Approaching higher education with Didaktik: university teaching for intellectual emancipation

Abstract

European higher education has been highly influenced by the Bologna-process, entailing coordination and standardisation from policy to teaching practices. This led to increased demands on university teachers. Courses in university pedagogy are required as part of competence development and have become decisive for employment. Constructive Alignment has become a popular model, being in line with Bologna-process ideals. Emerging is an instrumental view of higher education that risks excavating university pedagogy of its pedagogical dimensions and reducing the autonomy of the university teachers with focus on standardisation and emphasis on effective output. This paper proposes a Didaktik-approach to university pedagogy. We argue that Didaktik can help revive relational and emancipatory elements of higher education. By viewing the relationship between teachers and students as a gathering around common interests, we maintain that Didaktik emphasises teachers’ reflections regarding the subject, the students, and other educational dimensions.