The Quest for a New Education

hen I meet with col-leagues who teach inthe ambitious educa-tional institutions thatare trying to broaden

the scope and purpose of educationtoday, there is almost inevitably amoment when we bring up the latestcomments from students grappling withtheir own interpretation of “alternativeeducation.” A brief selection for yourenjoyment:

• “Reading is not integral/transforma-tive.”

• “Lecturing is not integral.”• “Grades are not ‘humanistic.’”• “Why should I do a literature review?

I’m creative—I don’t need to readwhat others have said—and most ofthem are dead anyway.”

• “Why should I read these mostlywhite men (Huntington, Fukuyama,Barber)? They’re not spiritual andthey’re boring.”

• “This is just intellectual.”• “I’m not interested in theory—I want

something that’s useful.”• “This is too mental.”• “I thought this program was about

personal transformation, not readinga bunch of academic books.”

These comments, both amusing andfrustrating, are not confined to alterna-tive institutions. What they illustrate forme is the extent to which it is importantto address the implicit assumptionsabout alternative education (or any kindof education) that students come to classwith. Constant exposure to these kindsof comments has led me to explore theunderlying issues, to explicitly articu-late some of my responses, and toaddress some of the deeper implicationsof my stance vis-à-vis some very basicdimensions of education.

Developing alternative, more inclu-sive, more integral forms of education isan enormously exciting challenge, but itis clearly not without its pitfalls. Incom-ing students, dissatisfied with main-stream education, often define alterna-tive education in terms of whattraditional academia is not. This is afundamentally reactive process thatposits alternative as the opposite of theirinterpretation of traditional. In fact, itinvolves a rather caricatured version oftraditional education and academia.

Alfonso Montuori

This “oppositional identity” manifestsmost clearly in the opposition betweenacademic work and transformation. Thedimension of self-inquiry and subjectiveprocesses, such as self-reflection, medi-tation, the creation of community in theclassroom, personal disclosure, and theexpression of emotion, is privileged asthe transformative aspect of education.The traditionally objective academicactivities, such as developing a body ofknowledge, academic writing, and criti-cal thinking, are at times viewed asunfortunate necessities of participationin a degree-granting program.

Unfortunately, this reactive opposi-tional identity also ends up rejectingmuch that is good about mainstreamacademic inquiry. The baby of academ-ic rigor, vigor, quality, and objectivity isthrown out with the bathwater ofoppressive tedium, constriction, and“Objectivism” (Palmer 1993). Legiti-

Alfonso Montuori, PhD, is program director andprofessor of transformative studies at the Califor-nia Institute of Integral Studies. He is the author ofseveral books and numerous articles on creativity,inquiry, and complexity. Copyright retained by theauthor.

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mate critiques of the limitations ofmainstream education can end up con-sciously or unconsciously rejectingsome of the central values of educationand inquiry. In the process, they fail todevelop a viable alternative vision thatframes education as a transformativeand creative process rather than merelyan informative one (Kegan 2000).

In this article, I will refer to twoexclusionary, polarized views of educa-tion, the Reproductive and the Narcis-sistic, and propose an alternative I callCreative Inquiry, the practitioners ofwhich navigate a middle way, a spec-trum of possibilities between extremes(Montuori 1989, 1998a, 1998b, 2003,2005a, 2005b). In Creative Inquiry thegoal is to make the academic transfor-mative and to ground the transformativein the academic. Creative Inquirers seekto navigate and integrate the skill build-ing, knowledge base development,scholarship, and critical thinking of tra-ditional academia with the emphasis onself-reflection, the excavation of values,the integration of the knower in theknown, and the stress on transforma-tion—personal and social—of alterna-tive approaches, without falling intopolarized excesses.

By Reproductive I mean an approachto education that sees the source ofknowledge as almost exclusively out-side the knower, and focuses on theaccurate reproduction of that knowledgeby the knower. It is about reproducingthe content one has received; reproduc-ing the disciplinary organization,instructional pedagogy, and powerstructures that generate this knowledge;reproducing the standard, acceptedways of conducting inquiry; reproduc-ing the societal-industrial expectationsfor what a good member of the work-force is; reproducing the existing socialand academic order.

Before I go on I must clarify the rela-tionship between Reproductive educa-tion and mainstream (nonalternative, ifyou will) academia. First of all, as Ipresent it here, Reproductive educationis an interpretation of education bysome students. It is a way they havecome to frame and understand educa-tion and inquiry. I do not mean to sug-gest that mainstream academia is allabout memorization and regurgitation.

Clearly there are innumerable examplesof wonderful educational experiencesin “traditional” educational institutions.But it is becoming clear that there arealso many, many instances where edu-cation is indeed reduced to memoriza-tion and regurgitation, for any numberof reasons too complex to address here(cf. Morin 2001; Palmer 1993, 1997;Wilshire 1990). Furthermore, regard-less of the vagaries of individual insti-tutions, courses, instructors, and stu-dents, traditional academia has donelittle to recognize the creativity ofinquiry, stressing instead the “scientif-ic,” rational and logical dimension ofthe process (Montuori 2005b).

By Narcissistic I mean an approach toeducation that sees the source of knowl-edge as primarily inside the knower. Itfocuses on the expression of the know-er’s experience and interiority and his orher personal growth and transformation.This approach reflects the students’ feel-ings that they can finally bring to thetable all that they had to hide and repressduring previous academic experiences—their personal experience, feelings, andopinions. It is a reaction to perceivedrestrictions, and, when accompanied bya rejection of all things perceived as tra-ditionally academic, manifests as anovercorrection.

Narcissists want to explore their feel-ings and their experience, and placefaith in their intuitive insights. Theywant to rehabilitate all that has tradi-tionally been ejected from academicinquiry, perhaps rightly so. They rein-sert the inquirer into the inquiry andgive voice to the many dimensions ofinquiry and inquirer that were left out ofacademic discourse for so long. But if inthe process they reject high academicstandards, if they do not dialogue withthe larger scholarly community, if theyare not grounded in the literature, if theyare not open to challenge and critique, ifthey defy the laws of science and com-mon sense, the result is a narcissisticworld of navel-gazing that adds little ifanything of value to the field, whereprocess replaces content and an entirelynew set of oppositions is created.

Abraham Maslow’s warning is asvalid today as it was in 1969:

I have been disturbed not only by themore “anal” scientists and the denial of

human values in science, along with theconsequent amoral technologizing of allscience. Just as dangerous are some of thecritics of orthodox science who find it tooskeptical, too cool and nonhuman, andthen reject it altogether as a danger tohuman values. They become “antiscien-tific” and even anti-intellectual. This is areal danger among some psychotherapistsand clinical psychologists, among artists,among some seriously religious people,among some of the people who are inter-ested in Zen, Taoism, in existentialism,“experientialism,” and the like. Theiralternative to science is often sheer freak-ishness and cultishness, uncritical andselfish exaltation of mere personal experi-encing, over-reliance on impulsivity(which they confuse with spontaneity),arbitrary whimsicality and emotionality,unskeptical enthusiasm, and finally,navel-watching and solipsism. We shouldremember the Nazis and Fascists withtheir call to blood and sheer instinct, andtheir hostility to freely-probing intellectand cool rationality. (xv–xvi)

Creative Inquiry can integrate thebest of traditional scholarship andexpand what is meant by education andinquiry by including an ongoing processof self-inquiry that recognizes the roleof the knower in inquiry. CreativeInquiry in the educational process is notmerely an accumulation of facts and fig-ures, the development of an academicspecialization and expertise in a giventopic, but can also be an opportunity totransform oneself, one’s world, and theprocess of inquiry itself.

By Creative Inquiry I mean anapproach that views inquiry as a creativeprocess. In doctoral work, the disserta-tion is defined as an original contributionto the field. Yet questions of originalityand, more specifically, the creativeprocess involved, are hardly ever explic-itly addressed (Guetzkow, Lamont, andMallard 2004). As Kaplan (1964) pointsout, our conventional approach to inquiryfocuses predominantly on the process ofjustification rather than the process ofdiscovery. Popper (2002) explicitly statesthat the creative dimension of scientificdiscovery was not a proper subject forscientific or philosophical attention,given its aleatory, contingent nature andthe fact that it does not involve logicalmethod. (Surely a deeply misguided andpolarizing statement in and of itself.)What mattered was what could be sub-jected to logical analysis, namely thetesting of the idea—not how one got

WINTER 2006 5

ity, as well as the assumption and aspira-tion, that musicians who develop theappropriate level of musical competenceand personal development may actuallyturn out to be more well-rounded andbetter educated musicians and people.The assumption is that there is a connec-tion between what one plays and whoone is. Furthermore, I believe that in atruly transformative education, thedevelopment of basic skills—such assight-reading, music theory, composi-tion, and history—would be contextual-ized and approached differently, in waysthat reflect the transformative potentialof education. In a previous article, I haveshown how a staple of traditional acade-mic education, the literature review, canbe reframed as a creative process (Mon-tuori 2005b), and I will return to thisexample at the end of this paper.Throughout this article, I will stress thedevelopment of basic academic scholar-ship and suggest that the academic canbe transformative, and the transforma-tive can be grounded in the academic.

On being “mental”

Let us get more specific. How do thedangers outlined by Maslow and, gener-ally, the problems of the Narcissisticapproach play out in the classroom? Irecently worked with a graduate studentwho presented me with a paper on therole of joy in volunteer work. His paperwas interesting, ambitious, thoughtfulbut, also, quite problematic in severalways. Joy was never defined or contex-tualized, either in terms of the livedexperience, the phenomenology of joy,or the literature.

Something else bothered me about thepaper that I could not initially quite putmy finger on. In a discussion about anarticle I had asked him to read, the stu-dent told me how the article I had givenhim was about the concept of joy, where-as his essay addressed the actual feelingand experience of joy. In his view, theother article was addressing a conceptand, thus, came from the head, and hisown paper came from the heart, address-ing a feeling and an experience, not aconcept; his paper was not conceptual.

It became clear to me that a substan-tial part of the problem with the stu-dent’s paper was that the student wasmaking a drastic split between “head”


the creative process isnot just original research but,also, the self-creation of the inquirer as aparticipant in a community of inquiryand action.

Creativity offers an important entrypoint into this discussion of alternativeapproaches to education for a number ofother reasons. Students coming to alter-native programs are looking for anopportunity, I believe, to do creativework. By this I mean that they want todo work that makes a contribution and isnot just a vermiform appendix to theiradvisor’s research agenda. They want todo this work in a way that is exciting, ina way that leads them to understandthemselves and the world anew; theywant knowledge of the world and self-

state” in performance, medi-tation practices for spiritual develop-

ment, and collaboration skills for theirgroup performances. The holistic ortransformative adds a lot to the moretraditional school and can provide arich and fascinating experience. Ifindeed it is the assumption that thesemusicians are being prepared for partic-ipation in the world of professionalmusic, however, unless the alternativeapproach graduates musicians whohave developed the skills to perform ata high level of instrumental ability andwho can perform competently with oth-ers, the alternative approach is funda-mentally useless.

Having said that, in the “holistic”school there is also the distinct possibil-

there. And, in fact, the reality of thehow—messy, contingent, imaginative,and exciting—has always been relegatedto biography, and what has been present-ed in its place is a reconstruction basedon logic and an assumption that whathappened had to happen. Indeed method-ology often serves as a handy cover storyfor the realities of inquiry.1

It should now be clear that what I amaddressing here is not the nature and roleof any specific methodology, but apremethodological attitude toward inqui-ry and scholarship that incorporates andis, in fact, founded on the creative, con-tingent reality of inquiry as opposed to areconstructed, sanitized view of inquiryas a purely logical and rational process.Furthermore, in CreativeInquiry the product of

knowledge, and the opportunity todevelop and express a unique viewpointthat reflects their passion and commit-ment. This is precisely what they feelReproductive education denies them.Having set these lofty and admirablegoals, we must now explore ways ofachieving them.

It don’t mean a thing . . .

Let us assume two music schools. Inthe first, students learn music theory,history, performance, composition, andsimilar staples of music education. Inthe second, an “alternative” schooldevoted to a more holistic or transfor-mative process of music education, stu-dents learn to get in touch with and

articulate their passion for music,how to achieve a “flow

Students com-ing to alternative

programs are lookingfor an opportunity,

I believe, to do creative work.

WINTER 2006 7

and “heart,” “concept” and “feeling.” Bydoing so, he was simply not acceptingthat although he was interested in theexperience of joy itself, his paper dis-cussed a feeling and an experience in anacademic context (whether he liked it ornot) and proposed a different under-standing and role for joy in social work.To write the paper effectively, he wouldhave to recognize that he had to articu-late the concept of joy as well as theexperience of the feeling itself, preciselybecause he was actually reconceptualiz-ing the role of joy in volunteer work. Italso became clear to me that the studenthad performed the somewhat odd con-tortion of not giving himself credit forproposing the need to reconceptualizethe role of joy in volunteer work becauseof his unarticulated belief that to dealwith concepts is only intellectual,whereas to deal with experience andfeeling is “real” and “where transforma-tion occurs.” The key for this studentwas the value of the experience of joypeople were having during volunteerwork—an interesting and valid subjectmatter. But what he should also havedone is clearly articulate the nature ofthat experience, contextualize it, concep-tualize it, and situate it in the literature.

In the student’s mind there was a realpolarization between concepts andexperience, intellect and feeling, theoryand practice. His paper was weakenedby his refusal to recognize the role ofintellect and concepts in the articulationof scholarly and transformative work.Although in his discussions with me thestudent told me that he did not approachthe subject intellectually or conceptual-ly, he obviously did. Because of hisunwillingness to accept the conceptualdimension of his work, the concepts,theories, and intellectual discussion inhis paper—although clearly theredespite his claims to the contrary—wereweak and underdeveloped. This is obvi-ously problematic, particularly in anacademic context, and illustrates pre-cisely the kind of problem in attitudethat I have outlined in my threeapproaches to scholarship and educa-tion—Reproductive, Narcissistic, andCreative Inquiry.

By not being able to accept that hewas actually engaging concepts andideas and not taking full responsibility

for his participation in intellectual dis-course, the student was left in a limbothat was neither experience nor reflec-tion, neither theory nor practice. Part ofmy job was to help the student to see thatif he wanted to participate in a certainworld or community, or engage in a spe-cific discourse, he would need to be ableto speak convincingly in that context.Not without struggle, he started to seehow his own thinking, his own language,and his own communications about hissubject were, in fact, also occurringthrough concepts and ideas. The studentcame to see how he could develop amore satisfying relationship between theintellect and the emotions, between headand heart, and theory and practice, andthat this was a creative challenge for himas it is for all of us. Ultimately, he wasnot offered a solution to the problem buta way of framing the relationship thatoffered the possibility of creativityrather than opposition.

Where does this polarizing, dichotomi-zing tendency come from? Academia his-torically identified itself in opposition tosubjectivity, emotion, and intuition in thesame way that science identified itself inopposition to the church. In the next twosections of this article, I step back andbriefly address the cultural and psycho-logical factors that contribute to a narcis-sistic, anti-intellectual view of educationin the U.S. context.

The spirit of/and anti-intellectualism

It is ironic how often the search forholism, transformation, integralism, andalternative approaches in general canlead to the exclusion of what is some-times disparagingly called “the mental.”In this view, not uncommon with stu-dents entering alternative programs andin New Age circles, anything considered“intellectual” is, by definition, not spiri-tual, because the intellect is the “old par-adigm,” the foe of spirituality. It is pre-cisely what separated us from thenatural, spiritual, intuitive, spontaneousexistence that our foremothers and fore-fathers apparently enjoyed in the daysbefore Descartes, Newton, the industrial,and even the agricultural, revolution.The emphasis is on personal insightand/or connection with “higher wisdom”or God. Book-learning is seen as ulti-mately “relative,” second-hand, and even

part of a process of egoic self-aggran-dizement, aloofness, snobbery, elitism,and a removal from the “real” world.

If students and faculty interested inalternative education sometimes think ofit in opposition to mainstream education,this should really come as no surprise tous. What is now called mainstream edu-cation and considered rigorous inquiryoriginally also defined itself in oppositionto values it rejected, as science defineditself in opposition to the church. Social-ization into mainstream academic socialscience has historically involved learningthe values associated with good or rigor-ous inquiry. These values can be summa-rized in a set of hierarchical oppositions.

• objective/subjective• theory/practice• reason/emotion• fact/intuition• universal/particular

Rigorous academic inquiry histori-cally focused squarely on the left-handside of these pairs. Indeed, Westernthought has a long history of either/orthinking, which can be traced back toAristotle’s basic principles of logic,such as the law of contradiction and thelaw of the excluded middle (Code 1991;Diesing 1992; Morin 2001; Palmer1997; Rosenau 1992).

The alternative to the extreme forms ofthis opposition, in the form of the deadlyReproductive education, can, all toooften, become a glorification of the right-hand side of the categories, namely sub-jectivity, emotion, experience, intuitionand the particular; a total rejection of theleft-hand side. Subjectivity simplyreplaces objectivity, feelings replacelogic and reason, intuitions replace factsand the result is equally partial and limit-ed but in a very different way, leading toa focus that is almost exclusively “inter-nal” rather than “external.”

In many ways, the problems found inthe quest for alternative approaches toeducation are not at all new. They arepart and parcel of American culture. Agood place to start is the influence ofanti-intellectualism, which sadly tran-scends all barriers of class, race, gender,politics, and spiritual orientation. Hofs-tader wrote his classic work on anti-intel-lectualism more than forty years ago, buthis words apply to our present situation:

The American mind was shaped in themold of early modern Protestantism.Religion was the first arena for Americanintellectual life, and thus the first arenafor an anti-intellectual impulse. Anythingthat seriously diminished the role of ratio-nality and learning in early American reli-gion would later diminish its role in secu-lar culture. The feeling that ideas shouldabove all be made to work, the disdain fordoctrine and for refinements in ideas, thesubordination of men of ideas to men ofemotional power or manipulative skill arehardly innovations of the twentieth centu-ry; they are inheritances of AmericanProtestantism. (1966, 55)

Anti-intellectualism pervades Ameri-can culture. It can be found in suchseemingly opposite worlds as corporateculture, religious fundamentalism, andthe culture of the sixties, throughHumanistic Psychology, and into theNew Age. The New Age critiques of“the mental” and the intellect are directdescendants of American Protestantism.

In New Age culture, there is much dis-cussion of old and new paradigms. If theold paradigm was male, objective,authoritarian, rational, and intellectual,the new paradigm is usually portrayed asfemale, subjective, participatory, feeling-oriented, and practical. Much of the“spiritual” literature focuses on the prob-lematic nature of thinking. Thinking isviewed as an obstacle to enlightenment.Intellectualism and “being in your head”are generally considered to be theantithesis of the characteristics of anenlightened person. Ironically, this NewAge rejection and compartmentalizationreflects precisely the kind of reduction-ism and disconnected compartmentaliza-tion it critiques in the “old paradigm.”

Particularly interesting is that despiteits often deeply anti-intellectual stance,many of the New Age appropriations ofsystems of spiritual development andtransformation do not eschew concep-tual systems. In fact, in many cases theydevelop quite elaborate frameworks ofBlavatskian intricacy that incorporateeverything from quantum physics to thechakras to Advaita Vedanta to shaman-ism to colonic irrigation to the evolu-tion of consciousness. And, much likemy student, many New Age systemssimply deny that their work is theoreti-cal or conceptual in nature. Theybelieve that they are expressing eternaltruths or deep insights that cannot be

addressed intellectually but only intu-itively or spiritually.

The New Age fascination with “newscience,” from physics to chaos theory tocosmology, and the development of evermore elaborate and omnivorous concep-tual systems, is interesting preciselybecause it represents a desire to articulatea new paradigm, largely in opposition tothe old paradigm. On the one hand, itutterly rejects what the old paradigmstood for, as I have already suggested,and on the other hand it reintroduces thesame underlying principles of reduction-ism, disjunction, and simplification thatwere at the foundation of the old para-digm. The new paradigm emerges in anoppositional identity to the old paradigm,as can be seen clearly in the tables foundin many New Age books, outlining keyaspects of both paradigms:

Old Paradigm New Paradigmpart wholequantitative qualitativemasculine femininecompetition collaborationhead heartlogic intuitionauthoritarian participatoryhierarchy network

It is clear that there is a cultural con-text that reinforces the polarizationbetween Reproductive and Narcissisticapproaches and that the latter has a longhistory in the United States, most explic-itly in anti-intellectualism. An awarenessof this cultural context is important, notleast because it contextualizes the stu-dents’ views about their own framing ofalternative education and shows theextent to which they are embedded in acultural context. This context does notsimply inform the Reproductive dimen-sions they explicitly reject but, also, thevery way they think about freeing them-selves from the constraints of tradition.

Who is “inferior”?

After a brief sketch of some of thecultural factors informing approaches toalternative education, I turn to the psy-chological. My argument, drawing onJungian psychology, will be that it isprecisely the students who have themost resistance to the intellectual andacademic who need to work most ondeveloping their intellectual and schol-

arly capacities. Central to my argumentis that this is not only for the obviousreason—that they are in graduateschool—but for their own personaldevelopment.

Jung’s study of personality can shedsome light on the psychological dimen-sions of oppositional identity with hisnotion of the inferior function. In theJungian personality typology, individu-als make judgments based either on thefunction known as Thinking or the func-tion known as Feeling. An awareness ofone’s own subjectivity, one’s own back-ground, motivations, and generallyone’s cognitive preferences (such as, forinstance, the preference for globalassessments of possibilities by Intu-itives in the Jungian typology, and thestress on step-by-step, fact-based pro-cessing by Sensate types to give just oneexample) can give us an insight intohow information is gathered and howdecisions are made based on that infor-mation (Feeling or Thinking). Our pre-ferred modes have strengths and weak-nesses and offer us opportunities tobetter understand how inquiry isapproached and how one might avoidthe inevitable pitfalls ahead.

My experience is that students social-ized in traditional, mainstream forms ofeducation are socialized in a cultural sys-tem whose personality writ large is ori-ented primarily toward Thinking. Logic,analysis, and rationality are privileged.Feeling is generally the inferior (orunderdeveloped) function in the person-ality system of academia. This is demon-strated in the categories discussed earlierand can be illustrated by the (admittedlycaricatured) image of the tweedy profes-sor who is “all up in his head,” andwhose judgments are made seeminglydispassionately by cold reason, analysis,and logic (which is how many students inalternative institutions define an “intel-lectual”). Although Thinking is the dom-inant function, Feeling does not actuallygo away. Such a professor is likelyunaware of how his feelings are influenc-ing him and the motivations behind hisuse of reason and logic. Despite theveneer of rationality and logic, he may, infact be driven by a competitive and evenaggressive spirit (e.g., in the debatingsociety, in critiquing a colleague, inreviewing a submission to a journal) and


may be driven completely off course bysentimental attachments that make him“lose his mind” and “act irrationally.”Reason can be used in function of ratio-nalization, to create seemingly reason-able stories to support repressed, out ofcontrol emotions. Indeed, the belief that“the mental” can exist in splendid isola-tion from emotions, the body, and theenvironment, ironically, represents theworst kind of reductionism.

Let us assume, for the moment, thatculturally and systemically, traditionalacademia is a Thinking system, withFeeling as its inferior function. As areaction, some students see alternativeeducation as a Feeling system, withinferior Thinking. My experience is thata substantial number, although by nomeans all, of students who choose alter-native, transformative educational insti-tutions are Feeling types with Thinkingas the inferior function.2

Inferior thinking is articulated by vonFranz and Hillman (1971) in a way thatis very relevant to this educational con-text. Von Franz writes that inferiorthinking types are “nervous aboutideas” (101), and Hillman goes on todescribe their distaste for “philosophi-cal principles or abstractions or basicquestions of life” (47). They base theirviews and judgments on feeling and aregenerally not interested in thinking crit-ically about them.

Von Franz writes that, “Feeling putsthings into place and they do need not tobe looked at again. In that way feeling-types put a stop to discussion, becausethey stop further psychological observa-tion. Once they are done with the evalu-ative process, the issue is rather closed(von Franz and Hillman 1971, 100).

This position places a lot of stock inthe immediacy of feeling and experi-ence but rejects theory, rationality,logic, and critical thinking—in the edu-cational context things all associatedwith the mainstream old paradigm. Asvon Franz goes on to say,

Feeling types tend to become fanatic andemotional in thought, but thought itself, sooverwhelmingly important, cannot bethought further, cannot be carefully workedout. It remains doctrinaire. Rather thanhaving ideas, ideas seem to have them. Fre-quently they read too much and indiscrim-inately or they do not read at all. The all-or-none reaction is common in other realms

where thinking shows itself; for instance,thoughtful planning becomes either over-exact or carelessly magical. Feeling-typesmay well devote themselves to an idea, butthe ideational programme will often turnout to be strange, archaic, crackpot. (101)

In my experience, this is an excellentdescription of Narcissists who rejectanything that appears to be overly intel-lectual or elitist, and, yet, become uncrit-ically focused on and enthralled withone idea or movement, whether it be anomniscient guru-du-jour, an author—preferably with an all-encompassing,totalizing system, that, with geometricprecision, allows one to find an answerfor anything and leaves no uncertainty orambiguity—or a cause, such as a class-based critique of the wealthy and ofindustry of any kind (often accompaniedby the student’s own struggles to keephis or her financial head above waterbecause, for them, wealth is, by defini-tion, bad and what “they” have). Ironi-cally, these same students will oftenembrace quantum physics and the “newsciences” in general, intricate models ofthe evolution of consciousness, andByzantine revisionist histories and con-spiracy theories that challenge tradition-al views of social evolution.

The rejection of “the mental” involvesa rejection of critical thinking thatincreases Narcissists’ risk of becomingvictims of their own blindspots. A cer-tain New Age gullibility emergesbecause they “want to believe.” It leavesthem open to manipulation and to thedangers of uncritical acceptance ofbeliefs, cults, practices, and individuals.

What becomes very problematic, asHillman writes, is when the enthusi-asm—surely the root of the word,“filled with God,” is telling, both interms of the experience and the poten-tial for illusion—is accompanied by arejection of critical thinking and deepermore philosophical questioning. Ironi-cally, Narcissists often end up “repro-ducing” somebody else’s view simplybecause they do not have the scholar-ship to develop their own perspective orthe ability to think critically about theirsubject. In that case, it can mean

simply repeating the concepts by heart ina mechanical way, but never working outone’s own standpoint. It is a kind ofpupil-like, uncreative attitude that justtakes over the entire system unchecked

and never asks: “What do I think aboutit? Does this really convince me? Does itcoincide with the facts that I havechecked?” If such people meet otherswho themselves know how to think, theyget fanatical because they feel helpless.They fight for the system they have cho-sen with a certain apostle-like fanaticismbecause they feel uncertain about thebasis of the thinking system: how thesystem developed, its basic concepts,etc. They are uncertain about it and havethe feeling that it could be thrown overby a good thinker, so they adopt anaggressive attitude. (von Franz and Hill-man 1971, 101)

This psychological dynamic, in thecontext of a larger cultural context ofanti-intellectualism in America, canmanifest systemically and create anatmosphere where, precisely becausethe inferior function is challenged andanxiety is raised in the process, therejection of intellectualism becomeshardened. Whereas the students in manycases correctly critique academia’s dryover-intellectualism and over-abstrac-tion, they often do so without reallyunderstanding what they are critiquing.In fact, not infrequently, the critiqueemerges precisely because they do notunderstand the subject in question andfeel threatened. In other words, the cri-tique is purely emotional and not care-fully thought out. As a result, when theyexplore nontraditional subjects, they areout on the bleeding edge without under-standing what they are on the edge of.So, although while the critique of someforms of academic discourse may be onthe mark, it is so because of the wrongreasons and comes from a position ofinsecurity. The students are often uncer-tain about their abilities as thinkers, asHillman suggests. This perception ofinsecurity then manifests in phenomenasuch as mental rigidity and an aggres-sive oppositional identity vis-à-vis intel-lectual pursuits in general.

The problem, however, for most stu-dents in alternative institutions is notthat they have too much “mental”work—it is that their “mental” capaci-ties, if you will, are terribly underdevel-oped and, therefore, the source of anxi-ety and insecurity. Paradoxically, it is“mental” work that must be integratedinto their curriculum not only for thestudent’s intellectual development but,from a Jungian point of view, also for

WINTER 2006 9


his or her psychological and even spiri-tual development. Jung, after all, arguedthat individuation or wholeness cameabout through the cultivation and inte-gration of all the functions and, specifi-cally, the inferior function.

Far from being a throwback to an oldparadigm, the development of solid aca-demic skills, including critical thinkingand a deep and wide knowledge base,can be a powerful source of personalchange in individuals who are insecureabout their abilities and their identity andneed to integrate their “mental.” Studentsand faculty can see this as an opportuni-ty for personal growth and to develop amore integrated, well-balanced person.

One of my students confessed she hadsome doubts about her own

ity to “succeed.” The aspiration of cre-ative inquiry to connect and contextualizeinstead of reduce and separate, is inspir-ing my own aspiration for this course ofstudy: relaxation with discipline.

The frame of Creative Inquiryallowed her to navigate between the twoextremes of Reproduction and Narcis-sism, find a “middle way” she couldsteer through, and find a way of think-ing about how to navigate the process ofCreative Inquiry itself.

Creativity and Creative Inquiry

Creative Inquiry is, simply put, aprocess that involves the cultivation ofcreativity in the process of inquiry.This creativity is not limited to the

development of a creative prod-

• A form of thinking that connects ratherthan separates and brings togetherterms and ideas that are conventionallythought to be separate, unrelated, orpolar opposites

• Independence of judgment• Tolerance of ambiguity• Problem finding• Complexity and asymmetry• Intrinsic motivation

Beyond polarizations

Creativity involves bringing togetherterms or ideas that have not beenbrought together before. This kind ofthinking, with some clear variations, hasbeen called bisociation (Koestler 1966),Janusian thinking (Rothenberg 1979),Dialectical thinking (Basseches 1984)and more but, ultimately, involvesthinking together terms that are not nor-mally thought together. Koestlerdescribed “bisociation” as “the perceiv-ing of a situation or idea . . . in two self-consistent but habitually incompatibleframes of reference” (1966, 35).

In Creative Inquiry, there is an ongo-ing creative dialogue between terms thathave historically been torn asunder. Inboth the Reproductive and Narcissisticviews there is disjunctive, polarizingthinking: the logic of either/or. In Cre-ative Inquiry it is not either innovationor tradition, where, for instance, innova-tion means ignoring the tradition. It isnot either discipline or self-expressionbut an ongoing creative navigation ofboth terms. Creative Inquiry involvesconstantly navigating and creating one’sown context-based dialectic betweenterms, such as:

objective↔subjectivetheory↔practicereason↔emotionfact↔intuitionuniversal↔particularinnovation↔tradition

Let us start with these polarizations.Fay (1996) points out that the history ofideas is riddled with polarizations likethe ones above. Dialectical sociologistshave made this point extensively, argu-ing that philosophical positions emergeand develop in opposition to each other(e.g., Diesing 1992; Collins 2000). Therelationship between Reproductive andNarcissistic approaches is a representa-

intellectual capacitiesbut had been reluctant to discussthis sensitive topic. When she realizedthat the Creative Inquiry frame explicit-ly invited her to address her own feelingsabout her capacities to do the necessarywork, rather than falling back into a Nar-cissistic rejection of intellectual dis-course as “too mental,” she recognizedher own insecurity, and wrote:

Now that I can “confess” and acknowl-edge this situation within myself, I feelthat a terrible burden is lifted. I knowwhat I need to do, and that is to go beyond“accepting” or “rejecting” the traditionalor narcissistic approaches, and aim for themore middle ground of creative inquiry.

Now, that you’ve given some parame-ters of creative inquiry I’m much moreoptimistic about the program and my abil-

uct, such as an original workof research, but also includes fram-

ing inquiry as a creative process, aprocess where the inquirer becomesboth producer and product. The inquiryis also a process of self-inquiry andself-creation. I define creativity here asan attitude toward life as a whole thatinvolves the ability to navigatebetween habit and possibility in a con-textually appropriate way (cf. Barron1995).

Creativity research has outlined anumber of key dimensions of the cre-ative person and the creative process rel-evant to the attitude of Creative Inquiry(Barron 1995; Dacey and Lennon 1998).I will summarize some of the majordimensions here. They include:

Imag

e©

Maj

ed.

WINTER 2006 11

tive example. Although the two perspec-tives are diametrically opposed, theunderlying organization of knowledgeis grounded in a logic of either/or. Nar-cissists define themselves in oppositionto Reproducers as a result of polarizing,either/or thinking, which leads straightinto the creation of mutually exclusive,oppositional identities.

Both the creative process and the cre-ative person demonstrate “paradoxical”qualities in the sense that they holdtogether terms and characteristics thatare normally not held together.

The creative process itself embodies ten-sion, and individuals who distinguishthemselves in artistic, scientific, andentrepreneurial creation exemplify vivid-ly in their persons the incessant dialecticbetween integration and diffusion, con-vergence and divergence, thesis andantithesis. (Barron 1964, 81)

Based on his extensive research onthe creative process, Barron concludedthat “the secret of generation is the ten-sion of opposites in duality. The antino-mies raised to their highest intensity arethe source of creation” (1995, 278).

The creative personality also showsseemingly paradoxical characteristics.Summarizing research on the creativeperson, Hampden-Turner writes:

The creative person is by turns open andclosed, tentative and certain, and flirtingwith disorder to create a better order. He orshe is intuitive but the passes this over infavor of the rational mind for thoroughassessment. The creative person scoreshigher on manifest anxiety, reporting moreoften despair, depression, anger, sorrow,and doubt; yet the creative person alsorecovers from these states far faster, show-ing ego-strength and reporting hope, ela-tion, delight, happiness, and confidence. Inother words, creatives rally more easilyfrom setback, shift more readily betweenmoods, and seem to destabilize more read-ily in order to reach higher equilibria. Theyare, from a mental health standpoint, both“sicker” and “healthier,” more vulnerableto what happens around them yet more ableto solve the problems that arise. (1999, 19)

Creative persons, therefore, experi-ence a wider range of human possibili-ties than the average person: they travelwidely across a spectrum of possiblebehaviors, thoughts, experiences, andemotions. They can be both open andclosed, intuitive and rational, capable ofexperiencing both great emotional dise-quilibrium and restabilizing at a new

equilibrium. This paradoxical relation-ship of apparent opposites or polaritiesis central to both the creative person andthe creative process, and it is one keyfactor in what has made creativity so“mysterious,” because open/closed,healthy/sick, reason/intuition, are moreoften than not, viewed as opposites, notas interrelated aspects of a larger whole.

One way of thinking about this throughthe lens of another characteristic trait ofcreative individuals is through the con-cept of androgyny (Dacey and Lennon1998; Norlander, Erixon, and Archer2000). Very stereotyped gender roles—the strong, hard, aggressive, male, thesoft, nurturing female—correlate nega-tively with creativity. Creative individualsdo not conform to such stereo-

expectation that one must fall on eitherside of the key polarities I have listed. Inthis way, both taking a position on eitherone of the sides (“taking a stand,” “hav-ing the power of your convictions”) andthe logic of either/or are part of societalexpectations (Fay 1996; Morin 2001).

Independence of judgment

Going along with common opinion atall times is referred to as conformism.Reproducers obviously want to be con-formists. They want to know what theyhave to do to get the grade. CreativeInquirers are not anticonformity, they donot rebel against order for the sake of it asNarcissists tend to do. Creative Inquirershave what is known as independence of

judgment. In other words,

types. In other words, they donot see male behavior at one end of thespectrum and female behavior at the otherin an either/or frame. They do not definemale behavior in terms of what femalebehavior is not and vice versa (and where“crossing over” can lead to being called a“sissy” or a “bitch”). They see a continu-um of human behaviors and experiencesand feel free to move along the entirespectrum. In the same way, creativityinvolves seeing and navigating an entirespectrum rather than seeing only opposi-tions and polarities.

One intriguing etymology of the wordparadox is, “something that is contraryto or conflicts with common opinion,something that goes against expecta-tion.” As I have shown, there is an

they do not assume thatpopular opinion is, by definition,

the final word. They explore, dig deeper,question assumptions, and then decide.They ask why things have to be the waythey are and wonder if they could be dif-ferent. Creative Inquiry can be an oppor-tunity to cultivate independence of judg-ment. When assessing a wide body ofknowledge, Reproducers simply repro-duce, and Narcissists simply express howthey feel, but Creative Inquirers canreview and make up their own minds indialogue with the field.

Tolerance of ambiguity

Creative Inquiry is a process ofexploration and navigation. It willtherefore lead us into ambiguous situa-

Creative persons, therefore,experience a wider

range of human possibilities than

the average person. . .

tions, where there are no preexistingrules and regulations, “no framework tohelp direct your decisions and actions”(Dacey and Lennon 1998, 18). CreativeInquirers cultivate tolerance for ambi-guity to do well in situations wherethere is no set way of doing things,where it is necessary to experiment andtry out new things. Inevitably, situa-tions for which there are no clear guide-lines or a field where there are multipleand, at times, conflicting perspectiveson one issue can create a lot of anxiety.One anxiety-reducing solution is toimmediately attempt to impose a preex-isting framework or set of rules on thesituation and not remain open to the sit-uation long enough to really assess itand allow an appropriate response toemerge. Anxiety can lead to very blackand white, either/or thinking, and thisshows up both in Reproductive andNarcissistic thinking.

In ambiguous situations where thereis no clear framework for acting, somekind of order has to be created. Whereassome people might see the lack of exist-ing structure and order as a source ofanxiety, something to be immediatelyremedied, Creative Inquirers oftenappreciate unstructured situations pre-cisely because they see them as anopportunity to explore and create. Theyare excited by the prospect of improvis-ing, of getting to experiment and figurethings out by trial and error, of develop-ing new frameworks and ways of mak-ing meaning in the world. They taketheir time to explore without coming topremature closure and have developedmore comfort with uncertainty.

Problem solving and problem finding

Creative Inquiry involves engagingthe unknown, the messy, the complicat-ed, the complex, and attempting tounderstand and make sense out of it.Getzels and Csikszentmihalyi (1976)have demonstrated that problem finding,as opposed to merely problem solving, iscentral to creativity. This is also a centralcharacteristic of Creative Inquirers. Cre-ative individuals show a preference forasymmetrical forms over symmetricalones. Barron summarizes:

Creative individuals have a positive likingfor phenomenal fields which cannot beassimilated to principles of geometric

order and which require the developmentor, better, the creation of new perceptualschemata which will re-establish in theobserver a feeling that the phenomena areintelligible, which is to say ordered, har-monious, and capable of arousing esthet-ic sentiment. (1995, 155)

Complexity, asymmetry, disorder,the unknown, the unexplained, and theedges of the paradigm become a sourceof stimulation and possibility, a chal-lenge and an opportunity to create andmake sense of the world in one’s ownway. A preference for simple orderinvolves an attempt to maintain equilib-rium at all costs. Barron writes that thisequilibrium “depends essentially uponexclusion, a kind of perceptual distor-tion which consists in refusing to seeparts of reality that cannot be assimilat-ed to some preconceived system”(1995, 198–99). This leads to anincreasingly closed view of the worldand the reinforcement of set ways ofdoing things, as well as prejudices andstereotypes.

Arlin (1990) highlights three more rel-evant characteristics of problem finders:

1. Openness to the possibility and realityof change. The willingness to remainopen to change, and to informationthat may lead to change, points to anongoing process of self-transforma-tion rather than a static, fixed sense ofself and world.

2. Pushing limits, which at times canlead to the redefinition of those limits.Change and the detection of problemsin the existing order can lead to push-ing limits, whether cognitive, political,or personal. Pushing limits also leadsto a redefinition of those limits as theperson develops a new understandingof what is and is not possible. Thisrequires courage and the willingnessto take risks, hence the title of RolloMay’s classic work on creativity, TheCourage to Create (1994).

3. A preference for addressing core orfundamental issues and problems,rather than an exclusive focus ondetail. Creative Inquiry, with itsongoing challenging of assumptionsand integration of the knower into theprocess of knowing, usually leads tocore or fundamental issues even ifthese were not part of the originalinquiry.

Creativity Inquiry involves an attrac-tion to the unknown, a desire to navigateuncharted territories as an opportunityto gain a greater understanding of theworld and of oneself. Barron hasreferred to this as the “CosmologicalMotive,” or the desire to create one’sown world and create oneself (1995).

Motivation

Motivation can be thought of as a per-son’s attitude toward the task she or heis engaged in. To be motivated, writeRyan and Deci (2000), means to bemoved to do something. Creative Inquir-ers are intrinsically motivated becausethey have a passion for their subject butalso learn how to turn the process ofresearch itself into something enjoy-able. Intrinsically motivated peopleenjoy what they do, and they do sobecause they find the task itself reward-ing. Intrinsic means “from within.”Intrinsic motivation literally means thatone is moved from within to do some-thing. Intrinsically motivating factorscan include fascination with the subject,enjoyment while performing the task, ora feeling of accomplishment. Extrinsi-cally motivated people do the taskbecause there is an external rewardattached to it. They do not enjoy the taskitself. It is the reward (getting the gradeor the degree) that is the motivator.Extrinsic motivation is motivation thatcomes from outside sources. Obtaininga good grade or degree, financial incen-tives, and social approval are examplesof extrinsic motivation. Creative Inquiryinvolves, among other things, reflectingon one’s attitude towards every dimen-sion and aspect of inquiry, and findingways to approach them creatively, asopportunities for learning and change.

A particularly interesting implicationof Amabile’s research (1996), which hasconvincingly shown that intrinsic moti-vation is a key factor in creativity, is thatwhether a task is intrinsically interestingto us or not is, on some level, a personalchoice. It is an aspect of the subjectivedimension of work. A particular task canbe seen as boring, but it can also beviewed as a something fascinating, use-ful or interesting. Even a literaturereview—something many students seemto find boring—can be interesting if per-formed with a creative frame (Montuori


2005b). It is possible to focus not just onthe nature of the task itself (writing upone’s references does not strike mostpeople as an intrinsically fascinatingtask, for example) but on the nature ofour consciousness while the task is per-formed. If the task is not interesting, per-formance and, certainly, creativity suf-fer. If the focus is on doing a good job,and working at one’s peak regardless ofthe nature of the task, we can actually“be moved” by the task. It is also possi-ble to reframe the task at hand, from onethat is desperately boring to one that ispotentially exciting—finding a new wayof performing the task or seeing the taskas an opportunity for learning andgrowth. This is called reframing. Cre-ative Inquiry can act as a frame that isgenerative of creativity—in other words,a frame that sees every aspect of inquiryas an opportunity for creativity.

Summary

Creativity involves an attitude towardinquiry that draws on our deepest moti-vations and views the unknown and thecomplex as opportunities for inquiryand for making meaning in the world.The cosmological motive Barron (1995)speaks of is a form of self-making andworld-making. It is an artistic process,requiring aesthetic skill and sensibility,and a scientific process, requiring bothrigor and imagination.

Creative Inquiry invites us to culti-vate our creativity. Independence ofJudgment, tolerance for ambiguity, andthe other dimensions of creativity I havelisted, can all be cultivated (Barron1995). They are not prerequisites forCreative Inquiry. Rather, CreativeInquiry presents us with an opportunityto engage them in our chosen contextand develop them with others. They areaspirations in the process of CreativityInquiry—touchstones along the waythat remind us that the academic contextcan be framed as a yoga, as a spiritualpractice. Once an appropriate frame isdeveloped and an appropriate environ-ment created, both intra- and interper-sonally, creativity can emerge (Amabile1996; Barron 1995).

A frame and three examples

In this section, I will briefly discussthe role of Creative Inquiry as a frame

for first-year graduate students and thenexplore three classroom examples: theliterature review, the development of anacademic voice, and classroom interac-tion and collaboration.

Creative inquiry as a frame

Key to developing the spirit of CreativeInquiry and avoiding the pitfalls of theReproductive/Narcissistic polarization, isto create a generative frame for inquiry ina first semester course. Creating theframe and the aspiration of CreativeInquiry can address a lot of the miscon-ceptions about what graduate studies inalternative institutions are about. I invitestudents to reflect on their own educa-tional experiences, their own assumptionsabout graduate education, and theirunderstanding of the role of alternativeinstitutions. I ask them about whetherthey identify with, or aspire to become,“intellectuals,” the relationship betweenscholarly research and personal growth,the academic and the transformative, thehistorical developments that lead to thepresent condition (including America’shistory of anti-intellectualism), and thepossibilities that lie ahead. I attempt tomake explicit most or all of the issues thatcome before actual inquiry but thatdeeply influence that process. CreativeInquiry is a frame that introduces stu-dents to a kind of thinking that connectsand contextualizes rather than separatingand isolating. With that approach, we canexplore some of the historical tension inthe history of knowledge, education, andthe development of alternative education-al approaches. It is also a frame that tapsinto their motivation by making academ-ic inquiry an opportunity to tap into andcultivate their creativity.

The three forms of inquiry I have pro-posed serve as a loose framework forunderstanding the perils of exclusionarypolarization and decontextualizing andalso outline how Creative Inquiry con-textually navigates tensions and polari-ties. The challenge for students, like thechallenge for great musicians, is todevelop their skills, knowledge, andinsights so that they can develop theirown voice, their own way of being inthis academic context, and in their workin the world. Framing inquiry as a cre-ative process works on many levels,addressing several aspirations: to make

the process of inquiry a creativeprocess; to produce original, meaning-ful research; to engage in dialogue withothers in ways that are generative andchallenging; and to create oneself as aninquirer in the context of a larger com-munity, whether one sees oneself as anintellectual, scholar-practitioner, oractivist, for example. The great chal-lenge is that every student has an oppor-tunity to create her or his own interpre-tation of these several dimensions. Andevery student has the opportunity to cre-ate him or herself in the process of aca-demic inquiry.

Students starting graduate school cansometimes understandably be quite anx-ious. In this new, challenging, generallyless rigidly structured, and, in somecases, more seminar-based environ-ment, students are required to be moreself-starting, self-motivating, and self-directed. At the graduate level there isinevitably more ambiguity in terms ofthe studies themselves. The notion ofone correct answer starts to becomemore problematic. Students begin to seethat an issue can be approached from aplurality of perspectives, that these per-spectives are sometimes antagonistic,sometimes concurrent, and sometimescomplementary. They see that there maybe considerable disagreements and evenirreconcilable differences betweenthem. This uncertainty can be confus-ing. Because the “one right way”approach seems not to apply, it mayseem that “anything goes,” that there areas many perspectives on an issue asthere are individuals, and that “we cre-ate our own reality” (Perry 1998).

Anxiety is increased dramaticallywhen there is considerable ambiguityand students are not clear about the basicparameters of the kind of experience theyare encountering. Further, in many edu-cational institutions, and not just alterna-tive institutions, the relationship betweenthe espoused educational philosophiesand the everyday work of academicinquiry is sometimes quite tenuous. Stu-dents are not clear about the attitude or“frame” with which to approach the actu-al reality of their work or even the basicissues of scholarship. As a result, theycan end up going back and forth betweenthe extremes of Reproductive and Nar-cissistic approaches.

WINTER 2006 13


Students in alternative institutionsmay initially believe that the plurality ofviews and perspectives they encounterexists only in the “leading edge,” “alter-native” world of their institution. Theymay begin to think that in more maturedisciplines, there is consensus and agree-ment about what is “right” and what is“wrong,” that there are no heateddebates, no major differences in perspec-tives. The uncertainty then leads togreater anxiety when students wonder ifit is a function of the field, of their quirky“alternative” institution, of the nature ofknowledge in general. Students, like allof us, often have a tendency to projecttheir own fears and concerns onto what-ever void they perceive to exist, in allareas where there are noexplicit guidelines. In

plexities of working at the leading edge,which is an art in and of itself because ofthe inevitably speculative nature of muchof the work.

Finding an introductory way to artic-ulate ways of thinking about inquiry inthis new context, based on the Repro-ductive/Narcissistic responses to thissituation and preparing students for amore complex, creative approach toinquiry has, in my experience, served toset students on a good course. I invitestudents to explore their own thinkingabout inquiry through the three perspec-tives. Immersion in this underlyingissue of how to approach inquiry (ratherthan a discussion of specific researchmethodologies, which I believe should

come later) helps to address stu-dents’ questions and anxi-

their own experience. After they complet-ed the readings, the students reflected onhow to apply the findings of the researchto expand their own creative potential.For instance, they explored their ownrelationship to such classic characteristicsof the creative person as independence ofjudgment or tolerance of ambiguity or totheir own experience of the creativeprocess when viewed from Wallas’s clas-sic four stages of Immersion, Incubation,Illumination, and Verification. Groundingthese characteristics in their own experi-ence gave them an opportunity to developa greater understanding of their complex-ities, implications, and applications—itmade them more “real,” rather than sim-ply theoretical constructs.

Students then explored a variety ofpsychospiritual practices to assist themin the process of exploring the nature oftheir own creative process and address-ing any blocks they were experiencing.The students were asked to stick with thepractices for at least a month and tofamiliarize themselves with the origins,theoretical frameworks, and assump-tions of the various practices. The under-lying assumption was that the academic(the creativity research) was alsoapproached in a transformative way andthe transformative was also approachedin an academic way. As a final integra-tive assignment, students were asked towrite their intellectual autobiographyfrom the perspective of age eighty, “rem-iniscing” on how they had applied theirgraduate studies in their lives and howtheir own voice had developed as theyimmersed themselves in their work andaddressed the personal psychologicalobstacles revealed by the earlier explo-ration of creativity research. This wasalso an opportunity for them to addresstheir voice since emphasis was placed onillustrating not only what they hadaccomplished but also who they had“grown into.” Their voice, therefore,became a crucial aspect of their paper,because it would give the reader an indi-cation of the person behind the actions.

So what does Creative Inquiry looklike when it is at home? How does it dif-fer from Reproductive and Narcissisticinquiry? I will give three examples: theliterature review, the development ofone’s academic voice, and the capacityto dialogue in class.

many cases, for exam-ple, they will demand “theanswer” from the instructor or from thereadings and assume that if the final andcorrect answer is not provided, theremust be something wrong with theinstructor or the readings or the subjectmatter as a whole.

Faculty must also be careful not toassume that students come with the samebackground they do. Faculty membershave, in all likelihood, had a somewhattraditional background with all the train-ing in academic scholarship. They maybe eager to “get to the leading edge.”Students, are in many cases, unlikely toknow the full extent of the territory thathas been traversed to reach the edge.They may also be unaware of the com-

eties while at the same timerecognizing the reality of that very

anxiety they may be experiencing, mak-ing it a subject of inquiry in the contextof their educational experiences and thehistory of knowledge and education.

An example of this relationshipbetween the academic and the transfor-mative emerged in a class I taught recent-ly on Creativity and Personal Transfor-mation. Students were invited to explorethe findings of creativity research andfamiliarize themselves with some of thekey findings about the creative personand the creative process. At the beginningof the course, before they had read thematerial, they had been asked to explorequestions based on this research andinvited to address them in the light of

Students, likeall of us, often have

a tendency to projecttheir own fears and

concerns onto what-ever void they per-

ceive to exist. . .

The literature review

A Reproducer sees a literature reviewas merely the demonstration that he orshe knows the knowledge base “outthere,” so that s/he can get a good grade.The literature review then oftenbecomes a tedious catalog of informa-tion, a series of book reports, at best,organized in chronological order. Thereis typically little or no effort to connectthe various approaches to a subject toeach other or to contextualize them inthe student’s own research. There is analmost atomistic approach whereby“bits” of information are collected butseemingly with no effort to show if andhow they are connected. There is noconnection and therefore no dialoguewith the community of fellow inquirerswho have also immersed themselves inthis subject. The student is not partici-pating in the discourse but observing itas an outsider. Furthermore, there is typ-ically no attention paid to an audience,in the sense of a contribution to an exist-ing discourse and an articulation ofwhere the student situates her- or him-self in that context. The student hasdrastically reduced his or her context toa relationship with the instructor and,more specifically, focused exclusivelyon getting the desired grade.

A Narcissist might see a literaturereview either as an unnecessary affrontto his or her creativity (“Why do I needto read what others have said—I’m cre-ative”) or as an opportunity to state whatauthors she or he “likes” or “dislikes”without any justification or contextual-ization, not giving the reader any insightinto why the student prefers author Xover author Y. Again, as with the Repro-ductive review, the student is not writingwith an audience in mind and therefore,does not communicate effectively withothers or actually participate in the dis-course in any sort of acceptable way,because the writing is always primarilyabout the self and feelings. Again, thereis no engagement with the scholarlycommunity, which is approached from aconsumer orientation—picking andchoosing what one likes and dislikesbased on what texts the student happensto have read. There is no sense of sys-tematic, disciplined inquiry or a realunderstanding of the issue in the broad-

est sense. Freedom is misinterpretedhere in the way that Kant’s dove thoughtthat it could fly faster if there were noair to hold it back.

For Creative Inquirers, a literaturereview is far from a simple, tediousrehearsal of what the “authorities outthere” said or a statement of somewhatarbitrary personal preferences. Engag-ing in Creative Inquiry, a literaturereview becomes an opportunity for adialogue between the inquirer and thosewho make up her intellectual context,situating her in that research context,paying tribute to her ancestors, andarticulating the limitations and chal-lenges of the field. The student begins tosee that the issue she is passionate aboutis one that has been approached by oth-ers and that she is part of an ongoingcommunity of individuals, sometimesstretching back hundreds of years, whohave shared that passion. She thenbegins to see the literature review as thearticulation of a set of relationships, aninterpretation of the field, and her wayof situating herself in that field (Mon-tuori 2005b). She finds that she belongsin a community and, yet, can also see away to articulate her own unique voiceand contribution to that community.

Key to this process is the attitude ofparticipation in a discourse, of commu-nicating with people, both living anddead, who share one’s interests and pas-sions. I encourage students to write withan audience in mind and the assumptionthat their paper may be read by mem-bers of the new community. This maywell be the case if the final assignmentis a publishable paper, as it often is. Bycreating this feeling of active participa-tion, the student’s attitude is often trans-formed and enlivened.

Participation in a community alsomeans developing an understanding ofwho we are vis-à-vis that community—our identity, our role, our passion, and soon. Exposure to other, perhaps conflict-ing, approaches can lead us to reflect onour own beliefs and to challenging ourown assumptions. Where do we stand inthe context of the discourse? What canwe learn from the many perspectivesthat have informed our understanding ofthe subject at hand, from their interac-tions, oppositions, explorations? In thisway, a literature review also becomes an

opportunity for self-understanding, forthe excavation of our implicit assump-tions about our topic, our implicit theo-ries, the origins of our beliefs and therelationship between our intellectualdevelopment and our biography, and theway we approach our subject.

One student told me that the literaturereview took her to places she did notthink she could go—both emotionallyand intellectually. In her research on thehistory of women healers, she becameaware of a whole set of historical cir-cumstances that she was unaware of,including the systematic killing ofwomen healers portrayed as “witches.”The literature review deeply affectedher understanding of the world and ofherself as a woman and a healer. Herimmersion in the literature made hereven more passionate about her subjectand motivated her to expand her contextin time and space to understand theglobal history and role of women heal-ers and, at the same time, look moredeeply at some of her own experiencesfrom this broader perspective.

This student found a new way to seeher participation in academic inquiry asa creative process—a process of self-creation, of exploring her identity in thecontext of inquiry. This has, in my expe-rience, been one of the most excitingaspects of the Creative Inquiry frame forstudents. It creates the opportunity forself-creation and self-discovery throughengagement with the academic work.This process is by no means easy—thesame student described having a virtualnervous breakdown as she delved intothe literature review and began to deeplyquestion who she was, where she fit intothe world she was discovering, and howshe might participate in it. As she articu-lated it later, her research

almost spun me into a crisis sometimes. Itdefinitely uprooted all my assumptionsand beliefs. It definitely challenged me onevery level. It sent me down a rabbit holethat had no return ticket. It takes a leap offaith to do a good creative inquiry litera-ture review and really let all of the newinformation transform you—which it willif you are doing creative inquiry correctly.The literature review was a death-rebirth-death-rebirth process. I did not just have to“see” my assumptions and beliefs but Ihad to “die” to them so new ones could beborn. This is not always the most gracefulprocess.

WINTER 2006 15

For some, a literature review can bean introduction to a world, a community,a discourse, and eventually a career, thatwe choose to pursue. It may thereforehave a profound impact on the directionof our life. For this student, the literaturereview became a transformative experi-ence in many different ways, allowingher to understand the world, her work,and herself in a radically different way.Her literature review became a researchproject that made her aware of a historyof women and women healers that hadgenerally been hidden and eventually ledto a new self-understanding and a deep-er sense of her mission in the world. Herown passion and involvement in theprocess gave her a richer appreciationfor her subject matter and a depth ofunderstanding that is lacking in studentswho have not immersed themselvesquite so deeply in their work.

The voice

If Creative Inquiry proposes thatevery inquiry is also self-inquiry andthat knower and the process of knowingare inextricably interconnected andmutually constitutive, then understand-ing the nature and development of one’svoice in the academic context becomesa central issue. The typical Reproduc-tive voice is determined by the require-ments of a particular academic stylemanual. It is a dry, often jargon-laden“objective voice from nowhere.” Manyacademic journals still promote thiskind of writing, but in practice there isan emerging openness to a richer style,formerly reserved for books and essays.

Students often exaggerate and strug-gle with the constrictions of third-per-son approaches. As a result, they writeoverly formal papers where any trace oftheir own contribution and interpreta-tion has been eliminated (typically thecase in Reproductive literaturereviews), for instance, resorting toreferring to themselves, with evidentdiscomfort, as “this author,” even whenthere has been no explicit request by thefaculty member that the student employthis style. A central challenge then is toencourage students to articulate theirown interpretations and viewpoints,and their passion, in a way that is schol-arly and appropriate to the target jour-nal, rather than fall back on their own

assumptions about the constrictivenature of academic writing.

Narcissists tend to write in a style thatis very personal, which, at times, readsalmost like a journal entry. There tend tobe a lot of references to their own per-sonal experience and to the expressionof feelings and opinions framed in termsof personal “insights.” There is hardlyany reference to the context, the largerdialogue that prompted those insights,and while there may be references toother authors, there is generally little orno effort to truly contextualize theirviews and critically engage the dis-course. Like Jung’s Feeling with Inferi-or Thinking, Narcissists have the ten-dency to become somewhat fanatical intheir views and have a strong tendencyto premature closure, precisely becausethey are so emotionally invested in theirviews and are generally unable to assessthem critically. The fanaticism tends toappear when the student is questionedabout his or her own views. This isbecause Narcissists assume that every-one has a right to their opinion and thatthis is an inalienable right of alternativeeducation, no matter how off the walltheir opinion might be. To challenge aperson’s views is almost considered anattack on freedom of expression and anattempt to deprive the student of some-thing she or he has a right to.

Developing one’s academic voice isa fascinating process. How we addressour colleagues, articulate our ideas,express our thoughts and feelings andintuitions—this is where science alsoembraces art and “self-making.”Developing a voice as a writer and aninquirer is not an easy process. It isactually easier, I believe, to write in an“objective,” third-person researchreport style. Once we bring in our ownexperience, our subjectivity, and ourfeelings about the inquiry, the wholeprocess becomes much more complex.It veers into the realm of art as well asscience, and the criteria for judging thewriting become more complex. Theauthor needs to develop skills that arenot usually addressed in academia, acoherent framework for integratingpersonal experience and the “first per-son” perspective, and articulate it ele-gantly. My experience has been thateven highly trained social scientists

can have trouble with a more essay-style or first-person form because theirtraining has never required them toexplicitly address their own participa-tion in the work they do. The explo-ration of our own voice in an academiccontext, whether in our writing, pre-sentations, or dialogue, is a wonderfulopportunity to begin a process of self-inquiry and self-expansion, as thesocial scientist also becomes a writer,and a contribution to the literature canbegin to mean something literary aswell as scientific.

The exploration and development ofone’s voice in the academic context canbe the nexus of Creative Inquiry, theplace where all the creative tensionsmeet: the art and science, the objectiveand subjective, the rational and the emo-tional, and the universal and the contin-gent. Navigating these creative tensions isan ongoing process, and the developmentof a voice is also an aspiration, not neces-sarily a goal to be achieved once and forall; as an evolutionary process, our voicemay change and develop over time.

To develop a real voice, students needto know themselves well enough andbecome skilled enough writers to con-textualize their work in their own expe-rience, to realize when it is appropriateto introduce a story or personal anec-dote, when they can explicitly bringtheir passion into their work, and how tonavigate the personal and the academicso that they interact synergisticallyrather than in a way that is awkward, dis-jointed, and/or self-indulgent. In thisway, the introduction of the personalvoice goes beyond Narcissism to groundthe writing in lived experience, weddingthe ideas to the realities of life, and per-haps giving an insight into the creativeprocess that led the author to the devel-opment of her or his perspective.

One student wrote that,

Finding my voice is a very organic andintuitive process for me. I have to listendeeply to all the voices I’ve read. I reallytry to “hear” what they are saying. Then Ihave to sit with it and let it sink in deeply.I have to hold all the opposite viewpointswithout judging or comparing, just holdthem all inside. Then I have to look forthe words that create resonance inside ofme. Why do they create resonance? Dothey articulate a personal truth for me?Do they make me feel comfortable? Then


I have to find the words that create disso-nance. Why do they make me feel uncom-fortable? Do they contradict my beliefs?Do they indicate a part or place in me thatneeds to grow/expand?

Then I start to write—again withoutjudgment or fear. I just write about myreactions, feelings, thoughts, intuitions,and insights about the topic. The morehonest I am (even if it is uncomfortable)the more I get in touch with my authenticself. Sooner or later, through the processof writing I find that I do have an opinion,I do have a voice, I do have a unique per-spective AND my writing has a contextbecause I’ve established a relationship toeveryone else who is examining thistopic. I know the opinions, voices andperspectives of others and how they com-pare to my own. I know how my voice fitsinto the chorus of other voices.

The student tunes into herself and intoher “community” and then just begins towrite—without censoring herself in anyway. This is an interesting and usefulway of simply getting in touch with one-self and “turning on the tap,” as it were.As the student states, sooner or later shefinds that in her writing, she is articulat-ing a perspective. The very process ofwriting allows her to articulate herviews—views she may not have beenexplicitly aware of before she startedwriting. In other words, we create whowe are and what we believe as we write.Writing becomes self-creation.

Writing and dialogue give us theopportunity to observe our own voice,to see our thoughts, feelings, and intu-itions become public and interact withthe world. This process points directlyto how the academic can be transforma-tive and the transformative is groundedin the academic. Looking back on theirwork over time, one can see the increas-ing confidence and maturity studentsdevelop in their writing, and the contin-ual dialogue and integration of theirown life experiences and perspectiveswith the literature and the community.Different contexts require differentframes, different angles of approach—from the reflective paper to the varietiesof submissions to scholarly journals—and students learn how to express them-selves and find their voice for a multi-tude of contexts and audiences.

The assistance of friends and col-leagues helps us understand ourselves,helps us understand what we are trying

to say and how we can say it. In theprocess, we also gain a better under-standing of who we are. This is truly anexample of “I am because we are.” Ourown voice emerges in dialogue with our-selves and with others—and althoughthere may remain some constant aspectsof our voice, it is to be hoped that it willkeep changing and transforming inas-much as it will reflect our own changesover the years to come.

Classroom interaction and CreativeInquiry

In a Reproductive approach, class-room interaction emphasizes the impor-tance of trotting out the “right” answerwhen called on with little or no attentionpaid to anything else. There is often anair of competitiveness in Reproductiveclassroom participation and it is notalways constructive. It is easy, of course,to become extremely invested in one’spositions, in being “right,” in wanting toplease the instructor to get a good grade,and it is harder to acknowledge theextent that our ego-investment upholdsour positions and leads to rigidity andcreates an attack/defend, discussion-is-war metaphor—particularly when theparameters set for inquiry do not recog-nize and make that ego-involvement inone’s position itself a valid subject forinquiry. One’s vehemence about one’sposition is then rationalized because it is“right.” Indeed one can be passionateabout something one believes in, but onecan also simply want to win a debate,“truth” be damned.

Excessive and/or unexamined ego-investment can lead to an unwillingnessto thoroughly examine the validity ofone’s own views, beliefs, assumptions,potential blind-spots, and so on, letalone the psychological dimensions ofinquiry (Maslow 1969). Interlocutors inthe classroom can be viewed as oppo-nents to be defeated at all costs, andalthough competition between conflict-ing views and perspectives is perfectlyappropriate, it all hinges on how onecompetes, how one treats one’s inter-locutors, and whether the exchange isviewed as an opportunity to learn andgrow or merely to dig one’s heels in anddefend one’s position from the opposi-tion at all costs (Montuori 1998a).

The Narcissistic mode moves to the

group level in classroom interactions,particularly among students sympatheticto the New Age. In a further oppositionalidentity to Reproducers and to “the oldparadigm,” students often make sureevery voice is heard and focus on creat-ing a largely uncritical and supportiveenvironment where students can sharetheir feelings about what they are goingthrough, their emotional responses totheir work, to their participation in theclass, and so on. When the core assump-tion is that everyone is entitled to his orher own view, to question, challenge, orcritique someone’s view—no matter howoutlandish it seems—is consideredoffensive. Typically, much more atten-tion is placed on “process” and self-reflection in a group context, than on so-called content, the subject matter of theclass. In fact, when the Narcissisticgroup-self is stressed or becomes thecentral focus of attention, it can easilybecome a vehicle for self-indulgence andemotional grandstanding. This collectiveNarcissism occurs because of the oftenexplicit privileging of process over con-tent. In my experience, if the framework,or the demand characteristic, is that theclassroom is the setting for processingemotional self-expression in oppositionto more “academic” matters, this is pre-cisely what the students will deliver. Fac-ulty must come with a clear and capa-cious frame for inquiry to avoid thesekinds of problems.

Not surprisingly, Creative Inquirydraws inspiration for creative interactionfrom jazz. If classroom interaction in theReproductive approach is about who canbe “right,” and the Narcissistic focus ison uncritical, group self-acceptance,Creative Inquiry stresses a spirit ofadventure and creative collaboration.Students are invited to explore theunknown together, to embark on a jour-ney of exploration, addressing the issuesthat really matter to them. Several fac-tors are important and need to be culti-vated right from the beginning.

Framing academic work as CreativeInquiry primes students to think of theirwork as a creative process that builds asense of excitement. Students commentthat this is an unexpected way for themto think about inquiry and graduateschool in general. It stimulates them, notsurprisingly, to think outside the box in

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terms of their own work, their capacities,their goals, their understanding of col-laborative work, and the way they canparticipate in an educational experience.

In the context of group and classroominteraction, students are encouraged tosee their work as a collaborative creativeprocess. Metaphors from the arts can beuseful here, and I personally use theimage of a jazz group, highly skilledimprovising musicians who both supportand challenge each other during perfor-mance (Montuori 1996, 1998b; Purserand Montuori 1994). Creative Inquiryprovides a framework students can useto make sense of their new activities asan exploration of the unknown, a frame-work that nevertheless draws on a longtradition. In the same way that anyexplorer might prepare for an expeditionand plunge into the unknown ready todeal with uncertainty, a student groundshimself in the field, develops skills,knowledge, and passionate attitudetoward scholarship, and then embarks ona journey. The sense of a creativeendeavor held by a group of jazz musi-cians is not limited to “the mind,” “emo-tion,” “collaboration,” or “self-explo-ration” because the music can be viewedas requiring the ongoing interaction ofall these elements and more.

Furthermore, a musician’s ability toperform depends also on his or her lifeexperience. As the old saying has it,“you play who you are.” Students are,therefore, encouraged to draw on theirown personal experience, their back-ground, and to bring all of who they areto bear on the dialogue and the inquiry.This involves the ability to integrate thevarious aspects of one’s being to be pre-sent in the moment with as much ofoneself as one can bring to bear on themoment. This is in contraposition to arather fragmented view of the academicor intellectual devoid of emotion, sub-jectivity, personal experience, or bias. InCreative Inquiry, the challenge is notremoving all hints of subjectivity andbias but, rather, being able to bring all ofoneself, biases and all, to the inquiry—and, indeed, the biases and assumptionsbecome valid and even necessary sub-jects for inquiry in and of themselves, aspart of our self-inquiry. In a collabora-tive context, students learn from theirinteractions and draw on the wisdom

and experience of their colleagues. Asone student wrote:

I am amazed at the amount of learningthat I’m experiencing in this shared con-text. It really has an exponential feeling toit. I am learning about music, art, dance,philosophy, history, language, thought,processing thought, emotions, ego, fear,humor, but mostly I am getting a sense ofeach of you! You are coming to life forme! Amazing! Anyone else blown awayby all this?

Most of what the student has beenlearning about has not come from me,the instructor, or even the readings. Itcomes from her fellow students who arehighly educated and intelligent and havean enormous amount to contribute to thedialogue. Asked about the role ofinstructors, another student writes:

My instructors have an uncanny ability tomeet right at the place where I am stuck orconflicted or resistant and give me that lit-tle nudge that I need to keep moving forward—much like a healer does. Wehave a saying in my field, “all healing isself-healing. All the healer does is supportthe process.” I think the same is true oflearning. “All learning is self-learning. Allthe instructor does is support the process.”

I believe the Creative Inquiry frame-work—stressing as it does the role ofrigor and imagination, discipline andimprovisation, grounding in knowledgebases and creative speculation—can pro-vide graduate students with a generativecontext for their learning through dia-logue and interaction. The musicalmetaphor stresses the importance ofdeveloping a thorough skill and knowl-edge base to be able to perform and, also,the ability to collaborate together on thisexpedition. Interestingly, it soon becomesvery clear that to collaborate together, toperform, collaboration requires both“soft” intra- and interpersonal skills and“hard” musical skills. It is not enough tobe supportive and collaborative if onecannot perform well on harder, moretechnically demanding passages.

Creative Inquiry emphasizes the valueof taking risks and utilizing not-knowingas an ally. Acknowledging our state ofnot-knowing becomes a way to deepeninquiry rather than a mark of ignorance(hence the use of the term not-knowingrather than ignorance, which carriesdecidedly negative connotations). Thenotion of not-knowing is directly related

to creativity because the creative process,by its very nature, leads to somethingthat cannot be known in advance.Research on creative individuals showsthat they actively seek out the unknown,challenge assumptions, and have a pref-erence for complexity—for whatever it isthat does not fit into established ordersand frameworks. Creative Inquiry culti-vates these attitudes and characteristicsin individual and collaborative settings.

Students are not encouraged to try to“look good” by giving easy, predigest-ed, trivial answers or even focusing ondemonstrating what they know. Theyare invited to share their questions andconcerns, to use their not-knowing (thefact that they do not have all theanswers, and that they are embarkinginto territory that, for them, is unchart-ed, both in terms of their overall acade-mic experience and their chosen topic ofinquiry) as an opportunity to challengeassumptions, to look at the materialwith fresh eyes, and to enjoy their jour-ney. Interestingly, over the years, I havefound that students find it surprisinglyhard to approach a dialogue with ques-tions—often because it is simply toounusual and uncomfortable for them tohave to say, “I don’t get this,” “Explainthat part better.” They are also some-times concerned that admitting igno-rance, as it were, when a spiritual matteris involved, might be an indication ofbeing somehow “un-evolved.” CreativeInquiry helps students frame question-ing as positive rather than negative—ascreative not-knowing—and allows themto go beyond these concerns.

A key factor in creating an atmosphereof creative collaboration involves enter-ing into inquiry with an attitude ofcuriosity and excitement. This is stimu-lated by the fact that the students reallydo not know the material and that, cer-tainly at the graduate level—in the con-text of addressing the human condition inthe largest sense—everyone, includingfaculty, can be thought of as an explorer.It is precisely this collective not-knowingand embarking on a journey of discoverytogether that can create the greatest soli-darity, in the same way that jazz musi-cians do not know what will emerge asthey embark on a collective improvisa-tion of a particular song. It is importantto reemphasize that this kind of collec-


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tive improvisation is only possible withmusicians who have, or are developing,solid instrumental skills and a solidgrounding in the vocabulary of jazz.Likewise the students must do therequired work, read the required read-ings, and immerse themselves in the fieldto avoid the pitfall of Narcissism. Facul-ty can model this creative not-knowingby showing how not-knowing can be asource and motivator for inquiry, ratherthan a weakness. One way of doing thisis to discuss one’s own intellectual devel-opment, one’s present research agenda,and the pitfalls, uncertainties, as well asthe uncertain and contingent nature ofknowledge and inquiry themselves. Inother words, to present inquiry into thecreative process with a degree of trans-parency and not just the reconstructedlogic of justification. I have used a forth-coming book of autobiographical essaysfrom leading “new science” thinkers togive students insights into the develop-ment of eminent scholars they may bereading. This allows students to developa more grounded and “human” under-standing of the activity of inquiry, of par-ticipation in a community of inquirers,and of self-creation and self-definition inan academic context.

One student, in her first semester,writes:

I asked myself how to be a CreativeInquirer. I think that a good place to startis to listen to myself: What is relevant forme in this moment of my existence? Whatis meaningful for me? It’s like askingmyself which instrument I am given toplay for a jam session. So, I start playingwith the instrument. And then I enter thelearning community. I need to listen toothers, to your voices. How can I enterand attune in the process? How can Iattune my voice with your voices? Howcan my existential questions intertwinewith your process? These questions arenot meant to be answered: they areexpressed to set the intention. We jamtogether and the instructor warns us:don’t worry about the final outcome,don’t worry about not being an experi-enced performer yet, we are just firstmonth of the doctoral program.

The talent of the inquirer is to emergefrom the field with a melody that attuneswith the community’s “chord progres-sion” and contributes to the unfolding ofthe collective performance. So, I wouldsay that in Creative Inquiry originalitypertains to the relationship betweenself/community. The community’s learn-

ing process enhances individual learningthat enhances system learning . . . a spiralprocess of mutuality and interdepen-dence. Is the collective melody prior toindividual voices, or are individual voicesprior to collective melody? The Zen mas-ter would ask if the waves are prior toocean or if the ocean is prior to wave.

In this week’s discussion I have expe-rienced the power of jamming. Some-times I got bored in this discussion; I feltlost; but I have tried to keep open. I havecommitted myself to drop in and give my2 cents and read your posting, withfocused attention and with relaxed aware-ness. I have learned that jamming is asimportant as performing. In other words,the process of learning as a value in itself,regardless of the content.

The student draws on her own experi-ence, her needs and assessment of whatis relevant, and seeks to align with thedialogue in the group, in the same waythat a soloist in a jazz performanceexpresses herself with her own soundand her own interpretation of the songin the context of the band’s overall read-ing of the song. She admits that she gotlost at times and became bored butchose to participate, to show up anyway,and she recognizes the value in that par-ticipation—the opportunity to learnabout the process of participating aswell as about the subject matter itself.

Students learn to avoid the extremesof viewing classroom interaction aseither a venue for excessive criticism,one-upmanship, and competition in itsmore unproductive forms or for exces-sive navel-gazing, group-processing,uncritical support, and unproductivecooperation. In other words, studentsdevelop an understanding of the waythey can navigate the extremes, avoid-ing unproductive polarizations andmoving toward generative tensions. Iencourage them to support each otherin the learning and explain that this isalso done through constructive criti-cism. I frame this in the context of thefinal assignment, which is often a pub-lishable paper: the participants in thecourse are there to help each otherwrite the best possible paper to submitto a journal. And it is an obligation tothe class colleagues to be critical if thepaper has weaknesses. Surely it is bet-ter to be assisted by one’s own class-mates’ criticism than to have the paperskewered by a reviewer. Students learn

to support each other by challengingeach other, in the same way that apiano player in a jazz group mightchallenge the saxophone soloist—play-ing chords behind him that provide asolid, supportive grounding but that,also, stretch the soloist with, forinstance, unusual chord substitutionsor syncopations.

The above examples give some ideaof how I have used the framework ofCreative Inquiry in the classroom. Theapproach can be developed in many dif-ferent ways, and many differentmetaphors can be used, of course. Ihope I have given some idea of theexperience here.

Conclusion

I began this article by presentingsome comments made by graduate stu-dents entering incoming alternative pro-grams. I then presented three differentframeworks for inquiry, two based onmy assessment of students’ polarizedperception of education as either Repro-ductive (traditional) or Narcissistic(alternative). I explored some of the cul-tural and psychological roots of this ten-dency toward polarization and then out-lined a third approach, Creative Inquiry,that integrates the best of both worlds:i.e., academic rigor and scholarship, andself-inquiry and transformation. I used aseries of musical metaphors to highlightthe differences between the threeapproaches and concluded by givingclassroom examples in three differentareas.

The quest for an alternative educationcan itself be an opportunity for transfor-mation—personal, educational, andsocial transformation—and for thedevelopment of a creative approach toinquiry. Excavating the polarities thatrun through educational processes,uncovering the assumptions that split upfunctions that should be vitally connect-ed, and beginning to bring them togeth-er, each in our own way, we can, as stu-dents, educators, and citizens, becomeengaged in an ongoing creative processwhere we not only challenge the waywe have thought about education andinquiry and the very nature of our think-ing about them but begin to formulateappropriate ways of envisioning andembodying new possibilities.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I thank the many colleagues and studentswho have explored these ideas with me. Inparticular, I thank Matthew Bronson, AllanCombs, Dan Crowe, Ian Grand, Sean Kelly,Gabrielle Pelicci, Jim Ryan, David Ulansey,and Judie Wexler at the California Instituteof Integral Studies; Heinz Von Foerster, towhom this article is dedicated, woke me upto the need to really own my ideas onememorable afternoon in Pescadero; andEdgar Morin continues to be a treasuredfriend and inspiration with his work onmethod and complex thought.

NOTES

1. The intriguing relationship betweenmethodology and anxiety-reduction hasbeen explored by Devereux (1968).

2. Mitroff’s work has articulated usefulapplications of the Jungian typology forsocial science inquiry (Kilmann and Mitroff1976; Krippner and Combs 1998; Mitroffand Kilmann 1978).

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The Quest for a New Education