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John Dewey (1859-1952) is considered one of the seminal thinkers of the 20th century and one of the great American philosophers. After graduating from the University of Vermont he taught high school and then completed his Ph.D. at Johns Hopkins. He taught at various institutions before going to the University of Chicago (1894-1904) where he established a Laboratory School to put his distinctive educational philosophies into practice. His best known innovation was what he called "directed living" with an emphasis on learning combined with concrete activity and practical relevance. He later went to Columbia University as professor of philosophy
(1904-1930) where he helped move Teacher's College into the forefront of American education.
Dewey's groundbreaking contributions to philosophy, psychology, and educational theory continue to animate research in those fields. Dewey stressed the relationship of student experience, critical reflection, and learning. He believed that education involved the development of the learner's capacities and interests in ways that empower her or him to assume the role of constructive participant in the wider society. His vision of community was one in which people come together to communicate and overcome conflict to reconfigure common problems in ways that lead to novel solutions. Thus, democracy for Dewey, was fundamentally a way of life and not simply a form of government. For Dewey, our task is to move from a society with a democratic government to one with a democratic way of life. The role of inquiry and education was
crucial for this movement to occur. The task of reworking democracy as a pedagogical and cultural practice contributes to, what Dewey once called, the creation of 'an articulate public.'
Dewey's relationship to Antioch is more indirect than direct, although many of his ideas about education and democracy, the role of experience in learning, notions of community and communication, and his considerations on ethics and inquiry, were foundational concepts for Antioch College and later, for the University that followed. Arthur Morgan, Antioch's president in the 1920s, was a devotee of Dewey's philosophy. In 1921, Morgan offered Dewey a job at the College, but there is no record of any response. Dewey, however, did come to the Yellow Springs campus in 1936 to deliver a lecture as part of the Horace Mann Centennial of Public Education. At that time, Dewey recommended George Geiger, one of his doctoral students at Columbia, for a philosophy position at Antioch. Geiger was hired and was eventually named the John
Dewey Professor of the Humanities. He ran an annual Dewey Lecture series during the 1970s.
For further readings: Among John Dewey's many books, The School and Society (1899); Democracy & Education: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Education (1916); Experience and Nature (1925); Experience and Education (1938): Also, Larry Hickman, [Ed.] Reading Dewey: Interpretations for a Postmodern Generation. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. 1998; and Barbara Levine, [Ed.] Works about Dewey: 1886-1995. Carbondale: Southern Illinois Press. 1996.
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