Abstract
It is now time to turn from theory to a brief consideration of practice—to ask the question, if something like the analysis given in the preceding chapters is correct, then what, if anything, does it demand that we do? At the end of chapter one, it was pointed out that, considered analytically, Holt’s works consist of three main components. First, they contain a positive or constructive account of what he considers the ‘best learning’, the sorts of conditions that promote such learning, and the sorts of conditions that are hostile to it. Secondly, they contain a critique of education, which is justified by appeal to the foregoing account of ‘best learning’. And thirdly, they contain a range of practical strategies, aimed at mitigating the problems of education (especially compulsory schooling) and maximising the opportunity of acquiring the ‘best learning’. This third component was of great significance to Holt. Although there is a sense in which Holt’s work is ‘utopian’, in that it criticises some foundational cultural assumptions and envisages a possible society that exists nowhere, he is, at the same time, a deeply practical, realistic thinker. He does not offer airy plans for grand social reconstruction, addressed to nobody in particular; rather, he tries to answer the question of what can be done by us, here and now. In the words of one of his book titles, he wants to answer the question: What do I do Monday?
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Apple, M. (2000). The cultural politics of home schooling. Peabody Journal of Education, 75(1–2), 256–71.
Bakunin, M. (1970). God and the state. New York: Dover Publications.
Boggs, C. (1977). Revolutionary process, political strategy, and the dilemma of power. Theory and Society, 4(3), 359–93.
Borgmann, A. (1984). Technology and the character of contemporary life: A philosophical inquiry. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
Braverman, H. (1974). Labor and monopoly capital: The degradation of work in the twentieth century. New York: Monthly Review Press.
Breines, W. (1989). Community and organization in the New Left, 1962–1968: The great refusal (revised ed.). New Brunswick and London: Rutgers University Press.
Coleman-Jensen, A., Rabbitt, M. P., Gregory, C. A., & Singh, A. (2018). Household food security in the United States in 2017. Economic Research Report No. 256. Washington, DC: US Department of Agriculture.
Cooper, B. S., & Sureau, J. (2007). The politics of homeschooling: New developments, new challenges. Educational Policy, 21(1), 110–131.
Dewey, J. (2004). Democracy and education. Mineola, NY: Dover.
Farenga, P., & Holcomb, J. P. (Eds.). (1990). Sharing treasures: Book reviews by John Holt. Cambridge, MA: Holt Associates.
Ferguson, J. (1990). The anti-politics machine: Depoliticization and bureaucratic power in Lesotho. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Geuss, R. (2008). Philosophy and real politics. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
Geuss, R. (2014). Must criticism be constructive? A world without why (pp. 68–90). Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
Godwin, W. (1965). The enquirer: Reflections on education, manners, and literature. New York, NY: Augustus M. Kelley.
Goodway, D. (2012). Anarchist seeds beneath the snow: Left-libertarian thought and British writers from William Morris to Colin Ward. London: PM Press.
Gutmann, A. (1999). Democratic education (revised ed.). Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
Holt, J. (1970). What do I do Monday? New York: E. P. Dutton and Co.
Holt, J. (1976). Instead of education. New York: E. P. Dutton and Co.
Holt, J. (1981). Teach your own: A hopeful path for education. Liss, Hants: Lighthouse Books.
Holt, J. (1990a). Letter to Ivan Illich, 2/22/73. In S. Sheffer (Ed.), A life worth living: Selected letters of John Holt (pp. 147–52). Columbus, OH: Ohio State University Press.
Holt, J. (1990b). Letter to Boston University Students, 2/27/70. In S. Sheffer (Ed.), A life worth living: Selected letters of John Holt (pp. 60–5). Columbus, OH: Ohio State University Press.
Holt, J. (1990c). Letter to Students at the Center for Intercultural Documentation, 2/19/70. In S. Sheffer (Ed.), A life worth living: Selected letters of John Holt (pp. 56–9). Columbus, OH: Ohio State University Press.
Holt, J. (1990d). Letter to Hartmut von Hentig, 8/25/80. In S. Sheffer (Ed.), A life worth living: Selected letters of John Holt (pp. 228–35). Columbus, OH: Ohio State University Press.
Kunzman, R., & Gaither, M. (2013). Homeschooling: A comprehensive survey of the research. Other Education: The Journal of Educational Alternatives, 2(1), 4–59.
Lubienski, C. (2000). Whither the common good? A critique of home schooling. Peabody Journal of Education, 75(1–2), 207–32.
Orwell, G. (2000). Toward European unity, Partisan Review, 1947. In S. Orwell & I. Angus (Eds.), In front of your nose, 1945–1950. The collected essays, journalism and letters (pp. 370–5). Boston, MA: Nonpareil Books.
Pearse, I. H., & Crocker, L. H. (1943). The Peckham experiment: A study of the living structure of society. London: George Allen and Unwin.
Redford, J., Battle, D., Bielick, S., & Gradey, S. (2017). Homeschooling in the United States 2012 (revised ed.). Washington, DC: US Department of Education.
Rothermel, P. (Ed.). (2015). International perspectives on home education: Do we still need schools? London: Palgrave Macmillan.
Tolkien, J. R. R. (1954). The lord of the rings. London: Allen and Unwin.
Ward, C. (2008). Anarchy in action (2nd ed.). London: Freedom Press.
Zhuangzi. (2018). The full understanding of life. In The outer chapters (J. Legge, Trans.). Available at https://ctext.org/zhuangzi/full-understanding-of-life. Accessed December 2018.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2019 The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Dickerson, A. (2019). What Is to Be Done?. In: John Holt. SpringerBriefs in Education(). Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-18726-2_4
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-18726-2_4
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-030-18725-5
Online ISBN: 978-3-030-18726-2
eBook Packages: EducationEducation (R0)