Michel de Montaigne: Education as Self-Awareness and Autonomy

Despite the centuries that separate us from his work, Montaigne’s educational thought still has much to offer to the needs of our pluralistic and democratic societies. Aiming to educate a well-formed rather than a well-filled mind, Montaigne’s Essays represent a plea for a pragmatist education that changes and improves the self. Throughout the modern period, his reflections have inspired educators as diverse as Locke, Rousseau, Emerson, and Dewey. Criticizing the authoritarian and verbalist models of education of his time, which fill the memory but leave the conscience empty, Montaigne emphasizes the importance of a learning based on child’s desire and capabilities. In our era of excessive information and data, Montaigne’s philosophy of education reminds us that the development of our cognitive performances must be subordinated to a certain knowledge of what is good for human beings.