Interview with Peter Mayo: Concepts may become “the serpents beneath the innocent flowers”

Uğur Karslı

Prof. Dr. Peter Mayo, who participated as a guest at the 6th Democratic Education Congress organized by Eğitim Sen last month, emphasized that “we need critical consciousness more than ever,” concluding his remarks by saying, “While moving within the framework, think outside the box of the framework. (In this way) we think of a different world which we can collectively create”.  Mayo, an education sociologist whose many books have been translated into our language, answered our questions on topics ranging from the philosophy of education to politics in light of his inspiring speech given at the congress.

As you concluded your speech at the Democratic Education Congress (6th DEK) held in Ankara in August, you referred to the metaphor of “the serpent beneath the innocent flowers” from Shakespeare’s Macbeth. Throughout much of your speech, you emphasized that the shift from UNESCO’s c