R&L Education
Pages: 182
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Trim: 6⅜ x 9⅜
978-1-61048-928-7 • Hardback • April 2013 • $99.00 • (£76.00)
978-1-61048-929-4 • Paperback • April 2013 • $52.00 • (£40.00)
Barbara J. Thayer-Bacon is a professor of philosophy of education in the Cultural Studies of Education masters program and the Learning Environments and Educational Studies doctoral program at the University of Tennessee. Her primary research areas as a philosopher of education are pragmatism, feminist theory and pedagogy, and cultural studies in education.
Dedication
Acknowledgments
Preface
Approach
The Intended Market
Outstanding Features of the Book
Introduction
Democratic Theory: Out From Under the Yokes of Locke and Rousseau
Classical Liberal Assumptions
Assumptions for Democracies Always in the Making
Conclusion
Notes
Chapter One
Learning to Trust Students: Rancière and Montessori on Democracy
Jacques Rancière and The Ignorant Schoolmaster
Maria Montessori and La Casa dei Bambini
Democracies Depend on Relationships of Equality
Rancière and Democracies-Always-in-the-Making
Notes
Chapter Two
Connecting the Home and School to Society: La Casa dei Bambini and the Chicago Lab School
Maria Montessori’s Private Story
Maria Montessori’s Casa dei Bambini
John Dewey and the Chicago Lab School
William Heard Kilpatrick
Montessori and Democracies-Always-in-the-Making
Conclusion
Notes
Chapter Three
Trying to Get Social Justice and Love Together: Highlander Folk School and Central Park East
Highlander Folk School
Getting Theory and Practice Together
Living What You Believe
Notes
Chapter Four
The Teacher as a Revolutionary Leader: Freire, McLaren, hooksand the staff at La Escuela
Movimento de Cultura Popular
Peter McLaren and the Jane-Finch Corridor
Bell Hooks, Booker T. Washington and Crispus Attucks
Centro Educativo Ixtliyollotl (La Escuela)
Conclusion
Notes
Chapter Five
Celebrating the Passions of Pluralism
Through the Arts: Maxine Greene, the Center for the Arts, Social Imagination, and Education, and Young Warriors High School
Maxine Greene and the Center for the Arts, Social Imagination, and Education
Young Warriors High School
The Indians’ Hole in Their Hearts and the Importance of Shared Identities Through the Arts
Conclusion
Notes
Chapter Six
Implications for Schools in Democracies-Always-in-the-Making: Conclusion
Theoretical Lessons Learned
Practical Lessons Learned
Conclusion
References
Index
About the Author
One of the great mistakes of our time is thinking we know the fixed and final form of democracy for all people, epochs, and places. Another mistake is thinking we have all the democracy we require. Barbara Thayer-Bacon draws on her background as a philosopher of education and her work as a cultural studies scholar to challenge narrow liberal democratic notions of rigid rationalism, atomistic individualism, and static universalism with her own contextual and transactional description of selves-in-relation-with-others. She shows that democracies and democrats are always-in-the-making.
— Jim Garrison, Ph.D., professor, School of Education, Virginia Tech University
Following her career-long commitment to examining the relationship between school, education and democracy, Thayer-Bacon once again brings her feminist insight into a contemporary critique of democratic classical liberalism. Drawing upon philosophers from Socrates to Rousseau to Dewey to Noddings, hooks and Greene, Thayer-Bacon argues that democracies, as ever incomplete, must turn from Rationalism, Universalism, and Individualism to Shared Responsibility, Authority, and Identity, as the guiding factors in our creation of a more humane and public democracy.
— Jaylynne N. Hutchinson, Associate Professor Critical Studies in Educational Foundations Ohio University
Thayer-Bacon offers a careful critique of the educational ill-effects of rationalism, universalism, and individualism. Informed by a wide range of progressive educational thinkers, Democracy Always in the Making offers many useful examples of engaged, relational education.
— Charles Bingham, Associate Professor in Curriculum Theory at Simon Fraser University
Barbara Thayer-Bacon provides strong arguments for revising classical liberal conceptions of democracy and coming to view humans — not as isolated individuals — but as beings-in-relation to others. Moreover, she combines philosophical argumentation with lessons learned from specific schools that recenter an ethics of sharing and interdependence. The combination of philosophical and pedagogical discourses make this book especially helpful.
— Frank Margonis, professor in educational philosophy, University of Utah
In this provocative new book, Thayer-Bacon (Univ. of Tennessee) aims to dislodge democratic theory from its reliance on the extreme individualism of John Locke and Jean-Jacques Rousseau and in its place construct a transactional view of democracy that emphasizes epistemological and cultural pluralism and a relational view of selfhood. Drawing from a variety of feminist and postmodern perspectives, she makes a convincing case for a view of democracy that is always incomplete and unfinished, yet nevertheless provides the best orientation for educational (and other social) institutions. Thayer-Bacon accomplishes this by linking critical investigation of key theorists (Jacques Rancière, John Dewey, Paulo Freire, bell hooks, and others) to descriptive analysis of actual school projects, some of which are based on firsthand experience. Her treatment of Myles Horton and Maxine Greene are especially noteworthy. In her effort to canonize some theorists while demonizing others, however, she makes the occasional heavy-handed caricature. The historical record makes it very difficult to see Maria Montessori, for instance, as someone animated by a purely egalitarian spirit. Moreover, Thayer-Bacon's sharp, nearly ad hominem critique of Peter McLaren's work will likely raise eyebrows. Still, it is this contentiousness that will generate good discussion in graduate seminars. Summing Up: Highly recommended. Undergraduates, all levels, and above.
— Choice Reviews
• Winner, American Educational Studies Association (AESA) 2015 Book Award