I came across the following intellectual move in my reading:
“Every teacher, then, has pedagogical methods whether or not they call them by that name, or are even consciously aware of them.” And again, “Every teacher, even the beginner, has a philosophy of teaching.” Robert Leamnson, Thinking about Teaching and Learning, p. 3.
This is a familiar move. I’ve encountered it frequently among student assessment gurus:
“You are already doing what we are asking you for. We are just asking you to use our vocabulary to tell us what you are doing.”
“The move” I’m speaking of is this: “Everyone already has (or does) X.”
If we watch the move unfold, we see that it leads somewhere. It becomes “Y is really an X.” or “When you do Y you are really doing X” so, “let’s give X this name; let’s define X in this way; let’s agree to these standards for good and bad X’s; let’s assess our Y’s according to the standards governing Xs. Have your report on my desk in the morning.”
It is not that I think these moves are always wrong or even avoidable in all circumstances (though sometimes they are). That does not make them less “moves.” And vocabulary is not innocent; it launches you on a project for which you might have to hire a department of specialists. And those specialists will be very good at statistics, but may not be very good teacher themselves. They might have an excellent knowledge of philosophies of education without being excellent educators. And god save us from the reductionism that reduces good teaching to approved pedagogical methods or high scores on teaching evaluation forms.
So, applying the example to my concern, it is common to hear people say, “Everyone has a worldview.” Or “Christianity is a worldview.”
That seems innocent enough. “Worldview” is just a word. It is just vocabulary.
But it comes not only with a history, but a project. By subsuming Christianity as a species within the genus “worldview, ” we are committed to the work that “worldviews” do. And the road that opens before us is full of open questions: Is Christianity REALLY a worldview? Is it just a worldview? Are the standards by which we might judge worldviews the same standards by which to judge Christian faith? Could Christianity fail as a worldview but succeed by a different standard? Could it succeed as a worldview but fail to be itself? Will believing that Christianity is a worldview and working out the implied project make us better followers of Christ?
