Educational History: Ivan Illich and Deinstitutionalisation

After being introduced to Ivan Illich as an educational thinker by two retired friends who were teachers, it raised so many questions in life that I have decided to create a series of digests on his famous book Deschooling Society.  He is a thinker who demands being read, so if you have not encountered his thought I recommend you make a point to read his work firsthand and then prompt you to go and explore it yourself.  This is the very spirit of Ivan Illich.
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Wanted Languages: Dead or Alive

I was reading about the demise of the old Cromarty dialect in Scotland recently. Retired engineer Bobby Hogg died at age 92 taking with him the traditional living language of the north-east tip of the Black Isle, just north of Inverness. With this man passing our last opportunity to understand many things has also gone.
David Ross of the Herald in Scotland wrote ‘He could still close his eyes, see the boats heading out to sea and hear the unique speech pattern that set his people apart.’ What does this mean in broader terms ? What significance does a language or dialect hold ?
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The Origin of Ragged Music by Dan Zambas

Myself and Gary Boast approached Alex Dunedin who was running the Ragged project to create the foundations of the music arm of Ragged at the beginning of 2011. Working alongside musical colleagues and venue owners we aimed to create the philosophies of an all-inclusive project that would strike a chord within the music industry on every level; from the musician learning their instrument to the large organisations that publish and sell music to the consumers.
We began by asking ourselves what resources would we have wanted at the beginning of our musical journey and begin to make them accessible to individuals wanting to take their music to society. We recorded unsigned artists, live gigs and co-ordinated over thirty events alongside Alex Dunedin at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. This experience was invaluable to the Ragged project and helped validate the need for artistic creativity to be treated as an important aspect of social inclusion within society. Read more…