‘시인-교육자’로서의 정지용과 그의 산문에 나타난 교육 담론

Abstract

This study examined the educational perspectives of Jeong Ji-yong, who was devoted to the teaching profession for most of his adult life, with a focus on his prose by dividing them into his perspectives on children's education and youth education, on women's education, and on literary education. The findings were as follows. First, Jeong believed that common children could be brought up into good citizens and hoped that schools would provide education based on scientific and rational methods. Feeling sorry for the children of Joseon, who did not grow up being treated respectfully, he communicated and got along with young students as their teacher and predecessor. Second, he had a relatively conservative view of women. After teaching girls at Ewha women's college, he took an interest in equality between the sexes and the liberation of women. His transition process naturally happened according to his attitude toward getting along and communicating with his students without constraints as an educator. Finally, he had trained aspiring poets as a "poet-educator" since the late Japanese rule. After liberation, he placed importance on the attitude of training genius through persistent learning and training, as well as natural genius. For him, teaching aspiring writers was not transferring simple knowledge and skills but carefully training genius and talent. It seems the cultivation of Neo-Confucianism and the Christian upbringing theory were at the root of his teaching. A look into his characteristics as an educator will help to broaden the understanding of him as a person and to verify his consistent educational viewpoints and attitudes before and after liberation. It will also help to open up the possibility of identifying the literary source that is consistent throughout his literary life beyond the viewpoint of his process from his early to later works being his transformation.