Pesquisa em Educação: o debate modernidade e pós-modernidade

Abstract

This article discusses the effects that the debate on the overcoming of modernity and the supposed establishment of a postmodernity has on education as a knowledge field, especially on the research in this field. We propose a critical discussion on the thesis that we live in postmodernity, because of the importance given to such an idea in social thought. Our main point is that the expression 'postmodernity' doesn't have the strength or power of a philosophical concept, and thus it has no sense. Beyond the debate on the end or not of modernity, the notion of hypermodernity appears as an option. Proposed by Lipovetsky, it is a way to characterize the contemporary world, searching for its implications. In this article, we work on the epistemological and political issues of the modernity/ postmodernity discussion, as well as its meaning to education research. Finally, we conclude by taking a position on this discussion in the name of the thought and the creative power of the research in education.