John Dewey’s Democratic Education and its Influence on Pedagogy in China 1917-1937


Book Description

Lei Wang researches John Dewey’s pedagogical influence on the historical context of China and compares his observations and his basic democratic approach with the concepts and practical implementation of his Chinese students. As a result, it turns out that the spread of pragmatic philosophy in China was accompanied by reductionism, misunderstandings, Confucian doctrine and nationalism and that Dewey’s reform proposals can open a democratic perspective on current challenges in Chinese society. On the occasion of the 100th anniversary of Dewey’s research trip to China, the author emphasizes the contemporary significance of his work. The results of her study can clarify and correct errors that continue to have effect today.




John Dewey and Chinese Education


Book Description

By critically reviewing the event of Dewey’s visit to China (1919-1921) through historical, philosophical and comparative perspectives, this book finds new value to revive the dialogue between Dewey and Eastern philosophies as a way to respond to contemporary educational challenges.




Inventing the Modern Self and John Dewey


Book Description

This collection includes original studies from scholars from thirteen nations, who explore the epistemic features figured in John Dewey's writings in his discourses on public schooling. Pragmatism was one of the weapons used in the struggles about the development of the child who becomes the future citizen. The significance of Dewey in the book is not about Dewey as the messenger of pragmatism, but in locating different cultural, political and educational terrains in which debates about modernity, the modern self and the making of the citizen occurred.




Works about John Dewey, 1886-1995


Book Description

Although she has devised a new format for this bibliography, Barbara Levine has included most of the materials published in the two editions of the Checklist of Writings about John Dewey. Material new to this volume includes recently discovered items published during the ninety years covered by the Checklist as well as items published since 1977. Because certain studies at best have only marginal value or because they can be obtained through ordinary library research tools, Levine has deleted some classes of material that appeared in the 1974 and 1978 Checklist editions: primary sources with only brief references to Dewey; the entire section entitled "Unpublished Works about Dewey" (which included theses, dissertations, and papers presented at meetings); and Educational Resources Information Center (ERIC) documents. Levine has included all of the material published about Dewey during the 108 years between 1886 and 1994 and has included many 1995 items as well. She has verified all items and, whenever possible, obtained copies. She has discovered hundreds of items omitted from the second edition of the Checklist and has augmented the current bibliography by nearly two thousand items published since 1977. The bibliography is divided into four parts. The first, "Books and Articles about Dewey," lists works alphabetically by author. Replies and responses to articles immediately follow the work cited. The "Reviews of Dewey's Works" lists titles alphabetically. Reviews are grouped alphabetically by journal under the Dewey work reviewed. The "Author Index" includes multiple authors and editors, authors of replies and responses, and reviewers of works both by and about Dewey. The "Title Key-Word Index" lists key words from most titles and subtitles. The CD-ROM version of Works about John Dewey contains both Windows and Macintosh formats and provides increased search capabilities.




Raising China's Revolutionaries


Book Description

A widespread conviction in the need to rescue China’s children took hold in the early twentieth century. Amid political upheaval and natural disasters, neglected or abandoned children became a humanitarian focal point for Sino-Western cooperation and intervention in family life. Chinese academics and officials sought new scientific measures, educational institutions, and social reforms to improve children’s welfare. Successive regimes encouraged teachers to shape children into Qing subjects, Nationalist citizens, or Communist comrades. In Raising China’s Revolutionaries, Margaret Mih Tillman offers a novel perspective on the political and scientific dimensions of experiments with early childhood education from the early Republican period through the first decade of the People’s Republic. She traces transnational advocacy for child welfare and education, examining Christian missionaries, philanthropists, and the role of international relief during World War II. Tillman provides in-depth analysis of similarities and differences between Nationalist and Communist policy and cultural notions of childhood. While both Nationalist and Communist regimes drew on preschool institutions to mobilize the workforce and shape children’s political subjectivity, the Communist regime rejected the Nationalists’ commitment to the modern, bourgeois family. With new insights into the roles of experts, the cultural politics of fundraising, and child welfare as a form of international exchange, Raising China’s Revolutionaries is an important work of institutional and transnational history that illuminates the evolution of modern concepts of childhood in China.




Thoughts on Economic Development in China


Book Description

This book is about mutual influences of thinking about economic development in China and in the West, from the 18th century until the present. Its chapters are contributed by development economists and historians of thought from China and other parts of the world. The book describes important stages in the evolution, cross-fertilization and contextual modification of ideas about economic order, development and institutional change. It illustrates how Western concepts and theories have been adopted and adapted to Chinese conditions in different waves of modernization from the late 19th century until the present and that this was and is no one-way traffic. The book describes how pre-classical thinking in the West, in particular French Physiocracy in mid-18th century, was influenced by China as an ideal and a source of ideas, at a time when China was the largest and most advanced economy in the world. It discusses to what extent concepts of Western-style economics, in particular in the fields of development economics and institutional economics, can be used to understand the rapid transitions and developments of the Chinese economy in recent decades, and to what extent they might need to be modified in the light of new experiences and insights. Against this background, several contributions to the volume provide assessments of the current state of economic science and teaching in China, in particular with regard to Chinese views on Western economics. The book should be of interest to those who are interested in economic development and the history of economics in China.




The Chinese Continuum of Self-Cultivation


Book Description

The Chinese Continuum of Self-Cultivation explores a transcultural philosophy of education based on the Neo-Confucian concept of the universal nature of self in the co-creative process of self-cultivation (xiushen 修身). This ancient approach to knowledge synthesis and consolidation informs and enhances the educational theories of John Dewey (1859–1952), creating a cross-cultural educational template for the 21st century. The Confucian-Deweyan educational model explored is not only a transcultural educational approach in the changing face of globality, but also a means to encourage and foster humanitarian and communitarian values in the learner. That is, a wholistic approach to education whereby the individual considers the other – human and natural – tantamount to the self in an increasingly shifting world. This concept is in direct opposition to the anthropocentric approach of egoistic individualism currently prevalent in post-modern societies. The educational model developed fosters cooperation, rather than competition; community over individualism, enabling non-European indigenous values and problem-solving to co-exist in balance with Western neo-liberal forces in the global arena. The model of education developed herein enables the phenomenon of glocalization (the overlap of global and local issues) to be pragmatically addressed in cross-cultural contexts, promoting economic, environmental, cultural and human sustainability for the future. This work will appeal to comparative philosophers, educationalists, and designers of pre-tertiary curricula.




John Dewey and the High Tide of American Liberalism


Book Description

"[A] brilliant intellectual biography. . . . Ryan submits incisive, compressed accounts of Dewey's important works and, with considerable flair, describes the major political debates into which Dewey entered. Ryan has an expert historian's grasp on the major events of the century and weaves them skillfully through Dewey's life story." --Mark Edmundson, Washington Post Book World




Problems for Democracy


Book Description

This book, based on the premise that democracy promotes peace and justice, explores theoretical and practical problems that can arise or that have arisen in democratic polities. Contributors address, with clarifying analyses, such theoretical issues as the relationship between recursivist metaphysics and democracy, the relationship between the economic and political orders, and the nature of justice. Contributors offer, as well, enlightening resolutions of practical problems resulting from a history of social, political or economic injustice.