Cultural education
Relevance of cultural education for social work/social pedagogy
Cultural education is relevant to the study of social work and social pedagogy for several reasons - both in terms of professional self-image and in many practical professional fields:
- Cultural education is an important element of individual development. This applies to children and young people as well as adults.
- Cultural education promotes both cultural participation and participation, i.e. the independent production of cultural artifacts or representations. Cultural participation empowers people to see themselves as cultural producers.
- Cultural education contributes to inclusion and social change. Cultural participation goes hand in hand with societal, economic, political and social participation. Cultural education therefore helps to reduce disadvantages. It also encourages people to engage with critical aspects of society such as discrimination, violence, racism and sexism.
- Cultural practices can be understood as media through which social workers/social pedagogues can communicate with their addressees. In this respect, cultural education provides a variety of media beyond the usual medium of everyday language that can take into account the diverse needs of the addressees.
- In their fields of work, social workers/social pedagogues encounter people who belong to certain scenes with a specific culture and participate in informal cultural education practices in these contexts. Therefore, the cultural education of social workers/social pedagogues promotes their communication opportunities with diverse addressees (groups).
- Social work/social pedagogy in the field of cultural education builds a bridge between the often separate formal education programs on the one hand and the cultural fields of action on the other.
Aim of the Cultural Education degree program for social workers/social pedagogues
Students acquire their own self-conception of cultural education in social work/social pedagogy. Expertise in certain cultural practices or their didactic teaching are not necessary goals; rather, a self-reflective understanding of cultural education as a human right and human resource, as socially relevant participation and contribution and as a medium for communication is essential.
Fields of action and disciplines of cultural education
Cultural education is based on an open concept of culture that takes diversity, intercultural and transcultural exchange and the dynamics of change into account. The traditional European art forms are just as much a part of it as informal practices of everyday culture, varieties of popular culture and the diversity of cultural practices in globalized societies. Within this range, the "Cultural Education" module is divided into six sub-areas to provide orientation
- Art
- music
- Theater and games
- Language and literature
- Media and mass media
- Physical education and culture
Academic teaching in cultural education requires the diverse perspectives of different subjects and Schools. Educational science
subjects, art or music education, various subject didactics, humanities, cultural or social sciences contribute to the diversity of the teaching approach with their respective focus on cultural fields of action or with their specific pedagogical or methodological approaches.
pedagogical or methodological approaches contribute to the diversity of the courses on offer.
Pedagogical dimensions of cultural education
Across practices and disciplines, three different pedagogical dimensions of cultural education can be distinguished, which in turn complement each other:
- Cultural education takes place through direct interaction with cultural artifacts and practices or with their producers and actors.
- Cultural education takes place through the acquisition of methods and skills for one's own cultural practice.
- Cultural education is achieved by studying and researching the history and theory of art and culture in their social contexts.
The courses offered in the module reflect the various sub-areas of culture as well as the various pedagogical dimensions - including all possible hybrid forms.
Examples of courses
- Elements of creative/artistic processes and art education
- Potentials of (cultural) media education in social work
- Seeing Going Intervening - city walks
- Performative strategies in public space
- Kneading, building, drawing - analog and digital animated film
- Show and tell - conceptual photography
- Basics of home recording
- Pop feminism
- Music and right-wing extremism
- Band workshop
- TheaterWorkshop
- New Babylon - model of a future cultural center
- Dealing with multilingualism: political communication
- Dance therapy elements
- Body/space/movement - Performative action in space/body as material
Selected basic texts
- Althans, Birgit / Kathrin Audehm (ed.) (2019): "Culture and Education - Cultural Education?", Journal of Cultural Studies, 2019 No. 2.
- Bockhorst, Hildegard / Vanessa-Isabelle Reinwand/ Wolfgang Zacharias (eds.) (2012): Handbook of Cultural Education. Munich: kopaed.
- "Focus: Cultural Education", Siegen:Sozial 2015 No. 1.
- UNESCO Guidelines for Arts Education (Road Map for Arts Education), 2006 (https://www.unesco.de/sites/default/files/2018-03/Kulturelle_Bildung_fuer_Alle.pdf).
- Weiß, Gabriele (ed.) (2017): Cultural education - visual culture. Intersections of education, architecture and art. Bielefeld: transcript.