Conflict and Resolution

A volume in Studies in the History of EducationSeries Editor: Karen L. Riley, Auburn University at MontgomeryConflict and Resolution: Progressive Educators and the Question of Religion investigatesthe impact of religion in shaping the progressive education movement. Historians of progressivismhave described the progressive movement as a secularized version of fundamentally religiousimpulses, a kind of ’secularized evangelicalism.’ Many progressive political and socialreformers were subject to powerful religious influences, but were unable to adhere to the theologicaltenets held by their parents or grandparents. Instead, they secularized their religiousimpulses and devoted themselves to social and political reform. Conflict and Resolution extendsthis analysis to progressive educators through biographical sketches of five leaders in the progressiveeducation movement and an examination of the role of religion in their work.This investigation models three distinct ways in which progressive educators mediated their youthful religious experiences andtheir adult lives and careers. Schoolmasters Jerry Voorhis of California and Felix Adler of New York City were Integrators, those whoactively incorporated firmly held religious beliefs into their educational thought and practice. Educational philosophers William HeardKilpatrick and John Lawrence Childs were Deniers, those who rejected religious experience in their educational pursuits, but not necessarilyin their personal lives. Finally, preeminent progressive educator John Dewey was a Reinterpreter, one who recast religious conceptsand terminology to fit his newly emerging educational approaches. The religious experiences of each of these men left their markon the progressive education movement.The richly textured biographical sketches found in Conflict and Resolution: ProgressiveEducators and the Question of Religion portray the interior lives of these figures andexplain how their religious experiences impacted their work. The book will be of interest toeducational historians, biographers, and others interested in the development of Americaneducation whether they come from a religious or secular mindset.