An Awkward Echo. Matthew Arnold and John Dewey (PB) 12+

📓 A volume in Research in Curriculum and InstructionSeries Editor: O. L. Davis, Jr. The University of Texas at AustinMatthew Arnold, 19th century English poet, literary critic and school inspector, felt that each agehad to determine that philosophy that was most adequate to its own concerns and contexts. Thisstudy looks at the influence that Matthew Arnold had on John Dewey and attempts to fashion aphilosophy of education that is adequate for our own peculiarly awkward age. Today, Arnold andDewey are embraced by opposing political positions. Arnold, as the apostle of culture, is oftenadvocated by conservative educators who see in him a support for an education founded on greatbooks and Victorian values, while Dewey still has a notably liberal coloring and is not too infrequentlytarred for the excesses of progressive education, even those for which he bears no responsibilityat all. Both, no doubt, are misread by those who rather carelessly use them as idols for theirown politics of education.This study proposes a pluralistic approach to education in which pluralism means not only plurality of voices, but also plurality of processes.Using a model built out of a study of rhetoric and hermeneutics, four aspects of mind are indentified that draw Arnold andDewey into close correspondence. These aspects are the tentacle mind (using Dewey's favorite metaphor for breaking down the barrierbetween mind and body), the critical mind (which builds on the concepts of criticism that animat...