Homer’s Odyssey: Education as Phaeacian (Hospitable) or as Laestrygonian (Hostile)

Abstract

Abstract The issue of hospitality in education has become prominent in the philosophy of education, with various articles and books being published recently. This is so for a number of reasons, such as the necessity to harbour and include immigrants and refugees in our schools and education systems, the rising levels of violence being experienced by individuals in school communities, and the importance of establishing dialogical relations between teacher and students and between students. In this article, we discuss the concept of hospitality by turning to Homer (8th Century BCE) and his classic work, The Odyssey (Ὀδύσσεια), connecting it to the issue of hospitality in education. The paper is divided into two sections. In the first, we refer to two passages in Homer’s The Odyssey that are very pertinent to the issue of the issue at hand; the Phaeacian passage, which stands for a prime example of hospitality, and the Laestrygonian case, a seminal example of non-hospitality, of hostility. In the second, we conduct a philosophical inquiry into hospitality and education.