2022년 개정 교육과정 국어과 ‘내용 체계’의 변화와 현대소설 교육의 과제 - 환경·생태 위기와 다문화·소수자 문제를 중심으로

Abstract

As the 2022 revised curriculum is finalized, many changes are expected in secondary school literature(novel) education in the future. Environmental/ecological crises and social conflicts, which are pointed out as the background of curriculum revision in the general discussion, deserve attention in that they are particularly related to the field of literature. Therefore, in this paper, we discussed how the environmental/ecological crisis and social inequality/minority issues, which were pointed out as the immediate challenges of our community in the new curriculum, can be meaningfully learned through literature(novel) education. In the existing novel education, environmental and ecological problems were mainly focused on introspecting the destruction of nature by humans on the premise of the dichotomy of human and nature separation. However, novel education that learns ecological sensibility as a matter of course not only abstracts the complexity of the social dimension inherent in the climate/environmental crisis, but is also less effective as novel education itself. As examined in Chapter 2, it is because the novel method of existing textbooks that emphasizes the necessity of ecological education not only ignores the complexity and urgency of the environmental and ecological crisis, but also has a high possibility of causing misreading of the work. Social inequality and minority problem education using novels also have similar problems. As examined in Chapter 3, if the educational use method of novel text is not considered, there is a possibility that novels dealing with minority issues will rather be learned as a medium to identify minorities or promote social inequality. Most of the dilemmas that arise when learning about environmental /ecological crises and social inequality/minority issues using novels stem from the stylistic characteristics of novels that rely on causal narratives. Since novels represent problems in reality as causal narratives, there is always a possibility that they are not distinguished from the representation system of reality or that they are appropriated by the dominant ideology. Therefore, in order to learn community issues meaningfully using novels, it is necessary to pay attention not only to causal narratives but also to the mediating action of novels. The realistic problems of our community still exist as limitations in Korean novels that reflect them, but literature has the self-aware capacity to see through the limitations built into its style itself. Literature uses the referential function of language, but it is defined as literature because it can determine the use and legitimacy of language as a tool to represent reality. Therefore, the task of mastering the unique capabilities of this literary language should be a key way to prevent individual isolation and foster a sense of community among learners.