Rex Li

How His Psychology

Transforms Our Education

Rediscovering

John Dewey

Rediscovering John Dewey

Rex Li

Rediscovering John

Dewey

How His Psychology Transforms Our Education

Rex Li

G.T. College

Tseung Kwan O, Hong Kong

ISBN 978-981-15-7940-0 ISBN 978-981-15-7941-7 (eBook)

https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-15-7941-7

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To my colleagues

Dewey Center, Fudan University, Shanghai

and

G.T. College, Hong Kong

Preface

John Dewey: The Best Known

and The Least Understood

In the widely-acclaimed series of Ver y Short Introductions by Oxford

University Press, a new title on education was released a few years ago

(Thomas 2013). In it, the name of John Dewey appeared in the ﬁrst

paragraph of the preface, alongside Einstein, Newton, Darwin and Marx.

While Dewey was hailed as “arguably the greatest thinker about educa-

tion in modern times,” the author conceded that few laypeople are able to

“offer anything at all about Dewey” (preface p.1). Why is there a paradox

that the best known becomes the least understood?

Dewey (1859–1952) started with a Christian faith and was trained

under Hegelian philosophy. However, he ended up as an atheist (by co-

signing the Humanist Manifesto in 1933) and founded a new philos-

ophy—pragmatism. His writings are as diverse as philosophy, psychology,

education, logic and science as well as democracy and local and inter-

national politics. His collected works exceeded 8 million words. He is

considered “the philosopher of American culture”, who deﬁnes “the spirit

of America” (Shook and Kurtz 2011: 9). His view on education is such

paradigm-setting that most modern education theories start from him.

However, his obscure writing style, partly due to his Hegelian-dialectic

tradition, deters readers from understanding what he means and says.

vii

viii PREFACE

Dewey viewed philosophy as “a criticism of criticisms” (LW1: 298).

In the way he criticized Cartesian and Hegelian philosophy, Dewey

had been criticized and dismissed in contemporary analytic philosophy,

while his ideas are being simultaneously reconstructed (Tiles 1988; Fair-

ﬁeld 2009; Fesmire 2015) and rediscovered (Tanner 1997; Boisvert 1998;

Tan and Whalen-Bridge 2008). Whoever studies education and philos-

ophy has something to learn from Dewey, but to evaluate him in light of

the new millennium with a global perspective is a most daunting task.

During his life time, Dewey had served as President of American

Psychological Association (1899), President of American Philosophical

Association (1905), Honorary President of American Progr essive Associ-

ation (1928) and Honorary President of National Education Association,

USA (1932). A society to the study of his ideas, John Dewey Society, was

founded in 1935, and he was honored with numerous honorary degrees.

After his death, his face appeared in the Prominent Americans Series on

the American postage stamp in 1968. Today, there are centers devoted

to studying him, in the USA (Center for Dewey Studies, Southern Illi-

nois University at Carbondale), in China (Dewey Center, Fudan Univer-

sity) and in Germany (Dewey Center, University of Cologne). No doubt

Dewey is an intellectual giant that deserves serious study, especially for

philosophers, educators and psychologists.

In the course of my study of John Dewey, I discover that while much

has been written about his philosophy and education, his psychology

has been largely neglected. Although he had made signiﬁcant contri-

bution to psychology, Dewey was only brieﬂy mentioned in psychology

texts. When I dig deeper in his early life, his ideas in psychology

and nineteenth-century milieu, I discover that his theory of psychology

grows to become his core concepts in education, which transforms our

present-day education practice.

This book aims to unveil a true Dewey, what his psychological and

educational ideas are as well as his impact. It starts from his early years, his

involvement in psychology and philosophy and then his move to educa-

tion. In summarizing his early works to later works in social and intel-

lectual context, I hope to rediscover a true evolving John Dewey, what

PREFACE ix

he says and what he means. Readers will then be able to examine the

implications of his ideas in the new millennium and global culture.

Rex Li

G.T. College

Hong Kong

References

Boisvert, R. D. (1998). John Dewey: Rethinking Our Time . New York: State

University of New York Press.

Dewey, J. (1882–1953). The Collected Works of John Dewey. The Early Works,

Volume 1–5; The Middle Works, Volume 1–15; The Later Works, Volume 1–17.

Illinois: Southern University Press.

Fairﬁeld, P. (2009). Education After Dewey. London: Continuum.

Fesmire, S. (2015). Dewey. London: Routledge.

Shook, J. R., & Kurtz, P. (Eds.). (2011). Dewey’s Enduring Impact: Essays on

America’s Philosopher. New York: Prometheus Books.

Tan, S. H., & Whalen-Bridge, J. (2008). Democracy as Culture: Deweyan Prag-

matism in a Globalizing World. New York: State University of New York

Press.

Tanner, L. N. (1997). Dewey’s Laboratory School: Lessons for Today.NewYork:

Teachers College Press.

Tiles, J. E. (1988). Dewey. New York: Routledge.

Contents

Part I Early Years

1 Boyhood and College Years 3

2 The Lost Years 19

3 Johns Hopkins Years 31

Part II Psychology

4 Young Dewey and Zeitgeist in Psychology 49

5 A Psychological Manifesto and Philosophic Method 75

6 Psychology, Reﬂex Arc Concept and the Birth

of Functionalism 99

7 Psychological Fallacy, How We Think, and Human

Nature and Conduct 135

xii CONTENTS

Part III Education

8 Chicago Years, My Pedagogic Creed and Resignation 173

9 Educational Writings in Chicago Years 199

10 Educational Writings in Columbia Years 237

Part IV Involvement in Education and Impact

11 Dewey in China 275

12 John Dewey and Progressive Education 309

13 Late Writings on Education 347

References 383

Index 401