Jacques Rancière: 'The Flipped Classroom'

      French theorist Rancière's views on education are as ever thought provoking now as they were in 1968. The idea of no hierarchy, no 'old wise one' and emancipated learning isn't necessarily addressed too in modern day, mainstream educational environments yet lives through the lives of some. 
People have always been split into two categories, Theory X and Theory Y. 
      Douglas McGregor's motivational theory says 'theory X' workers/students don't enjoy learning or taking on any kind of responsibility. This 'category' of people needs supervision and incentives to work, and will do very little independently. However, when looking at Rancière's 'flipped classroom' theory, this would only necessarily work with theory Y students who actively take control of their own education, and have the motivation to overturn the social norms of tutor-lead learning. 

As the French culture became more volatile with civil unrest throughout the 1960's, counter cultures started emerging and the birth of the 'free love' movement was born. The acceptance of new forms of social interaction, alongside youth subcultures lead to the traditional gender and social roles being slowly broken down, a process still occurring to this day. Rancière himself was part of the Parisian art school movement in May 1968, advocating a left wing protest. Average workers were rebelling and their messages of change were perpetuated by the visual communication of art students, produced in the print rooms of Les Beaux-Arts. The Parisian students acted as activists to build a revolutionary new world, one that sadly did not fully take full shape. Rancière's idea that education is demeaning and overly-confirmative isn't overtly far from the truth, yet one can argue by having one elected specialist, in full possession of correct factual knowledge, this would guide the additional cohort to a more refined outcome of learning. By adapting the theory of having no teacher, yet realising the value of 'traditionally taught' education, one is free to explore their own practice and take full control of their own learning, with the asked guidance of a 'specialist'. Rancière felt that teachers were only interested in creating specialists, one person assigned to be the best in every job (within societal limitations), a structure the revolutionists tried to break down.

Despite todays educational system still containing a set hierarchy, it is interesting to further break down why that is. Taking on Louis Althusser's ideology that anyone can learn anything, after being exiled from Paris to Flemish speaking Netherlands in the late 18th century, his students were forced into being Theory Y learners by Althessue simply giving them Télémaque, a translatable 1699 novel to learn independently. This technique surprisingly worked, yet one can question wether it was the mental attitude/motivation at the time of the 1700's, or the leadership of such an 'inspirational' figure.     
     It could even be argued that this simplistic leadership technique is still used today by the premise of dissertations; by giving a self-directed task and topics in which to explore, the student is sent away to figure it out for themselves. We however, are less remarkable than those in the early 18th century as we have the aid of the internet. Due to the ability of accessing any information at our fingertips, the need for a hierarchical tutor structure is less needed as any information one needs, they can simply self-seek.