Short Abstract:

The current research aims to explore the democratic potential of narrative imagination (Nussbaum, 2008) by inquiring students' self-narratives about flourishing opportunities. Through a narrative-appreciative design, the project involves voluntary students from three courses of Padua University in “WONDER”, a generative dialogue on human development towards an open flourishing manifesto.

Long Abstract:

In a contemporary scenario of liquid modernity (Bauman, 2002) and oppression (Freire, 1973), education assumes new but eternal ecosystemic responsibilities: educating for social justice, equity and freedom (Nussbaum, 1997, 2002).

However, the educational systems, particularly in higher education, harbor a paradox where individual fulfillment and community well-being still takes a backseat to academic success and economic progress.

Consequently, students' narratives about human rights and equal opportunities for personal growth are often disregarded, developing a sense of detachment from any interpersonal connection (Rosales, Frangioni & Marroccoli, 2019).

Within this frame, more and more university students are demanding for a shift of perspective, from performative to generative, where educational contexts finally support emerging individual and relational capabilities that, through appropriate resources, can become effective functionings (Volstad et al, 2020). Thus, higher education is required to acknowledge its crucial role in supporting students' right to live in a world that is deemed worth living in, as articulated by Walker (2009).

But, how to deal with this urgent need?

A potential avenue for the democratic cultivation of society, according to Nussbaum (2008), is represented by the use of “narrative imagination”, the capacity to interpret one's own history and empathize with the experiences of others, envisioning improved life scenarios for everyone.

Considering these premises, our research aims to answer the following questions: which are the opportunities of flourishing currently offered by University, according to students’ self-narratives? Which are the ideal opportunities aspired by the students? Which common flourishing dimensions equally emerge from students’ narratives? And, in which ways can self-narratives support students’ personal flourishing within the University contexts?

Therefore, the project find its main core in self-narratives as valuable medium for inquiring personal capabilities and individual aspirations aligned with the concept of ancient εὐδαιμονία (eudaimonia), denoting a flourishing life (D'Olimpio, 2022; Duraiappah et al., 2022).

The principal purposes are discovering flourishing experiences emerging from undergraduate students’ narratives; learning about students' aspirations of flourishing by enhancing practices of narration through appreciation; engaging students to co-create their flourishing manifest, in the form of an Open Educational Resource (OER), shareable with the university students’ representatives, in order to make this topic a communitarian discussion since living well in education is a right that regards each of us, all of us.

Grounded in the Interpretivist Paradigm and driven by the lens of the Capability Approach, our research adopts a methodological blend of Narrative Inquiry and Appreciative Inquiry, featuring a sensitive focus on human development. Indeed, this unique combination looks for finding actions and policies that are needed to guarantee the empowerment of everyone’s capabilities (Sen & Nussbaum, 1993). In particular, the first methodology employs self-narratives as in-depth living data, means of understanding individuals’ perspectives (Connelly and Clandinin, 1990); while the second methodology seeks for images of the possible within personal storytelling, through a strength-based frame and a 4-D cycle design (Whitney & Cooperrider, 1998). These four distinct steps precisely delineate the various phases of our research.

Then, following a bottom-up design, the project involves the voluntary students emerging from three different university courses, aligning with the concept of "Grassroot Innovation" (Belda-Miquel, Pellicer-Sifres & Boni, 2020), advocating for a circular and integrated connection between individuality and relationality.

Through this research, we expect to give the opportunity to contemplate students’ autobiographical epistemologies and personal telos concerning both present and aspired opportunities of flourishing, engaging them to co-build a shared flourishing manifest that serves as starting foundation for a connective WONDER – a process that involves questioning and marveling on equal and accessible educational paths for human development.