A phenomenon in the making: the Hizmet Movement, its philosophy on education, schools, and notions of bilingual education

Education in general, and bilingual education in particular, faces many challenges in the U.S. As an immigrant receiving country, the U.S. is in dire need of sound language programs that will both maintain the use of home language and improve the English proficiency of bilingual children. This will also benefit the monolingual English-speaking students as well. This study looks into a new emerging movement deeply involved in education: The Hizmet Movement (HM). Its emergence, philosophy, educational practices, and approaches to bilingual education are the focus of the study. The research question aims to bring out the views of HM administrators on education as well as bilingual education. The present day leader of the HM, Mr. Fethullah Gülen, was interviewed and his responses were taken as the basis for the HM’s educational philosophy. Phenomenology was adopted as a research method to collect, process, and analyze data. Some key findings include the following: a) the HM participants see education as a lifelong process to be pursued with passion and interest, b) the Gülenian approach offers a more Sufism oriented socio-cultural approach to education that includes altruism, inner ethics, morality, and tolerance, c) bilingual education does not exist in HM schools. However, those schools qualify as multicultural and/or multilingual schools in terms of student body with educators offering education in a monolingual setting, d) Mr. Gülen sees women as an indispensable part of the society and education.

Name thesis:degree_name

Ph.D.

Level thesis:degree_level

Dissertation

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Secondary & Continuing Educ

Grantor

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Year dc:date

2014

Author dc:creator

• Incetas, Yusuf

Contributors dc:contributor

• Willis, Arlette I.
• Garcia, Georgia E.
• Harris, Violet J.
• Yurtsever, Ali

• Hizmet Movement (HM)
• Fethullah Gulen
• Gulenian philosophy
• bilingual education
• multicultural education
• bilingualism
• multiculturalism
• social context of education
• education
• language education
• phenomenology
• bricolage
• Hizmet phenomenon
• phenomenological research
• Gulen Movement (GM)
• Fethullah Gülen
• The Gülenian philosophy
• Gülen Movement
• Gülen

Statement dc:rights

• Copyright 2014 Yusuf Incetas

Language dc:language

en

Handle dc:identifier

http://hdl.handle.net/2142/49621

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/49621