Blackwell has just published the latest of the Blackwell Philosophy Anthologies: Philosophy of Education: An Anthology
Philosophy of education suffers from being somewhat marginal within Education, and not well respected within Philosophy (for example, I’ve never seen an advertisement in Jobs for Philosophers with Philosophy of Education as an AOS, nor do I know of a Philosophy PhD program in the US which regularly, if ever, offers Philosophy of Education graduate seminars. I don’t offer them, and nor do the other philosophers of education I know within philosophy departments).I doubt many philosophers know much of the field beyond Plato’s, Aristotle’s and Rousseau’s contributions, and knowledge that Locke said something relevant but no idea what it was. (Anyone who does know that much knows more than I did when I started working in the field).
If you wanted to know more, Curren’s Anthology would be the perfect place to start.
All the greats are here – Plato, Aristotle, Isocrates, Locke, Rousseau, and Mill. And some of the topics you would expect. A long section on the nature and aims of education has chapters by most of the above plus Dewey, Sen, Joel Feinberg, and others. It is more or less obvious to include the relevant pieces by Christopher Jencks and Amy Gutmann on educational equality, Israel Scheffler on teaching, and John Dewey and Nell Noddings on discipline and care. But there’s a lot in here that is unexpected, but just right. So for example, it makes complete sense to include the chapter advocating markets in education from Capitalism and Freedom, even though I doubt it’s been done before, and ingenious to pair it with a nicely edited excerpt from Colin Crouch’s brilliant Fabian Society pamphlet critiquing actual markets in public services. Similarly, Curren has excerpted Robert Paul Wolff’s lovely analysis of students’ attitudes to grades in terms of commodity fetishism from The Idea of the University. Denis Philips’s nice piece on constructivism is obvious to include; Richard Grandy’s nice piece distinguishing the claims of cognitive constructivism from those of metaphysical constructivism less so, and just as valuable for students in Ed Schools where such distinctions are easily fudged. Who but Curren would have thought to include David Velleman’s essay about why he used to kick his wife in the head in the section on moral education?1
I confess an interest (so, now, completely full disclosure): two of my pieces are in the volume, including the philosophy of education paper I am most proud of and which, but for being collected here, I had despaired of anyone ever reading. I’d like to think my contributions strengthen the collection, but I doubt it. It’s a great representation of the field, and it should help raise its profile and demonstrate that it is stronger than you might have thought.
1. Not as bad as it sounds: they were practicing Tae Kwon Do.
{ 16 comments }
John Emerson 03.22.07 at 2:25 pm
Philosophy of education suffers from being somewhat marginal within Education, and not well respected within Philosophy…..I doubt many philosophers know much of the field beyond Plato’s, Aristotle’s and Rousseau’s contributions, and knowledge that Locke said something relevant but no idea what it was.
This is one of the reasons why I hate analytic philosophy. Sixty years ago these statements would not be true.
Analytic philosophy tends to make the interesting areas where philosophy might have a cash value, such as philosophy of education, into unimportant applied subspecialties for philosophers who aren’t capable of important philosophical work.
Matt 03.22.07 at 2:35 pm
That’s surely a bit over-stated, John. Many people who do excellent work in medical/bio ethics, for example, are considered top philosophers, hold positions in excellent departments, and are very well respected (Francis Kamm, Jeff McMahon, Allen Buchanan, Norman Daniels, etc.) Something similar applies to legal philosophy of a more applied sort (that is, tort theory, criminal law theory, etc.) where many of the most respected philosophers do this sort of work. Philosophy of education is somewhat different, it seems, and this is probably a deficiency of the field but you’ve clearly over-stated your case.
John Emerson 03.22.07 at 2:39 pm
Those sound like niche second-tier names to me, but maybe I’m out of touch.
Tim 03.22.07 at 2:46 pm
As an undergrad, it always made me sad that there were no courses offered in Philosophy of Education at U. of Rochester, especially with Professor Curren there as a resource. The only exposure I had with the topic was a single lecture at a colloquium.
Anyhow, I’ve always been curious about the field, but never had the time to pursue it while in school. Maybe I’ll pick up the anthology. Thanks for the tip.
Patrick S. O'Donnell 03.22.07 at 3:20 pm
Are there non-Western perspectives included in the volume? I suspect classical Chinese traditions, especially Confucianism, as well as Indian religio-philosophical traditions would have something of value to add to the discussion. For instance, much of what Confucius says about education (e.g. familial, but also for the aspiring junzi) bears comparison with classical Greek ideas on paideia, in particular with regard to arts like dance, poetry (as ‘odes’), and music and their indispensable role in moral and psychological development (long before the idea of ‘multiple intelligences’ and scientific studies citing the benefits and by-products of an education in the arts!)
Matt 03.22.07 at 5:07 pm
I guess you’re out of touch, John, since those are all top names in ethics teaching at top departments (Harvard [before that NYU], Rutgers, Duke [before that Arizona], etc.) Any one of them would be welcome at nearly any philosophy department in the US. The same goes for the legal philosophers working on topics like tort theory, criminal law theory, and so on.
John Emerson 03.22.07 at 6:05 pm
OK, but isn’t ethics second rank too? I remember from the Leiter rankings that departments are judged mostly on Logic, Philosophy of Science, Ontology, and Philosophy of Language, with ethics, politics and everything else bringing up the rear. (I am also taking what Harry posted here as given; I have no way of either confirming or criticizing his post.)
Matt 03.22.07 at 6:50 pm
In general it seems that being a top department in metaphysics and epistemology, broadly construed, gives a department more prestige in the Philosophical Gourmet report than does being a top department in ethics. But, being a top department in ethics also gives a lot of prestige. Harvard is still a top philosophy department even though it rates much higher in moral and political philosophy than it does in the M&E sub-disciplines. And, nearly all of the top departments have significant coverage in ethics (including applied ethics in most cases). Harry is right about what he says about philosophy of education. My point is only that this doesn’t spill over to applied philosophy as a whole, or to ethics, and that it’s a poor basis to use to ground one’s prejudices against analytic philosophy.
John Emerson 03.22.07 at 7:23 pm
I have a full repertoire of only the best grounds. I have grounds in stacks of ten-point cans. I’ll move this particular ground down the queue a bit.
harry b 03.22.07 at 10:08 pm
john — I don’t know whether to take comment #1 as an insult! Maybe I should. I think Matt is completely right about his assessment of the place of ethics, and even political philosophy, and some areas of applied ethics/philosophy. There is a marked contrast between the situation now and the situation of 20, even 15, years ago with respect to applied ethics; ethics itself has been highly respected for at least the last 30 years or so.
My sense is that phil of ed just hasn’t caught up (yet!), and this is partly because it was already institutionalised outside of Philosophy when the rest of applied philosophy was building itself up within Philosophy departments. Various factors have been slowly changing this over the past 15 or so years and Curren’s anthology is a sign that things are improving. (And I wanted to draw attention to its high quality to the many analytical philosophers who read the site.) I’m involved in other efforts to raise its profile.
John Emerson 03.23.07 at 1:28 am
That’s cool Harry, I’ll tell people I don’t know you.
It seems that my critical and quite unfavorable contact with analytic philosophy was during its worst period. However, I am not sure how well it has recuperated what was lost during the analytic Dark Ages. For example, the fact that ethics is allowed at all is good, but what I’ve seen of analytic ethics underwhelms me.
bill wringe 03.23.07 at 11:06 am
One curiosity about the institutional position of philosophy of education is that, although one might naturally think that it fell under appplied philosophy, it seems to be quite unusual to see papers about philosophy of education in applied philosophy journals. (or at least so I’m told by people who have worked in the field.)
Maybe that is changing (or will change):it’s presumably encouraging to see that its now possible to publish on philosophy of education in a journal like Ethics, as Harry has recently done.
Brian Burtt 03.23.07 at 2:52 pm
Curren has also edited for Blackwell a “Companion to the Philosophy of Education,” a compendium of overviews of topics in the field written by contemporaries. This is also a fine work.
Chris Henrichsen 03.23.07 at 7:38 pm
Which Education PhD programs offer specializations in phil of education for those interested in questions of Rawlsian justice as they relate to education? How are such programs viewed by philosophers?
Luther Blissett 03.24.07 at 1:17 pm
It looks like an interesting anthology, but why in the wide wide world of sports does it not include something by Jerome Bruner? Bruner is perhaps the most influential, and one of the most respected, post-Dewey educational thinkers. Is it some sort of professional boundary issue, with Bruner as a psychologist excluded from the ranks of philosophers? But Bruner’s work bridges these two disciplines. Crazy.
Timothy Scriven 03.26.07 at 10:05 am
In response to Emerson’s comment on “cash value” it depends on what you mean. In the fields of computer science, evolutionary biology, physics, the foundations of mathematics, experimental psychology and neuroscience analytic philosophy has got a lot of cash value. Emerson in his writings seems to equate philosophy being useful with philosophy being useful within humanities subjects. Analytic philosophy is so tied in a lot of questions in cog-sci for example that it’s impossible to know where the philosophy ends and the ordinary theoretical psychology begins.
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