El enfoque de ocupaciones (EO): Un capítulo olvidado en la filosofía educativa de John Dewey

Abstract

En este trabajo nos proponemos dos objetivos. Por un lado, delimitamos la interconexión conceptual entre el Enfoque de Ocupaciones (EO) y filosofía de la educación de Dewey, y por el otro, señalamos el alcance del EO en otras áreas de la filosofía deweyana. Dividimos el ensayo en cinco. En las secciones de 2 a 4, defendemos que la concepción de Dewey del Learning by Doing podría interpretarse como una idea vaga u obvia si no la analizamos mediante la noción de ocupaciones en términos de un contexto intersubjetivo de aprendizaje. En la sección 5, señalamos las implicaciones morales y políticas (junto con las epistemológicas) de las ocupaciones en la visión de Dewey. Finalmente extraemos conclusiones.In this paper, we have two aims. On the one hand, we delimit the conceptual interconnection between the Occupational Approach (oa) and experimentalism in John Dewey’s educational theory, and on the other, we point out the scope of oa in other areas of Deweyan philosophy, particularly in political and moral reflection. We divide the essay into five sections. After the introduction, in the three following sections, we defend that the conception of Learning by Doing could be interpreted as a vague and pretty obvious idea if we don’t analyze it with the notion of occupations as giving an intersubjective learning context. Then, we point out the morals and politics implications (along with the epistemological ones) of occupations in Dewey’s view. It is concluded that the oa contributes to adequately presenting Dewey’s experimentalism. On that account, it is argued that experimentalism provides an appropriate framework for accounting for the complexity of Dewey’s educational theory, particularly in its way of overcoming the division between technical and intellectual work and in its pedagogical proposal to articulate individual and community interests as a key to guiding democratic education.