigning positions. His main objective in “Deschooling Society” is to

open our eyes to other than institutionalized possibilities and choices in education and life in general.And so doing, also create a possibility of “a

new man”, that Illich calls “Epimethean”,who would have more direct relations with reality, who would love the earth and the

other  people (Illich 2004: 115-116). This point, the creation of an Epimethean – in opposition to the progressive-industrial Promethean – is

the third aim of education that I abstracted from Illich.While the previous two focused on individuals’ sociality, the third one, I feel, gathers

a generalattitude towards life and the world. This attitude can be calledecological , though Illich himself never uses this term. But he

does stress the need of love for fellow humans, earth, communitiesetc – and this kind of holistic consideration of everything

surrounding is very close to anecological model of thinking, that also opposes itself to the (industrial, scientific, social) progress

envisioned by enlightenment thinkers. For Illich, the latter kind of progress is simplyimpossible, it leads to a dead end, and so we need to figure out

new ways of living – which canonly be achieved by revolutionizing education and institutionalized society in general.In search of the aims of

education in Illich’s “Deschooling Society” I’ve abstracted threemain notions: 1) the free self-formation of

individuals; 2) unmediated communication andassociation of people; and 3) a more genuine and direct relation to the world/reality that peoplelive in.

2

 These would be the main three aims of education, all of which are greatly underpinned by a focus oncreativity

. The deschooling of society would open up a field of potentialities of 2

Writing down these aims here I feel a strong connection between Illich and John Dewey, as

paradoxical as itmay seem. Dewey’s democratic society had almost the same characteristics than the aims of education broughtout here. Themajor difference, of course, is that Dewey

believed that democracy would be achievable in existingsociety, using existing institutions, while for Illich, there are no existing democratic institutions: every institutionoperating in

his time was already totalitarian, anti-democratic. 

which humans were previously not aware; it would make possible creative relations

of individuals to self, others, and reality. Creative social and cultural action is, I think, what Illichseeks with his educational critique and

theory, what he means by a truly “popular culture”.BibliographyAlthusser, Louis 1971. Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses. – Althusser, Louis.

 Leninand Philosophy and Other Essays. New York: Monthly Review Press: 127-186.Foucault, Michel 1984. What is

Enlightenment? – Foucault, Michel.The Foucault Reader . New York: Pantheon Books: 32-50Illich, Ivan 2004.

 Deschooling Society. London, New York: Boyars.Latour, Bruno 2005. Reassembling the Social. An Introduction to

Actor-Network-Theory. New York: Oxford University Press.Lotman, Juri 2009.Culture and Explosion

. Berlin; New York: Mouton de Gruyter