Ivan Illich
Ivan Illich
Ivan Illichwas an Austrian philosopher, Roman Catholic priest, and "maverick social critic" of the institutions of contemporary Western culture and their effects on the provenance and practice of education, medicine, work, energy use, transportation, and economic development...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionSociologist
Date of Birth4 September 1926
CountryUnited States of America
meaningful men circles
Traditional society was more like a set of concentric circles of meaningful structures, while modern man must learn how to find meaning in many structures to which he is only marginally related. In the village, language and architecture and religion and work and family customs were consistent with one another, mutually explanatory and reinforcing. To grow into one implied a growth into others.
school simple two
School divides life into two segments, which are increasingly of comparable length. As much as anything else, schooling implies custodial care for persons who are declared undesirable elsewhere by the simple fact that a school has been built to serve them.
believe technology self
I believe that if something like a political life is to remain for us in this world of technology, then it begins with friendship. Therefore my task is to cultivate disciplined, self-denying, careful, tasteful friendships.
get-well health healing
Healthy people are those who live in healthy homes on a healthy diet; in an environment equally fit for birth, growth work, healing, and dying... Healthy people need no bureaucratic interference to mate, give birth, share the human condition and die.
people political narcissistic
Observations of the sickening effect of programmed environments show that people in them become indolent, impotent, narcissistic and apolitical. The political process breaks down, because people cease to be able to govern themselves; they demand to be managed.
leadership doe depends
Leadership does not depend on being right.
two envy addiction
In a consumer society there are inevitably two kinds of slaves: the prisoners of addiction and the prisoners of envy.
dark flames candle
Carry a candle in the dark, be a candle in the dark, know that you're a flame in the dark.
teacher school pyramids
Schools are designed on the assumption that there is a secret to everything in life; that the quality of life depends upon knowing that secret; that secrets can only be known in orderly successions; and that only teachers can properly reveal these secrets. An individual with a schooled mind conceives of the world as a pyramid of classified packages accessible only to those who carry the proper tags.
attitude health essentials
Health is not an objective condition which can be understood by the methods of natural science alone. It is rather a condition related to the mental attitude by which the individual has to value what is essential for his life.
diagnosis problem ethical
The depersonalizati on of diagnosis and therapy has changed malpractice from an ethical into a technical problem.
learning reality information
Learning from programmed information always hides reality behind a screen.
order people want
What kinds of things and people might learners want to be in contact with in order to learn?
education believe learning
School is the advertising agency which makes you believe that you need the society as it is.