Learning democracy. Beyond Traditional Didactics

Abstract

The article analysis learning about democracy and citizenship in the new, alternative environments, that are created through civic activism ('occupying' unused spaces for cultural and learning activities, organizing peaceful protests against autocratic city planning and urbanism without participation of citizens, and similar actions.). This kind of learning is always a kind of community organized activity, whereby community is not understood in the traditional way, but as togetherness, as the collective action of citizens where people learn, through urban activism, about the values and mechanisms of democracy through practicing it. The new practices of this kind of learning in Serbia are analysed from the point of view of three theoretical approaches – public pedagogy, critical theory and embodied learning.