The Child's Philosopher ed. by Maughn Rollins Gregory and Megan Jane Laverty

Abstract

Reviewed by: The Child's Philosopher ed. by Maughn Rollins Gregory and Megan Jane Laverty Claudia Mills (bio) Gareth B. Matthews, The Child's Philosopher. Edited by Maughn Rollins Gregory and Megan Jane Laverty. Routledge, 2022. Throughout my career as a philosophy professor who is also a children's book author, and a children's book author who is also a philosophy professor, I have often been asked about what seemed to many an odd pairing of professions. I'd answer that philosophers were just the grownups who kept on asking the childlike questions that the other grownups had long ago abandoned. Gareth B. Matthews (1929-2011) was a highly respected philosopher specializing in Aristotelian metaphysics who forged a pioneering path by responding to children's philosophical questions with extraordinary respect and deep seriousness. In books such as Philosophy and the Young Child (1980), Dialogues with Children (1984), and The Philosophy of Childhood (1994), he analyzed conversations with his own children and grandchildren as well as schoolchildren in both American and international settings, arguing that even young children are capable of conceptual reasoning and their philosophical speculations are worthy of adult attention. His work as a visionary leader in the Philosophy for Children movement is given appreciative (but also critical) examination in this title in Routledge's new series on Philosophy for Children Founders. Following the series format, the volume on Matthews is organized into sections featuring different aspects of his work, each with a substantial introduction by a prominent scholar who situates his writings in a wider context and provides an extensive bibliography of relevant literature, followed by a selection of Matthews's essays curated by that scholar. The introductions are uniformly well researched and thoughtful, striking a tone that is both celebratory of Matthews's work and willing to note its limitations, among these that his evidence for the "naturalness" of children's philosophizing is a product of specific culture factors that he ignores. But it is Matthews's own words that are rightly the star of this excellent collection. His clarity of thought, droll but provocative examples of the children's insights he recorded, and bold positions advanced with disarming charm make for delightful reading. Part I, on philosophy and children's literature, reflects Matthews's view that "authors of children's books are more likely than psychologists, educational theorists, or even philosophers to be sensitive to philosophical thought in young children" (44). In his seminal 1976 article "Philosophy and Children's Literature" which, according to section editor Karin Murris, "inaugurated the study of philosophy in children's literature" (47), he highlights children's books that raise philosophical questions in a style he calls "philosophical whimsy." The Bear That Wasn't by Frank Tashlin engages [End Page 337] themes of "dreaming and skepticism," "being and non-being," "appearance and reality," and "the foundations of knowledge" (61). Rich philosophical insights abound in Baum's Tin Woodman (personal identity), Thurber's Many Moons (perception and illusion), and the Roo-capturing scene in Winnie-the-Pooh when Pooh ponders the "Aha!" that he's supposed to say to Kanga and wonders whether he can make it mean all the elaborate things Rabbit has told him it needs to mean; Matthews likens Pooh's speculations to questions about meaning posed by Wittgenstein in his Philosophical Investigations. A second essay in this section contrasts the condescension toward children of "Questions" in Jean Van Leeuwen's More Tales of Oliver the Pig, which offers a "phony contrast between naïve ignorance in children and patient wisdom in adults" (69), with Arnold Lobel's invitation for readers of all ages to join together in exploring puzzles about the nature of causation posed by Toad's mistaken reasoning in "The Garden" in Frog and Toad Are Friends, where Toad thinks his "hard work" of singing and reading to his seeds has caused them to grow. Matthew's essay "Children, Irony and Philosophy" (reprinted in the section on developmental psychology) employs this same story to refute theorists who argue that preschoolers cannot understand irony. Part II, on children's philosophical thinking, is replete with children's philosophical questions and comments that demonstrate remarkable imagination and insight...