Education for the Whole Person in a Modern East Asian Context - “Caring-About the World” as a Form of Self-Love

Oct 15, 2026

The essay explores “education for the whole person” as a way to recover the spirit of liberal education (Bildung) in a modern language. It diagnoses problems in contemporary Korean educational culture using Rousseau’s two forms of self-love, then argues that pursuing whole, wholehearted being can function as a healthy self-love mediated by love of the world or other persons. Although full feasibility may be out of reach today, the ideal guides teaching and learning through regulative practice.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryResearch & Report

FormatPDF

Pages16

Reading Time40 min

AccessFree to download

Abstract

Purpose

Design/Approach/Methods

Findings

Introduction

Contextualizing “education for the whole person”

Education for the Whole Person in a Modern East Asian Context: “Caring-About the World”as a Form of Self-Love Duck-Joo Kwak Seoul National University ECNU Review of Education 2020, Vol. 3(3) 488–503 ª The Author(s) 2020 Article reuse guidelines: [sagepub.com/journals-permissions](sagepub.com/journals-permissions)[ ](sagepub.com/journals-permissions)[DOI: 10.1177/2096531120936291](DOI: 10.1177/2096531120936291)[ ](DOI: 10.1177/2096531120936291)[journals.sagepub.com/home/roe](journals.sagepub.com/home/roe) Abstract Purpose: The essay attempts to explore a possibility to conceive the idea of education for the whole person as a way of recovering the old spirit of liberal education or Bildung, yet in a new language. Design/Approach/Methods: The essay largely consists of two parts. The first part touches upon and diagnoses the current problems with educational culture in modern Korea where youths suffer their divided soul, by employing Rousseau’s notions of two different kinds of selflove, amour-de-soi and amour-propre. The second part addresses how the pursuit of the whole person as being wholehearted can be a healthy form of self-love mediated by love of the world or other persons. Findings: The idea of education for the whole person may turn out to be an unfeasible ideal, in the modern condition. Yet, being a whole person as wholehearted can be taken as a regulative ideal that guides our practice in teaching and learning, stimulating us to make an effort to be so despite our knowledge that it is out of reach. Corresponding author: Duck-Joo Kwak, Department of Education, College of Education, Seoul National University, 1 Gwanak-ro, Gwanak-gu, Seoul 08826, Republic of Korea. Email: [djkwak@snu.ac.kr](djkwak@snu.ac.kr) Creative Commons Non Commercial CC BY-NC: This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 License ([https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/)) which permits non-commercial use, reproduction and distribution of the work without further permission provided the original work is attributed as specified on the SAGE and Open Access pages ([https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/open-access-at-sage](https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/open-access-at-sage)). Originality/Value: The essay shows how the idea of education for the whole person can be newly interpreted in modern East Asian context, which can resonate with current problems with education culture in the West as well as around the globe for the age of measurement. Keywords East Asian education, self-love, whole person education Date received: 15 February 2020; accepted: 27 May 2020 Introduction: Contextualizing the discourse on “education for the whole person” What seems educationally noteworthy about the way in which the essay “Educating Whole Human Beings” (2019) coauthored by Wortham and others frames and addresses the recently arising movements of “education for the whole person” in various veins is twofold. First, it describes a host of movements, which are responsive to the cultural malaise in contemporary Western society, as an educational project that attempts to “expand the goal of education to include individual flourishing beyond subject matter knowledge and vocational skills”(Wortham et al., 2019, p. 20) . As a matter of fact, going beyond the acquisition of subject matter knowledge and vocational skills was traditionally the very idea of education per se, whose spirit had well been formulated in the Western tradition of so-called “liberal education” or “education as self-formation (Bildung) .” But this idea has become unfamiliar in the culture of modern schooling where education is taken for granted purely as a means to economic and political utilities. So we may say that the essay above contextualizesthe project of“education for the whole person” in the light of a possible recovery of the old language of liberal or humani

FAQs

What is the purpose of the essay about education for the whole person?

It examines how the idea of educating the whole person can recover the spirit of liberal education (Bildung) using a new modern language.

How does the essay explain the educational culture problem in modern Korea?

It diagnoses youth experiences in contemporary Korea by using Rousseau’s two concepts of self-love: amour-de-soi and amour-propre.

Why is education for the whole person still valuable despite limited feasibility?

The essay argues it may be an unfeasible ideal in modern conditions, but wholehearted wholeness can serve as a regulative ideal that guides teaching and learning and motivates practice.

Oct 15, 2026

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