George Lucas and Anthroposophy...

I am new and lurk to learn 90% of the time, but I am embarking on a project that I want some feedback on. I wanted to know first though if anyone here has a background that has led them to the works of Steiner (or even Goethe) and Anthroposophy in relation to the SW Saga. My formal work is in the realm of Steiner and his methods of education, i.e. the Waldorf school movement/Waldorf homeschooling movement. The SW Saga is full of anthroposophical notes, not surprising since George is a supporter of the Waldorf school movement, his children from what I understand attend/ed the Marin school and Kurtz also has strong Waldorf ties.

I teach at conferences on Waldorf education and bringing these ideals home... mostly to homeschoolers, but also to families that just want to be more connected with each other and the Universe around them. I find the concepts in Steiner's work are really hard to present to some people, it's NOT a lack of intelligence, it's our society and how we have been programmed to only learn in certain ways. My project will deal greatly with using SW to explain much of Steiner's philosophy to the public at large. Yeah, I know that some would say the Saga is good without indepth conversation, but it is also a huge learning tool at the same time about humankind.

It sounds nutty, but any feedback would be great.

 

The largest connection I see between Lucas and Steiner is an interest in mystical matters and the occult. That is more of an Indiana Jones connection than a Star Wars one.

I'm no expert of Steiner and from what I've read, I disagree with his system of education, while not disagreeing with all of the ideas. Are there large parts of Star Wars which you could say have been influenced by Steiner? Are there specific examples from the films?

-Seldon

 

I'd love to know what parts of his educational ideas you disagree with... I have studied his methods and while I do NOT think they work for ALL children, I do think they are a good model, and when modified from their original base to fit today's models, there is much logic in his work. I have seen it work with my own children as well as my clients.

I agree with your assessment of the Indiana Jones flicks... maybe for a broader Steiner base those would be a good set to work from, but for this project... which I should explain in more detail, just looking at the SW Saga would suffice. The project encompasses bringing Waldorf education to dads, and in specific, homeschooling dads. As women, it's often times easier for us to grasp some of Steiner's ideals because the root of them is so close to the transformation that happens in motherhood, but a lot of his thoughts on education get muddled in the explanation of them... like a game of telephone. Two of the biggest Steiner concepts that I can see easily explaing to new Waldorf dads via SW are temperament, and control of the will... it's use in the life cycle, etc. The use of biography in the saga is pretty amazing too.

It's not just the esoteric thinking that I feel is present in the SW Saga, tying it to Steiner, it's broader than that... and I am having trouble articulating that completely in this post. And of course it should go without saying that Steiner did NOT invent these ideas! Everyone is influenced by someone, usually many someones... so his work was a compiling of many things he studied, translated, etc. and some of those ideas have changed over the last 100 years and been rewritten to fit for today.

The very idea of this came out of my meditating on my role in a lot of things, one being how I can help families that come across these concepts integrate what they want and feel free to leave what doesn't work for them. I need to be able to meet families where they are, men and women alike...I never would have thought to look here for the medium... if that makes sense, but the more I watch the more I find that Waldorf can be explained with SW... of course it doesn't go the other way! lol. Bringing balance to ones home is a little like bringing balance to the Force, yk?

 

UPDATE... I am updating here because I'd like to see if there is any interest from this group in helping me with this project.

There is a possibility that there could be a book from this idea. I am working on my outline for it now. I have found large connections with Lucas and the Waldorf school movement, from early on in his career, that doesn't mean I think he was influenced by the movement, but that they run parallel in a lot of ways.

The types of volunteers I am looking for are those with a good indepth knowledge of SW that would be willing to learn about Waldorf education using SW as a model. I have plenty of people that know about Waldorf education and want to learn about SW, so I really need a group of folks from the SW crowd. I don't care about age, demographics, etc. I want a nice sampling of folks.

If you are interested, please PM me. Thanks!

 

Sounds interesting.
Do you have any details of a direct connection between Lucas and Anthroposophy?

-Seldon

 

>Do you have any details of a direct connection >between Lucas and Anthroposophy?

I DO!! And more is coming in by the minute. The connections that I have are of him directly in the Waldorf school movement. From what I am piecing together, there is a connection between Marcia Lucas and Meridith Kurtz, they ran a Waldorf publishing company for a time. Apparently what I understand (and it is still being verified) when ANH was set to come out, Lucas wanted to help some of the schools raise money and so he did some screenings for fund raisers. The Marin Waldorf school seems to be his area of interest for support. He does a lot of work with them. This is information I have gotten from the Waldorf end of resources. I am hoping to get to talk with Meridith Kurtz this week and tie up the connections. I have a close friend in the Waldorf movement who lived with the Kurtz family years ago. Apparently the Kurtz's were not impressed with the schools near them so they hired ten or so Waldorf teachers to come to their home in England (?) and teach the Kurtz children. My friend is the daughter to one of the teachers and got to go along.

I should be clear... I am NOT proposing that Lucas used Steiner as a base for writing the movies, I am saying that the parallels in the archetypal imaging that are present in the movies and are bases for grasping Waldorf are the same. I want to use Star Wars as a way to tangibly grasp Waldorf concepts. Steiner, while full of wisdom was VERY wordy... that puts it mildly... I have studied his work for some years and am just now understanding some of it. How I would have loved for someone to say... "Let's watch SW and I'll explain Steiner to ya" it would have been a great AH HA moment! The fundamentals of Steiner's work were not natural toys, foods, etc.... they were balance of spiritual forces, understanding development, temperaments, and our connection to the Universe. Once you have those basics down, man or woman, it's easier to swallow the rest because you can grasp why.

When I first started this, I will admit I must have sounded really sexist! For that I apologize. I have had just as much response from women as men, it's a learning position for me to not judge based on sex!

Also, I don't think for a minute that Steiner has all the answers, lol... I don't think he even thought he had all the answers, but they are certainly an interesting jumping off point.

PS- Forgive my spelling... I have a terrible headache and I am not in the mood to spell check.

 

Seldon or spiraldawn, do me a favor: What the hell IS Anthroposophy? Sorry.

 

LOL... here's a good basic answer... from the website waldorfanswers.com

"Anthroposophy is a human oriented spiritual philosophy that reflects and speaks to the basic deep spiritual questions of humanity, to our basic artistic needs, to the need to relate to the world out of a scientific attitude of mind, and to the need to develop a relation to the world in complete freedom and based on completely individual judgments and decisions."

Some people really think Steiner was a nut... however, it's one of those things where unless you've read his works in order then they are easily taken out of context... and LOADS of people do that. I am no purest, I used to think I was, eh... life changes things! I do however believe that his methods of education work in the proper context, and I hold his ideals for living close to my heart. Sadly, if you do a net search for his teachings, you're likely to find a lot of bad stuff... loads of folks going to the dark side and not looking at his works as a whole.

 

Thats what I did ( netsearch ) and your right, its all negative stuff and not one definition as to what it actually is. Thank you.

 

Well it's like anything else... if you want to totally pick it apart, you can. lol.