Questioning the Founders--and Ourselves

Autor/in	Lindsay, Thomas K.
Titel	Questioning the Founders--and Ourselves
Quelle	In: Academic Questions, 25 (2012) 3, S.366-371 (6 Seiten)Infoseite zur Zeitschrift PDF als Volltext Verfügbarkeit
Sprache	englisch
Dokumenttyp	gedruckt; online; Zeitschriftenaufsatz
ISSN	0895-4852
DOI	10.1007/s12129-012-9306-7
Schlagwörter	Guidelines; Educational History; Politics of Education; Educational Policy; Administrative Principles; Democratic Values; United States History; Civics; Citizenship Education; Intellectual History; Foundations of Education + Suchen Sie Ihr Suchwort? Richtlinien; History of education; Bildungsgeschichte; Educational policy; Bildungspolitik; Politics of education; Staatsbürgerkunde; Citizenship; Education; Politische Bildung; Politische Erziehung; Staatsbürgerliche Erziehung; Geistesgeschichte; Grundlagenausbildung
Abstract	The question of the relation between liberal education and political liberty, perennially important, is driven for this forum by the Obama administration's endorsement of "A Crucible Moment: College Learning & Democracy's Future," according to which the chief ends of postsecondary civic education ought to include the promotion of sweeping egalitarianism, progressive activism, and cosmopolitanism. In its guidelines for addressing this issue, "Academic Questions" offers contributors a dichotomy between the "university as a "temple of science," where rival theories, perspectives, and preferences receive a rigorous and impartial testing," versus "A Crucible Moment"'s promotion "of a particular political view." The guidelines go on to distinguish the vision behind the "scientific university" from that underpinning institutions that carry "ideological and philosophic commitments." Keen to the dangers attending this dichotomy, "Academic Questions" also offers contributors the option of defending instead a "'mixed regime'--part science, part commitment." In this article, the author describes an account that suggests the ineffectiveness of seeking to combat "A Crucible Moment" while simultaneously employing the assumptions embedded in the language of the science-commitment dichotomy. To offer a better civics, the author suggests that one needs at least to begin with an attempt to understand the American Founders as they understood themselves. The Founders wrote before the rise of positivism, historical relativism, and the progressive Left. Questioning them on their own terms is the first, though not the last, requirement of scientific integrity. (Contains 2 footnotes.) (ERIC).
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Erfasst von	ERIC (Education Resources Information Center), Washington, DC
Update	2017/4/10