**6. Final thoughts**

beings, are part of a larger living system that gets organized to generate life. For the Chilean educator, education is the darkest expression of the crisis of Euro-Western civilization:

• I would like to be extremely sincere in reviewing the energy background of our civilization

• The contemporary education, in almost everywhere in the West, does not fulfill its task of

• It neither provides the natural germs of vitality nor the values of the intimate. It does not develop creative potentials, intellectual freedom, or the uniqueness of skills. It does not

• Its task is at the service of political and economic power and, to fulfill this mission, it orga-

• The current education tends to produce servile adaptation to the established. It seeks to create a sense of duty and an attitude of respect toward things that are not respectable [30].

Rolando Toro mentions 15 assumptions of the biocentric theory, including the following: biodance is oriented by "an ecological concept of human and cosmic relationships"; biodance postulates a prophylactic action that transcends the borders of conventional therapy, attempting to prevent diseases to manifest; it postulates a community-centered social change system and not client focused; biodance is a theory based on Human Sciences (Anthropology, Etiology, Biology, Medicine, Psychology, and Sociology), and "does not stem from any special ideological, religious, or psychological system"; "biodance is an evolutionary—not

Why biodance? Rolando Toro was born in the territory that, before 1492, was occupied by a wide diversity of indigenous people having (and they still have) dance as an existential practice to connect with the natural and spiritual world. Furthermore, Toro lived through the crisis of social, political, and epistemological paradigms that would get expressed in a more striking manner in the rebellions of youngsters, in several countries through the 1960s, against the materialistic, destructive, and consumerist rationale of West European modernity; a rationale that fosters competition, war, and deaths. Biodance theory is hence a theory aspiring to promote life and the peaceful and respectful coexistence of humans and nonhumans alike; it is an approach proposing a new educational/upbringing paradigm for subjects that are capable of feeling, coexisting, and connecting to the life beings community, be it at local level or in any other living environment in the universe; it is a systemic and holistic vision of the world, based on a dialogical interaction between the tradition, wisdom, and knowledge

Rolando Toro says that the "biodance" concept gets close to the idea of *Dancing Your Life*, from the French philosopher Roger Garaudy, who expressed his dance philosophy as one of the vital components of live beings, humans included; to live and interact with nature dancing for life. Dance, according to Garaudy, "is a complete way of living the world; it is knowledge, art, and religion, all at once." So dance "shows us that what is sacred is carnal as well, and the

providing the individual with internal guidelines for development.

112 New Pedagogical Challenges in the 21st Century - Contributions of Research in Education

nizes magnificent programs of psychological sterilization.

and its darker expression: Education.

foster the splendor of human relationships.

revolutionary—system" [30].

produced by contemporary science.

Overall, we found that Latin America reached the end of the twentieth century having accomplished a significant part of the educational ideals proposed and claimed by the generation of educators born and graduated in the first half of that same century. All countries implemented a national public education system "for all." Literacy includes the wide majority of the population. Elementary education has become an obligation of the family and a duty of the state. There are school buildings implemented in all regions, cities, and small villages. Each country has developed its university-level teacher qualification policy. New universities came up, as well as a new breed of educators-researchers. Science and scientific knowledge have been absorbed by the school culture. "Liberal democracy" has become the dominant (and practically only) paradigm of a State, with the exception of Cuba and occasional "Coup" attempts, which are still a political practice fostered and validated by conservative sections of Latin-American countries and imperialistic Northern governments.

Many conquests and few victories—The metrics of violence against the poor, Afrodescendant, and indigenous populations are ingrained in what is known as the "banality of evil." Social disparity between the rich and the poor is shamefully staggering. The national educational system has made significant improvements to the living conditions of many families; however, it is a bureaucratic system that perpetuates the "banking education" rationale and develops a schooled population deprived of intellectual autonomy and critical thinking, as intended by the educators who dreamed about and believed in the transforming role of modern education. Elementary school teachers' working conditions and compensation are still in indigenous and demotivating situation in most countries.

From either left or right, Latin America has adopted the developmentalist model from the West European modernity. The educational system and professional training for teachers were both adjusted to match this model. The inter-ethnical plurality of national States only began to be acknowledged in fact during the first decade of the twenty-first century. Some states dignified the rights of their autochthonous people; however, in most, their situation entails hostility, violence, and exclusion.

Eurocentrism still dominates the curricular structure of national education systems at all levels. Most scientists and educators in Latin America have not yet noticed or acknowledged the effects of the epistemological domain of Eurocentrism in its way of seeing "problems" and "solutions" for Latin America. However, a new generation of educators has undertaken the

challenges left by the generation that designed the initial framework of liberating education, of the decolonial education, of the pedagogy of the *Abya Yala* people, and of the education that values the life and the well-living of all live beings.

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