2026 Character Education - Visiting Fellow Address

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Beyond Achievement: Awe, Wonder and the Formation of Character

Experiences of awe can be powerfully transformative in terms of developing character, impacting on intellectual, moral, civic and performance virtues. While awe is an aesthetic emotion, it can also be powerfully morally transformative. People’s sense of responsibility, pro-sociality and stewardship of the planet can be enlarged through a sense of awe at the wonders of the world.  In addition to helping cultivate moral and civic virtues like these, the experience of awe influences intellectual virtues, including reflection, critical thinking, and of course, curiosity. Experiencing awe may contribute to our resilience and perseverance, thereby strengthening performance virtues. 

That people are transformed by awe is very much in the foreground of world religions. Consider Saul’s life-changing experience on the road to Damascus, for example. In contrast, character education (and perhaps more specifically Aristotelian character education) does not currently assign much attention to the role of awe and wonder in our transformation in virtue. 

Aristotle regards human beings as characterised by a range of rational activities, specifically theoretical reflection, practical deliberation and the cultivation of virtuous emotions and good habits. For Aristotle, thinking, wisdom, and reflection do most work in terms of becoming a virtuous person. While Aristotle’s view of human personhood is profoundly rational, he has little understanding of the human person as spiritual, and while he foregrounds the importance of cultivating virtuous emotions, he does not have the emotion of awe within his sights (Kristjánsson, 2017).  

The lecture will explore ways in which character education (and more specifically Aristotelian character education) could be enriched by incorporating the character-transformative experience of awe. It will draw on theoretical and empirical research to show how the effects of awe extend beyond the appreciation of beauty (aesthetics) to catalyse a positive change in a host of character virtues.  

Speaker

Associate Professor Liz Gulliford, The Jubilee Centre for  Character and Virtues, University of Birmingham

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Biography

Dr Liz Gulliford is Associate Professor at the Jubilee Centre for Character and Virtues. She currently teaches on the University of Birmingham’s MA in Character Education. She is also an Associate Fellow of the Oxford Character Project. Liz has an interdisciplinary background with an MA in Theology (Trinity College Oxford), MPhil in Theology and Religious Studies (Queens’ College, Cambridge), and a BPS-accredited BSc in Psychology from Anglia Ruskin University. Her PhD (Queens’ College, Cambridge, 2011) established a firm, critical foundation for theoretical and practical work in positive psychology, positive education, and character education, upon which she has progressively built an international reputation.

During her tenure as an Associate Professor in Positive Psychology at the University of Northampton (2018 – 2023), Liz was Co-Pi on a John Templeton Foundation funded research project on ‘The role of exemplar narratives in cultivating character’ (2019 – 2023), which was part of a larger network grant on moral exemplars.

Liz has carried out extensive conceptual and empirical work on gratitude, forgiveness, hope, optimism, courage, compassion, virtue ethics, moral development, positive psychology, positive education, character education and exemplarism. She has published in a wide range of journals in psychology, education, and philosophy.  She has also given numerous invited presentations internationally to both academic and lay audiences.

Venue: Fraser Smith Theatre at Scotch College, Hawthorn
Date: Tuesday, 17 November at 6.30pm
Price: Free of Charge
Bookings will close at 5pm on Monday, 16 November

Enquiries: Josephine Forkin   e: josephine.forkin@scotch.vic.edu.au