Abstract

ARAUJO, Alberto Filipe  and  RIBEIRO, José Augusto. The Adventures of Pinocchio in the light of Educational Imaginary. Rev. Lusófona de Educação [online]. 2012, n.22, pp.39-53. ISSN 1645-7250.

This study intends to demonstrate that the subject of "initiation" as a passing rite in The Adventures of Pinocchio (1883) gains greater reflexive and semantic consistency in the light of the Bildungsroman (formation novel). Thus, Pinocchio's plot contributes both to the enrichment of the educational imaginary and to reflexive criticism on the role of schools that seem more interested in assembling stringed puppets obeying to the principle of "the same for everybody", than in promoting conditions for each person to discover his or her destiny in a context of desirable alterity. In this frame, it is the aim of this article to discuss the book "The Adventures of Pinocchio" in its Portuguese edition (As Aventuras de Pinóquio) having in mind the educational imaginary and the formation novel (Bildungsroman). The purpose is to stress the fact that this book devoted at children and youth provides the possibility of rethinking critically School as an object of analysis. The method used for this task is the hermeneutics of Paul Ricoeur. This proposal provides a fundamental and critical tool for understanding a text based on the trilogy of dialectics among explanation and comprehension towards the building of an interpretation. The interpretation aims at the development of a projected meaning, an outcome of a dialectical game between explanation and comprehension in which the symbolism insight plays an important role. The conclusion of this paper relies on the power of a literary story devoted to children and youth and on when the subject of a symbolic hermeneutic reading wishes to demystify and to think on a theme crucial for School: its mission of developing a subject that is autonomous, free and faithful to its faith (and not just to the mission of manufacturing a puppet). To accomplish the aim established, this paper includes three parts: in the first one the meaning of the initiation of Pinocchio in the frame of the "formation novel" (Bildungsroman) is made; in the second one the crucial role of philosophy of education and of figures of the educational imaginary is emphasized - in fact in what refers to initiation formation (bildung) and transformation (umbildung) are words preferred; in the third and last part of this article the role of School as a manufacture of puppets is discussed.

Keywords : initiation; Bildungsroman; educational imaginary; school.

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