In Perpetual Motion

In Perpetual Motion is an «historical choreography» of power, pedagogy, and the child from the 1600s to the early 1900s. It breaks new ground by historicizing the analytics of power and motion that have interpenetrated renditions of the young. Through a detailed examination of the works of John Locke, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Johann Herbart, and G. Stanley Hall, this book maps the discursive shifts through which the child was given a unique nature, inscribed in relation to reason, imbued with an effectible interiority, and subjected to theories of power and motion. The book illustrates how developmentalist visions took hold in U.S. public school debates. It documents how particular theories of power became submerged and taken for granted as essences inside the human subject. In Perpetual Motion studiously challenges views of power as in or of the gaze, tracing how different analytics of power have been used to theorize what gazing could notice.

Autorentext

The Author: Bernadette M. Baker is Assistant Professor of Curriculum and Instruction at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. In addition to articles published in professional journals, she has co-edited a book on education's new timespace. Her research interests are curriculum history and curriculum theory and their intersection with issues in historiography and philosophy of education.

Klappentext

In Perpetual Motion is an «historical choreography» of power, pedagogy, and the child from the 1600s to the early 1900s. It breaks new ground by historicizing the analytics of power and motion that have interpenetrated renditions of the young. Through a detailed examination of the works of John Locke, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Johann Herbart, and G. Stanley Hall, this book maps the discursive shifts through which the child was given a unique nature, inscribed in relation to reason, imbued with an effectible interiority, and subjected to theories of power and motion. The book illustrates how developmentalist visions took hold in U.S. public school debates. It documents how particular theories of power became submerged and taken for granted as essences inside the human subject. In Perpetual Motion studiously challenges views of power as in or of the gaze, tracing how different analytics of power have been used to theorize what gazing could notice.

Zusammenfassung
«'In Perpetual Motion' is a remarkable book. Bernadette M. Baker's thought-provoking and inspiring analysis creates a 'dancing history' that is conceptually dense and at the same time very enjoyable to read. It cannot fail to make an impact on the reader. This book invites us to think and to react - it challenges and instructs us. It will become, beyond a shadow of a doubt, one of the most important referential works in the field of educational history.» (António Nóvoa, Professor Catedratico, University of Lisbon; Chair of the International Standing Conference for the History of Education)
«It appears that the field of education now has its own Foucault. Her name is Bernadette M. Baker, and she has written a panoramic, profoundly provocative history of the discursive formations from which the figure of 'the child' appears. This book is, in a word, a masterpiece.» (William F. Pinar, St. Bernard Parish, Alumni Endowed Professor, Louisiana State University)
«This is an extremely important book, brilliantly conceived and very erudite. Its significance for the study of childhood cannot be overestimated. It is an essential text for all those concerned with conceptions of the child in education and the human and social sciences.» (Valerie Walkerdine, Foundation Professor of Critical Psychology, Centre for Critical Psychology, University of Western Sydney-Nepean)