FOOLS, YOUNG CHILDREN, AND PHILOSOPHY

Policy Futures in Education, 2024

This article is a conceptual co-exploration of the relationship between philosophy and childism. It draws upon a colloquium in December 2021 at the Childism Institute at Rutgers University. Nine co-authors lay out and interweave scholarly imaginations to collectively explore the concept of childism in critical philosophical depth. Through diverse entry points, the co-authors bring a wide range of theoretical perspectives to this task, some engaging the term childism explicitly in their work, others approaching it anew. The result is an extended conversation about the possibilities for deconstructing ingrained historical adultism and reconstructing social norms and structures in response to what is marginalized in the experiences of children. Our own conclusion, having initiated this dialogue, is that we have learned to think about childism with greater plurality, that is, as childisms.

This paper offers an approach to child study that moves beyond the traditional modern domains of medicine, education and the social sciences, to explore the representation and symbolization of the child in philosophy, social and cultural history, myth and spirituality, art, literature, and psychoanalysis. It considers childhood as a cultural and historical construction, and traces the ways in which characterizations of children function symbolically as carriers of deep assumptions about human nature and its potential variability and changeability, about the construction of human subjectivity, about the ultimate meaning of the human life cycle, and about human forms of knowledge. The child as limit condition—as representing for adults the boundaries of the human—that is “nature,” animality, madness, the “primitive,” the divine—is re-evoked continually in modern and postmodern symbolizations, and then tension between reason and nature or instinct, or Enlightenment and Romance, is never far from their surface. Finally, the extent to which the construction of “child” also implies a construction of “adult” is explored in the context of the history of culture and of child rearing, particularly in the rise of the modern middle-class European adult personality, which defined itself on the basis of its distance from childhood—both the child before it and the child within. An ideal of adult maturity which includes rather than excludes childhood is capable of transforming our notions of optimal child rearing and education.

Journal of Philosophy of Education, 2011

In this paper I investigate how philosophy can speak for children and how children can have a voice in philosophy and speak for philosophy. I argue that we should understand children as responsible rational individuals who are involved in their own philosophical inquiries and who can be involved in our own philosophical investigations-not because of their rational abilities, but because we acknowledge them as conversational partners, acknowledge their reasons as reasons, and speak for them as well as let them speak for us and our rational community. In order to argue this I turn, first, to Gareth Matthews' philosophy of childhood and suggest a reconstruction of some of his concepts in line with the philosophy of Stanley Cavell. Second, in order to examine more closely our conceptions of rationality and our pictures of children, I consider the children's books, The Lorax and Where is My Sister? and Henrik Ibsen's play, The Wild Duck.

It is interesting to note how, beginning far back in the history of ideas, the devaluation of childhood has paralleled a devaluation of philosophy. The correlation probably begins with a passage in Plato ́s Gorgias, where the devaluation of childhood is associated with a criticism of philosophy. Even more surprisingly, in that passage Plato himself offers a critique of his own master, Socrates--both of his understanding of philosophy and of the way he practiced it in the polis. Here we have Plato criticizing not only a denaturalization of dialectic argumentation but indirectly charging against his beloved master, Socrates himself? From a philosopher we can expect anything specially from a prominent philosophy as Plato when such serious things as the education of the young are at sake. In this paper, I ́ll try to unfold this critique, justify the previous assessment and take some inferences in terms of some contemporary issues relating philosophy and the education of childhood. Or, as we might also say, about childhood and the education of philosophy.

Metaphilosophy, 1999

In this paper I trace the dialogical and narrative dimensions of the philosophical tradition and explore how they are reconfigured in the notion of community of philosophical inquiry (CPI), the mainstay of the collection of novels and discussion plans known as Philosophy for Children. After considering the ontology and epistemology of dialogue, I argue that narrative has replaced exposition in our understanding of philosophical discourse and that CPI represents a narrative context in which truth comes to represent the best story, in a discursive location in which there are always multiple stories. Finally, I raise the issue of children's philosophical voice. Can children philosophize, and if they can, do they do so in a voice different from adults'? If so, what are the distinctive features of that voice? I assert that it is children's historical marginalization in the Western construction of rationality that now – as that rationality undergoes its crisis – makes of them, like women and other “natives,” privileged strangers to the tradition, who are, through CPI, enabled to enter it through dialogue and narrative.

Kindheit – Bildung – Erziehung. Philosophische Perspektiven, 2021

Philosophy with Children as and for moral education With his leer of sympathy he [Mr. Forbes, the teacher] contemplated the small, smiling, incommunicable, deprived morsel of humanity beside him. Curdie's smile was notorious: other teachers called it sly and insolent; it was, they said, the smile of the certified delinquent, of misanthropy in bud, of future criminality, of inevitable degradation. Forbes refused to accept it as such; to him it indicated that this slum child, born so intelligent, was not only acknowledging the contempt and ridicule which his dress and his whole economic situation must incur, but was also making his own assessment of those who contemned and ridiculed. The result was not a vicious snarl, but this haunting and courageous smile. It was possible, it was likely, that the boy would ultimately become debased. Who would not, born and bred in Donaldson's Court, one of the worst slums in one of the worst slum districts in Europe? There rats drank at kitchen sinks, drunkards jabbed at each other's faces with broken bottles, prostitutes carried on their business on stairheads, and policemen dreaded to enter. Most children brought up there were either depraved or protected by impenetrable stupidity (Jenkins, 1989, p.2). Here, in the beginning of Robin Jenkins' book The Changeling, we see various versions of 'the child'. The child, latent with badness, ordained to be worthless. The child with intelligence, stymied by circumstance. The child, as observer, as cynic, looking at the world with wisdom beyond his years; the puer senex (Cunningham, 2006). The child both as victim and not. The child, with potential; potential to overcome the context in which he finds himself. And it is the adult, Mr. Forbes, the boy's teacher, who sees this potential, who sees an opportunity to rescue the boy Tom Curdie from his surroundings and to preserve a childhood innocence he thinks is there. Mr. Forbes, in the remainder of the book, sets out to do just that. He seeks to lift Curdie from the sanctuary of what he knows by taking him on holiday with his middle-class family to the countryside where innocence and childhood can blossom. As Forbes sadly discovers, any innocence that was once there cannot be recovered and is ultimately lost in the final and tragic scenes where Curdie, recognising his own lack of childhood innocence or that what awaits him in adulthood is far from desirable, takes extreme action to avoid fulfilling the potential Forbes may have recognised in and for him. This sense of the child as potential is one that pervades the academic literature in the field of childhood studies and philosophy of childhood (

Educational Philosophy and Theory, 2003

childhood & philosophy

This article considers children’s status in society and how this may be elevated with a view to imagining a possible future. Children’s status is such that the structures and systems under which they live diminish their agency. In so doing, their opportunity to contribute to the shaping of what appears to be an uncertain future is limited. The article proposes that looking towards children as saviours of our tomorrows is misguided and that a healthier view is to recognise the networked nature of children, which recognises children’s humanity and sees them as connected to the world in which and of which they are a part. By accepting the networked nature of children, adults may come to think and behave differently towards children, beginning to see themselves and children as ‘one among many’. This perspective allows for compassion, a notion that supports our living together. This article proposes that Philosophy with Children may offer an approach to engaging in community and dialogue...

2007

The study analyzes the theoretical basis of the Philosophy for Children (P4C) program elaborated by Matthew Lipman. The aim is, firstly, to identify the main philosophical and pedagogical principles of P4C based on American pragmatism, and to locate their pedagogization and possible problems in Lipman's thinking. Here the discussion is especially targeted to the thinking of John Dewey and George H. Mead as well as Lev Vygotsky, whom Lipman himself names as the most pivotal sources for his own thinking. On the other hand, the study aims at opening up new perspectives and thematizations on P4C from the viewpoint of the continental tradition of thought. The essential principles of P4C connected with reasonableness and judgment are ultimately interpreted as a neo-Aristotelian effort to contextualize philosophy by tracing it back to moderation, the man's ability to consider and solve problems that he meets in practical life kata ton orthon logon – by doing right things in the rig...

Journal of Scottish Thought

The intellectual capacities of children, especially their capacity for reasoning, is a topic of great interest in current discussions about primary and secondary school education. This is due, in part, to the fact that pupils in such schools appear to gain benefits from doing philosophy. 1 'Philosophy for children' is an enterprise that got started in the late sixties by Matthew Lipman. He stressed the importance for children to practice their intellectual capacities of judgment and reasoning, as it helps them to think for themselves. 2 Philosophers of education such as John Dewey and Lef Vygotsky likewise have attached great value to autonomous thinking. 3 In this paper we aim to bring to the discussion about philosophy with children a number of remarks made by the eighteenth century Scottish philosopher Thomas Reid, especially in his Essays on the Intellectual Powers of Man, about the intellectual capacities of children. 4 The project of this paper, then, is to discuss the relevance of Reid's philosophical thoughts about children for contemporary philosophy with children. Children and Perception In a philosophy for children session, a very common question to be asked by children aged 5 is 'How do I know what is real?' 5 Apparently even at that age children wonder about existence and non-existence. Lipman and several 1

CHANGING CONCEPTIONS OF CHILDHOOD FROM RENAISSANCE TO POSTMODERNITY: A PHILOSOPHY OF CHILDHOOD, 2006

FORWARD: Gareth B. Matthews INTRODUCTION: Signifying Children CHAPTER 1: The Roots of Child Study: Philosophy, History, and Religion CHAPTER 2: Child and Fool in the Western Wisdom Tradition CHAPTER 3: Fools, Young Children, Animism, and the Scientific World Picture CHAPTER 4: Subversive Innocence CHAPTER 5: The Child and Post-Modern Subjectivity CHAPTER 6: Parent, Child, Alterity, Dialogue CHAPTER 7: Young Children's Discourse and the Origins of the World: The Transformation into Text CHAPTER 8: What Some Second Graders Say About Conflict

The sage encyclopedia of children and childhood studies, 2020

childhood & philosophy, 2021

This book may be described as a Festschrift—or more accurately a Gedenkschrift, given that it is a posthumous celebration of Gareth Matthews’ (1929-2011) work and career. It consists of a selected anthology of his papers, interspersed with papers by scholars that offer interpretive perspectives on his work . The Matthews papers, which are brilliantly chosen, represent only one dimension of his oeuvre; he was in fact a recognized scholar of ancient and medieval philosophy, particularly Plato, Aristotle and Augustine. The present selection draws from his persistent, oddly related inquiry, pursued over the course of almost 40 years, into the theory and practice of conducting philosophical conversations with children, whether inside or outside the classroom.

Journal of philosophy in schools, 2022

This chapter begins by illustrating the role of children in philosophy, and how childhood may impact philosophy, by turning to the work of Stanley Cavell. In particular this chapter focuses on his idea of philosophy as a confrontation with our culture’s criteria, but read in the light of Pierre Hadot’s understanding of philosophy as a way of life. It goes on to consider how the philosophy for children movement has developed through three generations of thought and practice. To illustrate how these generations have emerged, the chapter surveys differing views of the use of picture books in children’s philosophizing and philosophy. Going on from the third generation’s criticism of how the philosophy for children movement’s use of picture books has been insufficiently aware of its own assumptions, limits, and borders, the chapter concludes by showing that the critical moves from one generation to another in the field itself can be seen as a philosophical way of life, a way of life that involves philosophy for children confronting its own criteria, by emphasizing and questioning not only the boundaries of the content but also of the places where philosophy with children happens.