The masters’ thesis deals with teachers’ sensitivity to the development of national identity during literature classes in Slovenian gymnasiums. We understand gymnasium as an
environment for learning and education and as such we emphasise its importance for the integration into a specific cultural and national tradition, as well as for the introduction to other cultures and civilizations. Literature classes also play an important role in familiarizing with
Slovene culture, as students develop the cultural competence which permits them to develop a stronger sense of national identity. We are interested in how teachers develop national identity as part of the cultural competence; therefore we are analysing Slovene teachers’ sensitivity (or sensibility) for the development of national identity in gymnasium literature classes.
In this masters’ thesis, we present cultural and national identity in postmodern society and explain the importance of culture for national identity. In the context of literature classes, we understand national identity as a component of cultural competence, therefore we present the knowledge, skills and standpoints which it should encompass and, furthermore, how it could be operationalized.
We understand the documents which structure teachers’ practice in gymnasium as a recontextualization of national identity (as a part of cultural competence) on a macrolevel of teaching Slovene. Our main focus was the formation of the sensitivity of teachers for developing national identity. We present objective and subjective factors that influence teachers’ cultural capital and their disposition for the sensitivity for developing national identity during
literature classes.
We have conducted interviews with eight Slovene gymnasium teachers, gaining the insight into the recontextualization in practice, which is connected with the teacher’s cultural capital, habitus, and the dispositions which it creates. The purpose of this thesis is to show that the sensitivity to developing national identity is an important part of the cultural competence of teachers, and to discover which are the objective and subjective factors that impact teachers the most or the least.
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