Modern Greek Enlightenment Research Papers (original) (raw)

Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi (1746-1827), the great Swiss pedagogue, not only decisively influenced his native country with his work, but also changed the education practice worldwide during his lifetime. The reception of Pestalozzi’s pedagogical ideas and the pedagogical influence which was exercised in this way, as well, in the Greek region during the 19th century, is an important issue for the formation of Modern Greek Pedagogy.
Adamantios Korais (1748-1833), who was a leading figure of the Modern Greek Enlightenment, was the one who gave prominence to the work of the great Swiss educator in Greece, as early as 1809. This activity was part of the “metakenosis” of the Lights in enslaved Greece. The leading Greek periodical of the pre-revolutionary years Logios Hermes (1811-1821), published in Vienna, played an important role in the dissemination of Pestalozzi’s ideas.
Ioannis Kapodistrias (1776-1831), the first Greek Governor, acting alongside the initiatives of the Greek Enlighteners, believed that the Greek people as a whole needed education in order to be able to claim their freedom; for that reason, he was actively concerned about the state of education in his enslaved homeland. He showed a particular interest in the educational system which was being developed during those years in Switzerland and expressed his admiration for Pestalozzi’s work. Besides, Kapodistrias had personally met Pestalozzi. The Greek Governor had also expressed the same interest in the work of Pestalozzi’s “faithful student”, the noble politician Philippe-Emmanuel von Fellenberg (1771-1844).
Unfortunately, after the Greek Governor’s tragic assassination, his welfare program for the orphans, inspired by the movement of Philanthropismus, deteriorated and shrank. The Othonic monarchy, in collaboration with the Regency, which followed the assassination of Kapodistrias, imposed the one-way Bavarian educational system, with elements from the neo-humanistic and the classicist practice of the time, whereas Philanthropismus was abandoned. This trend was reinforced by many Greek educators who, as scholarship recipients of associations and bequests, studied in Germany during that period, and transferred these pedagogical ideas to Greece.
Finally, systematic historical and bibliographical research shows that Pestalozzi’s writings were also heavily ignored in post-revolutionary Greece.