Seventy Years of Changing Great Books at St. John's College - William Scott Rule

Georgia State University ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University Educational Policy Studies Dissertations Department of Educational Policy Studies 8-12-2009 Seventy Years of Changing Great Books at St. John's College William Scott Rule Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.edu/eps_diss Part of the Education Commons, and the Education Policy Commons Recommended Citation Rule, William Scott, "Seventy Years of Changing Great Books at St." Dissertation, Georgia State University, 2009.edu/eps_diss/37 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Department of Educational Policy Studies at ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University. It has been accepted for inclusion in Educational Policy Studies Dissertations by an authorized administrator of ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University. For more information, please contact scholarworks@gsu.

ACCEPTANCE This dissertation, SEVENTY YEARS OF CHANGING GREAT BOOKS AT ST. JOHN‟S COLLEGE, by WILLIAM SCOTT RULE, was prepared under the direction of the candidate‟s Dissertation Advisory Committee. It is accepted by the committee members in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree Doctor of Philosophy in the College of Education, Georgia State University. The Dissertation Advisory Committee and the student‟s Department Chair, as representatives of the faculty, certify that this dissertation has met all standards of excellence and scholarship as determined by the faculty.

The Dean of the College of Education concurs. Philo Hutcheson, Ph. Wayne Urban, Ph. Committee Chair Committee Member Susan Talburt, Ph.

Phill Gagne, Ph. Committee Member Committee Member Date Sheryl A. Chair, Department of Educational Policy Studies R. Dean and Distinguished Research Professor College of Education AUTHOR‟S STATEMENT By presenting this dissertation as partial fulfillment of the requirements for the advanced degree from Georgia State University, I agree that the library of Georgia State University shall make it available for inspection and circulation in accordance with its regulations governing materials of this type.

I agree that permission to quote, to copy from, or to publish this dissertation may be granted by the professor under whose direction it was written, by the College of Education‟s director of graduate studies and research, or by me. Such quoting, copying, or publishing must be solely for scholarly purposes and will not involve potential financial gain. It is understood that any copying from or publication of this dissertation which involves potential financial gain will not be allowed without my written permission. William Scott Rule NOTICE TO BORROWERS All dissertations deposited in the Georgia State University library must be used in accordance with the stipulations prescribed by the author in the preceding statement.

The author of this dissertation is: William Scott Rule 2049 Queensbury Dr. Acworth, GA 30102 The director of this dissertation is: Dr. Philo Hutcheson Department of Educational Policy Studies College of Education Georgia State University Atlanta, GA 30303 – 3083 VITA William Scott Rule ADDRESS: 2049 Queensbury Dr. Acworth, Georgia 30102 EDUCATION: Ph.

2009 Georgia State University Educational Policy Studies M. 1997 Kennesaw State University Management B. 1990 Southern Polytechnic State University Computer Science PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE: 2007-Present Vice President of Economic Development North Metro Technical College 2004-2007 Vice President of Instruction Appalachian Technical College 1995-2004 Chief Information Officer North Metro Technical College PROFESSIONAL SOCIETIES AND ORGANIZATIONS: 2007-Present American Association of Collegiate Registrars and Admissions Officers 2003-Present Association for Computing Machinery 2001-Present Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers ABSTRACT SEVENTY YEARS OF CHANGING GREAT BOOKS AT ST. JOHN‟S COLLEGE by William Scott Rule This dissertation examines a curricular approach at an institution that claims to maintain a liberal arts focus – that of the canon of Great Books as implemented as a formal curriculum at St.

My research question is: what enabled the Great Books program at St. John‟s College to survive for over seventy years? The significance of this question can be seen by noticing that St. John‟s College is the only college in the United States to have exclusively adopted reading the Great Books as its four-year curriculum. Other institutions that have experimented with a Great Books program prior to and since its introduction at St.

John‟s College have continued their existing programs as well, but many have limited their Great Books efforts to an honors course or general core requirement, if their Great Books effort survives at all. My dissertation is historical starting with the influencing factors leading to this curriculum‟s introduction at St. John‟s College in 1937. I then outline the implementation and document the changes to the list of Great Books comprising the program as it was updated over the subsequent seventy years as documented in St.

John‟s College‟s academic catalogs from 1937 through 2008. I show that the list of Great Books required to be read by every student over the years has contained a consistent core while making slight adjustments. SEVENTY YEARS OF CHANGING GREAT BOOKS AT ST. JOHN‟S COLLEGE by William Scott Rule A Dissertation Presented in Partial Fulfillment of Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Educational Policy Studies in the Department of Educational Policy Studies in the College of Education Georgia State University Atlanta, GA 2009 Copyright by William Scott Rule 2009 TABLE OF CONTENTS Page List of Tables.

iii Chapter 1 INTRODUCTION .1 Higher Education Curriculum in the United States .5 Attempts at Liberal Education in the Twentieth Century .15 Compiling the Canon .27 2 TWO EDUCATORS LEADING TO THE NEW PROGRAM .51 3 EARLY ATTEMPTS AT GREAT BOOKS PROGRAMS .61 University of Wisconsin .71 University of Chicago .82 4 ENABLING THE CANON .99 1911: Loeb Classical Library .105 1940: How to Read a Book .109 1952: Great Books of the Western World .115 5 IMPLEMENTATION AT ST.123 Not Repeating Others‟ Mistakes .131 Seventy-two Years of Great Books.162 ii LIST OF TABLES Table Page 1 Common Great Books from Three Lists .24 2 Columbia University‟s General Honors Reading Lists .43 3 Humanities A Course Required Reading .70 4 Experimental College Freshman Reading List .80 5 Everyman‟s Library: Volumes 1-50.101 7 Loeb Classical Library: Volumes 1-54.107 8 Adler‟s Great Books List .114 9 Great Books of the Western World.120 10 Authors Surviving Seventy-two Years at St.143 11 Authors Added and Kept on the St. John‟s College Reading List .146 12 Authors Removed from the Original St. John‟s College Reading List.147 13 Authors to Come and Go on the St. John‟s College Reading List .149 iii CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION Throughout the twentieth century, education, especially higher education, has become more specialized.

Veysey points out the professionalization of the professoriate and the corresponding departmentalization of knowledge beginning in the late 1800s.1 While there is no definitive answer to why this move toward specialization has occurred, the advancement of science, the scientific method, and technology are commonly thought to be the motivating forces. Indeed, as the twentieth century has seen more rapid advances in technology, the specialization of higher education has tried to keep pace. There have been many educators who have mourned over the loss of the unity of knowledge, as expressed in the previous century by Cardinal John Henry Newman,2 and they have pursued various strategies to return to a mythical golden age of liberal education. Alfred North Whitehead strongly states that “a man [sic] who only knows his own science, as a routine peculiar to that science, does not even know that.

He has no fertility of thought, no power of quickly seizing the bearing of alien ideas. He will discover nothing, and be stupid in practical applications.”3 1 Laurence Veysey, The Emergence of the American University (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1965), 142. 2 Cardinal John Henry Newman, The Idea of the University (London: Longman, Green, 1899; reprint, New Haven, Connecticut: Yale University Press, 1996), 127. 3 Alfred North Whitehead, The Aims of Education and Other Essays (New York: The Free Press, 1929), 52.

1 2 Yet, the idea of a liberal, non-specialized education persists. Indeed, there are numerous programs throughout the nation that attempt to provide just such an education. I do not wish to argue the strengths or weaknesses of these various programs nor even articulate them. I will, instead, focus on one such program – that of the canon of Great Books as implemented as a formal curriculum at St.

My research question is: what enabled the Great Books program at St. John‟s College to survive for over seventy years? What is significant about this question can be seen in light of the fact that St. John‟s College is the only college in the United States to have adopted reading the Great Books as its four-year curriculum. Other institutions that have experimented with a Great Books program prior to and since its introduction at St.

John‟s College have continued their existing programs as well. Many have limited their Great Books efforts to an honors course or general core requirement. My dissertation is historical starting with the influencing factors leading to this curriculum‟s introduction at St. John‟s College in 1937.

I outline the implementation and document the changes to the list of Great Books comprising the program as it was updated over the subsequent seventy years. John‟s College, while not the first to attempt the adoption of a canon as its curriculum, is the longest-running and continues today. I found that the list of Great Books required to be read by every student contains a consistent core while making slight adjustments over the years to arguably prevent the list from stagnating or keeping works that no longer contribute to a liberal education. As I will expound upon below, unlike the common belief that a Great Books canon is unchanging due to its claim to being a core of knowledge that everyone should know, the thinkers behind the St.

John‟s College program have always advocated adding 3 and dropping works as they are found to be of value4 or not to contemporary issues. John‟s College canon has, indeed, changed. Yet, advances in science and technology were not the only instigators I found for change to the list of Great Books. Although science did contribute its share to change, such as the introduction of Einstein‟s work in 1957, I found just as many if not more changes due to social issues.

Virginia Woolf became part of the curriculum in 1993 and W. Dubois and Booker T. Washington were added in 1998. To someone unfamiliar with the actual execution of the program at St.

John‟s College, these late entries may indicate the college‟s delayed interest in race and gender issues. However, although it took some time to identify and adopt non-white, non-male authors, race, gender, and other issues as discussed by Eric Margolis as editor of The Hidden Curriculum in Higher Education,5 were included in the seminars and discussions for years. Indeed, one could argue that one of the most provocative ways to discuss race and gender issues is to read works that ignored these issues in a diverse setting – for example, it would be difficult to read Rousseau without questioning his differing recommendations between educating boys versus girls. Perhaps the least effort has been made to address the Eurocentric bias of the program.

With the growing awareness of cultures outside of our limited Western views, it has become unacceptable to allow the statement put forth by Robert Maynard Hutchins in volume one of the Encyclopedia Britannica‟s Great Books of the Western World that “at the moment we have all we can do to understand ourselves in order to be prepared for 4 Value is difficult to define at this point, but should become apparent as the philosophy behind the Great Books program is discussed later in the dissertation., The Hidden Curriculum in Higher Education (New York: Routledge, 2001). 4 the forthcoming meetings between East and West. John‟s College has established an Eastern Classics Program in its Graduate Institute, I found no evidence of including non-Western authors in the undergraduate Great Books Program. However, like race and gender, topics were discussed as they apply to other works being read and their applicability to today‟s society in a wider world.