Study on improvements in general education of culture and arts

Abstract

It is currently spotlighted to show the significance of empathy-related culture and artistic imagination in the general education of universities. The empathy means the ability of intellectually view the world of others and emotionally perceive it, particularly based on the vulnerability of subjects. The culture and artistic imagination might be educationally developed in order to heighten the subjectivity of individuals, and to consider their involvement with the world of others. It is necessary to highlight the ‘vulnerability-centered empathy’, in which the subjects perceive the world through the webs of interdependence, as a critical factor of the culture-artistic education. The culture and arts education should be performed while taking several considerations. First, it should be oriented on the democracy of citizens for their ‘spiritual elevation’ and ‘empathic enhancement’ with respect to others. Secondly, it should positively consider the ‘factor of plays’ in view of the general education. Thirdly, it should provide the ‘opening field of commons’ like a festival or celebration. Fourthly, it should make students deeply perceive the vulnerability of human beings themselves such that they should take a humble posture toward the others. The culture and arts general education must collectively serve students to cultivate the capacity of constructing narratives such that they find themselves being in the world with the morality of socio-communal sensibility. The Korean universities currently face a critical situation of crisis in the fields of humanity and culture arts under the atmosphere of worldwide neo-liberalism.