ON INTEGRATIVE STUDY

Integrative Study Contemplates principles of integration revealed by life at its many hierarchic levels. Since living systems can be understood only by reference to their transformations over time, the objects of integrative study are narratives (histories, case histories, works of literature, etc.). The discourse does not stop at any disciplinary boundary, yet integrative study is not anarchic but is guided by frameworks of thought which it constructs. In this form of study the asymmetry between teacher and student, speaker and audience is greatly reduced; participants derive from a diversity of backgrounds; the common language, the language of everyday life is used; communication is primarily oral, face-to-face, rather than via the written word. Integrative study takes place where we are, with the people among whom we live, and exerts a benign integrative influence on the community in which it takes place.