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The Revisionists Revived: The Libertarian Historiography of Education

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2017

Milton Gaither
Milton Gaither*
Affiliation:
Messiah College, Grantham, PA
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Extract

Over a decade ago Jurgen Herbst, in a retrospective review of the field of educational history, noted with considerable perturbation that educational historiography had grown tired and dull. “The revisionist surge, whether traditional or radical, has spent itself,” said Herbst, and nothing new or interesting has emerged to replace it. A year later, in March of 2000, a major invitation-only conference sponsored by the Spencer Foundation was held to discuss the state of the field. Some of the conference's conclusions were published by Ruben Donato and Marvin Lazerson, who prefaced their comments on the current state of the field with a refresher on the “Golden Era” of the late 1960s and 1970s, noting that for many, in the words of one attendee, the passion of those days “is somehow lost. We don't know where we're heading. We don't know what we're doing.”

Type
Articles
Information
History of Education Quarterly , Volume 52 , Issue 4 , November 2012 , pp. 488 - 505
Copyright
Copyright © 2012 History of Education Society 

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References

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6 Doherty, Brian, Radicals for Capitalism: A Freewheeling History of the Modern American Libertarian Movement (New York: Public Affairs, 2007), 31–66, 8–15; Gaither, Milton, Homeschool: An American History (New York: Palgrave MacMillan, 2008), 91–96, 101–4.Google Scholar

7 Holies quoted in Doherty, Radicals for Capitalism, 175.Google Scholar

8 Doherty, Radicals for Capitalism, 680, 337–39. This should be the reference for the Rothbard quote. Please address.Google Scholar

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13 Ibid., 43–48, 108–9. On Rushdoony's impact on Christian day schools and home-schooling see Gaither, Homeschool, 134–40, 158–62. The best example of the libertarian appropriation of Rushdoonian themes is probably Susan Alder, “Education in America,” in Public Education and Indoctrination, ed., Sennholz, Hans F. (Irvington-on-Hudson, NY: Foundation for Economic Education, 1993), 20–34.Google Scholar

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23 For examples of summative studies see High, Jack and Ellig, Jerome, “The Private Supply of Education: Some Historical Evidence,” in The Theory of Market Failure: A Critical Examination, ed., Cowen, Tyler (Fairfax, VA: George Mason University Press, 1988), 686–94; and Richman, Sheldon L., Separating School and State: How to Liberate America's Families (Fairfax, VA: Future of Freedom Foundation, 1994).Google Scholar

24 On the civilization thesis and early professional education historiography see Gaither, Milton, American Educational History Revisited: A Critique of Progress (New York: Teachers College Press, 2003), 58–88.Google Scholar

25 Coulson, Andrew J., Market Education: The Unknown History (New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction, 1999), 105.Google Scholar

26 Coulson, Market Education, 105.Google Scholar

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33 Ibid., 37.Google Scholar

34 Ibid., 38.Google Scholar

35 Ibid., 45, 107, 112, 152, 155.Google Scholar

36 Ibid., 384. Ruenzel, , “The World According to Gatto,” 26–32.Google Scholar

37 For a thoughtful reflection on positionality in educational historiography from an African American perspective see Alridge, Derrick P., “The Dilemmas, Challenges, and Duality of an African-American Educational Historian,” Educational Researcher 32 (December 2003): 25–34.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

38 On the debates between functionalists and liberals, see Cremin, Lawrence, “Recent Development of the History of Education as a Field of Study in the United States,” History of Education Journal 7 (Fall 1955): 1–35; and Cohen, Sol, Challenging Orthodoxies: Toward a New Cultural History of Education (New York: Peter Lang: 1999), 9–19.Google Scholar