Product Description
Praise for The American Community College “Since 1982, The American Community College by Cohen and Brawer has been the authoritative book on community colleges. Anyone who wants to understand these complex and dynamic institutions–how they are evolving, the contributions they make, the challenges they face, the students they serve, and the faculty and leaders who deliver the services and the curricula–will find The American Community College both ess… More >>

The American Community College

As we attempt to analyse dialogue as a human phenomenon, we discover something, which is the essence of dialogue itself: the word. But the word is more than just an instmment that makes dialogue possible; accordingly, we must seek its constructive elements. Within the word we find two dimensions, reflection and action, in such radical interaction thai if one is scarified – even in part – fhe other immediately suffers. There is no ime word that is not at the same time praxis. Thus, to speak a true word is to transform the world. (Freire, 1996) This article covers study circle history, tradition, research, practice, development and challenges for the future. As a method for ‘liberal adult education,” the study circle has existed for a hundred years. The study circle is a democratic and emancipatory method for leaming. *For the people, by the people’ became the study circle slogan influencing adult learning in Scandinavia for years. The article is based on a presentation at the Umguayan govcmmental conference on leaming for youngsters and adults in Montevideo, June 2006.

Study circles may – when they are functioning at their best – offer leaming without humiliation, leaming without guilt and bad consciousness, non-violent leaming, a humble way of leaming and leaming for self-confidence and selfesteem. But there was a long way to go to here. As a Nordic traditional method for liberal adult education, the study circle has been active for more than a hundred years. From the beginning, the Study Circle has been seen as a democratic and emancipatory method and arena for leaming, particularly among adults. Study circles were bom in New York in the 1870s. By their peak in 1915, 700,000 people were participating in 15,000 study circles in the USA. People close to the union, co-op, the temperance movement, and the Social Democratic Party carried the idea to Sweden to educate their followers. Even though study circles have more or less passed away in the USA, they have flourished ever since in Sweden and Scandinavia. Still nearly three million Swedes participate in more than 300,000 study circles annually, partly funded and subsidised (but not controlled) by the public sector and the govemment. Scandinavian communities have even convened study circles to work through major issues facing their local areas and towns, with study circle participants turning into activists who then have a significant impact on events. In the last ten years, there has been a renewed and blooming interest in study circles in the USA also.’ The study circle followed the ‘top-to-botfom approach’ for enlightenment developed in the eighteenth century, expressed, for example, through the University Extension movements in France, England and Scandinavia,- to become a ‘bot1om-up’ method. The so-called founder of the study circle, the Swede Oscar Olsson, expressed that ‘the emancipation of the working class should be a task for the workers themselves.’ ‘For the people, by the people’-’ became the political slogan that infiuenced the study circle and the adult education system in Scandinavia for years. The close links between the method study eircle and the tool for democracy study circle may also be exemplified with the expression by the former Swedish Prime Minister OIov Palme: ‘Sweden is to a great extent a Study Circle democracy’ (1998). The study circle is a human, easy, and fearless way to leaming for adults with low self-esteem and self-confidence. But the study circle method is also demanding. It claims activity and dialogue between its participants (members), and just occasionally you can rely on a teacher or an expert joining in. Normally the study eircle is a group of equals, the leader the ‘primus inter pares.’ The pedagogical idea may – in my words – be summarised by ‘leaming by sharing,’ relying on each member’s experience.

‘The Study Circle, which voluntary organisations claim to be their special method, from both ideological and educational reasons, has very much been taken for granted,’ says the Norwegian researcher Hallgjerd Brattset in her study (1982, p. 13) on how to describe and analyse the experiences from methods of planning and organising study circles. Because the Norwegian Act on Adult Education”* (NOU, 1976) requires students’ involvement in contents and method in the courses, Brattset thought it was of special interest to find out to what extent this is practised in study circles.

Scandinavian Background
The study eircle was developed in late-nineteenth-eentury Sweden. It is usually dated to 1902, the year Oscar Olsson, ‘the father of the study circle,’ started his first circle in the Lund branch of the Intemational Order of Good Templar and named it a ’study circle.’^ The most distinctive features of circle studies, as Oscar Olsson (quoted in Brattset, 1982, p. described them, were that: * * * people studied in small groups, ofren at home; study material was rare; teachers were not considered a necessary prerequisite of study. The leader of the group was an organiser, and he possessed no theoretical qualifications; people supplemented their group studies by attending lectures or meetings; circle members had no previous theoretical qualifications but a good deal of practical experience; members leamt to discuss, argue, show consideration for others, accept defeat, and share responsibility; members experienced a sense of community and identity; the knowledge members acquired could be directly related to their everyday lives; and studies began at the initial cognitive level of the members and were guided by their needs.

* * * * * *

According to Oscar Olsson, the most important features of study circles were that they operated independently of teachers, were based on the reading of fiction, and used conversation and discussion as methods. His definition of a study circle was ‘a circle of friends who come together to discuss problems or subjects of common interest’ (quoted in Brattset, 1982, p. 9). From this definition it follows that the leader should be more a guide to the members than a traditional teacher. A practical consequence of this is the terms applied: circle members or participants, not pupils or students: circle leaders. Convergence, Volume XXXIX. Number 2-3. 2006 51

not teachers, circles or groups and meetings, not clas.’ses or lessons. This use of tenninology has been considered quite important, because the participants should not associate the studies with ‘bad previous school experiences.’

Voluntary Organisations
Historically, study circles and popular movements are inseparable concepts. Oscar Olsson’s study circle exemplifies the close links that have always existed between popular movements and the study circle, and also that adult education has always been strongly associated with the voluntary sector in Scandinavia. The aim of their educational activities was to promote changes in society, according fo their values. Therefore adult education can be described as instrumental to reach their goals, and the study circle their tool to do so. The study circle is a fiexible tnethod. Several terms are therefore in use, such as: ‘ * * * * * * circles with or without a teacher; circles combined with lectures; circles based on prcproduced plans; correspondenee eireles; combined circles – members taking correspondence courses individually, supported by circle studies with teacher; multimedia courses, studies integrated in a pre-produced scheme, including usage of media; and, finally and most recently, ‘E-circles,’ in which the members communicate on the Intemet.

Research
The study circle as an aeademic field of research has been rare. Most of the research being done in recent years is known from Sweden and the University of Linkoping (see, for example, Andersson et al., 1996). The most comprehensive study was conducted by Jan Bystrom (1976). The aim of Bystrom’s study was lo investigate and discuss the reasons why study circles develop differently and to pay special …