The new humanism: The criticism of educational progressivism

Abstract

The New Humanism is a movement of literary criticism deployed from the beginning of the twentieth cen¬tury to the Second World War, which has many implications for education. We discuss two of his principal figures, Irving Babbitt (1865) 1933), and Norman Foerster (1887-1972) to expose these issues. For the New Humanists, the teaching of “great books” has a moral and political significance and should not be reserved for specialists in literature or philosophy. This study must be widely proposed, especially at the level of secondary education, in a democratic school. For this reason, the Progressive education is the target of criticism, as an aspect of a civilization wich has reversed thte sense of Progress. Scientific progress has created a power that is not accompanied by wisdom, while the romantic reaction to the upheaval of culture through the exploration of nature has engendered sterile sentimenta¬lism. It is in this perspective that works must be analyzed and transmitted. Norman Foerster has written and applied a program for the University of Iowa that gives a concrete idea of the teaching of the New Humanists. Should we be inspired by them to give a “bildung” to the contemporary subjects, lacking landmarks in the disorder of the twenty-first century?.