Breaking New Ground: The Development of Adult and Workers' Education in North America. Proceedings from the Syracuse University Kellogg Project's Visiting Scholar Conference in the History of Adult Education (1st, Syracuse, New York, March 1989).

Overview & Synopsis

The 19 papers in this conference report examine the formative period of the field of adult education, the development of workers' education, and the interrelationships of the two fields. The four papers in Section I, on defining adult education are: "Challenging the System: The Adult Education Movement and the Educational Bureaucracy of the 1920s" (Rose); "The American Library Adult Education Movement: The Diffusion of Knowledge and the Democratic Ideal, 1924-1933" (Rachal); "A Primary Source for Everett Dean Martin's Agenda for Adult Education" (Day); and "The Danish Folk High School and Its Reception in the United States: 1870s-1930s" (Stubblefield). Section II contains two papers on adult education as a new academic field: "Early Ideas on the Training of Leaders for Adult Education" (Brockett) and "Social Science and the Making of Adult Education Theory: Influences on the Study of Participation, 1930-1960" (Courtney). The 10 papers in Section III address the questions of whether workers' education and adult education are separate topics. They are: "Early Interpretations of Workers' Education" (Keane); "Education and Working Class Culture: German Workers' Clubs in Nineteenth Century Chicago" (Schied); "Workers' Education as Counter Hegemony: The Educational Process at Work Peoples' College, 1907-1941" (Altenbaugh); "Dangerous Knowledge: Canadian Workers' Education in the Decades of Discord" (Welton); "Fannia Mary Cohn: An Education Leader in Labor and Workers' Education, Her Life and Times" (Long, Lawry); "Eduard Lindeman and Workers' Education" (Stewart);"Workers' Education and Adult Education" (Bloom); "The Women of Summer: The Bryn Mawr Summer School for Women Workers, 1921-1938" (Heller); "Workers' Education and the National Urban League" (Morgan); and "Building for a Long Future: Workers' Education in the Progressive Era" (Casey). Section IV provides three papers on adult education, workers' education, and national policy: "New Deal Teacher-Training Centers, 1934-1935" (Kornbluh); "Education in the Work Place: A Brief Overview" (Carlson); and "The Morale of the People: Reflections on Adult Education in British Columbia in the Great Depression" (Selman). (YLB)