Some Antecedents of Educational Philosophy in Britain with Particular Reference to Social Science

Abstract

Summary It would be convenient to pretend that the histories of educational philosophy in Britain and, by extension, the USA and Australia, were responses to a common social and intellectual history but convenience in this case could only be accomplished at the expense of explanatory power. The history of educational philosophy in these three places is parallel but not in common. Philosophy of education in Britain is more closely related to philosophy than is philosophy of education in the USA. Philosophy of education in the USA appropriated the lead of the American Social Science Association and initially retained closer connections with social science than did its English counterpart. Nevertheless, it is argued here that educational philosophy's reference to social science—Victorian and modern—is the missing explanatory element in modem histories of the discipline. The appropriation of education by social science—a common feature of the intellectual history of education in Britain, Australasia, and the ...