Research Catalog

The pursuit of knowledge under difficulties : from self-improvement to adult education in America, 1750-1990

Title: The pursuit of knowledge under difficulties : from self-improvement to adult education in America, 1750-1990 / Joseph F. Kett.
Author: Kett, Joseph F.
Publication: Stanford, Calif. : Stanford University Press, 1994.

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Status	Format	Access	Call Number	Item Location
Request for On-site Use Request Scan How do I pick up this item and when will it be ready?	Text	Use in library	LC5251 .K48 1994	Off-site

Details

Description

xviii, 581 pages; 24 cm

Summary

"This first history of nontraditional education in America traces the emergence of continuing and adult education from roots in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century popular self-improvement movements - the efforts of autodidacts, literary societies, mechanics' institutes, lyceums, Chautauqua, and the early experiments with university extension in the 1880's and 1890's."--BOOK JACKET. "The book persuasively links developments in the realm of popular self-improvement to cultural and social forces. It describes the way in which scholars and literati employed the diffusion of knowledge to establish a ground of sympathy between themselves and the public, and it explores the reasons why ordinary citizens turned to the cultivation of knowledge. By investigating both the intentions of leaders and the responses of followers, the author reveals a great deal about the motives that have driven the voluntary pursuit of knowledge in America. He also traces the complex relations between Chautauqua and similar informal institutions of popular self-improvement and such formal institutions of education as high schools and colleges."--Jacket

Subjects

Genre/Form

History.

Bibliography (note)

Includes bibliographical references (p. [457]-559) and index.

Contents

1. Literature, Philosophy, and Self-Education in Eighteenth-Century America -- 2. The Uses of Knowledge in Antebellum America -- 3. Strenuous Learning and the Diffusion of Knowledge -- 4. "The Liberal and Practical Education of the Industrial Classes" -- 5. The Homely Renaissance, 1870-1900 -- 6. The Decline of Culture, 1890-1900 -- 7. From Useful Knowledge to Job Improvement, 1870-1930 -- 8. Higher Education and the Challenge of Job Improvement -- 9. Educating the Public, 1900-1925 -- 10. The Electric Fire of Thought -- 11. The Art of Living -- 12. The Learning Society.

ISBN

0804722978
9780804722971
0804726809
9780804726801

LCCN

93041885

OCLC

ocm29315634
29315634
SCSB-8921471

Owning Institutions

Princeton University Library