Though Emile is still considered the central pedagogical text of the French Enlightenment, a myriad of lesser-known thinkers paved the way for Rousseau's masterpiece. Natasha Gill traces the arc of these thinkers as they sought to reveal the correlation between early childhood experiences and the success or failure of social and political relations, and set the terms for the modern debate about the influence of nature and nurture in individual growth and collective life. Gill offers a comprehensive analysis of the rich cross-fertilization between educational and philosophical thought in the French Enlightenment. She begins by showing how in Some Thoughts Concerning Education John Locke set the stage for the French debate by transposing key themes from his philosophy into an educational context. Her treatment of the abbé Claude Fleury, the rector of the University of Paris Charles Rollin, and Swiss educator Jean-Pierre de Crousaz illustrates the extent to which early Enlightenment theorists reevaluated childhood and learning methods on the basis of sensationist psychology. Etienne-Gabriel Morelly, usually studied as a marginal thinker in the history of utopian thought, is here revealed as the most important precursor to Rousseau, and the first theorist to claim education as the vehicle through which individual liberation, social harmony and political unity could be achieved. Gill concludes with an analysis of the educational-philosophical dispute between Helvétius and Rousseau, and traces the influence of pedagogical theory on the political debate surrounding the expulsion of the Jesuits in 1762.

The 28 essays reprinted here are arranged in four sections that offer theoretical, historical, educational, and community perspectives on the whole topic of literacy. In addition to their substantial introduction, the editors provide an exhaustive bibliography based on the citations to the essays. Kintgen, Kroll, and Rose see literacy as an extremely complex area of inquiry in which all aspects are interrelated, and they hope to avoid creating or perpetuating false boundaries within the field. The book’s first section contains articles dealing with various psychological and economic consequences of literacy. The second provides an introduction to the development of literacy in different eras of the West, from its inception among the Greeks to the teaching of it in North America during the past century. The third section treats the teaching of literacy in educational institutions, primarily at the secondary and post-secondary levels. The final section discusses literacy outside the traditional classroom: the development of literacy among children and adults, the functions and uses of literacy in the workplace and elsewhere, and the identity and problems of those who have not mastered literacy skills.

This volume presents an array of studies on many aspects of the eighteenth century: on the novel, history, the history of ideas, drama, poetry and sentimentality. The essays are as diverse as ‘Pope’s Essays on Man and the French Enlightenment’ and ‘Of Silk-worms and Farthingales and the Will of God.’ One group is concerned with the works and ideas of Bayle, Alexander Gerard, Diderot, Fuseli, Hawkesworth and Swift among others. The essays are the work of leading scholars for many disciplines and were presented at the Second David Nichol Smith Seminar; together they reflect some of the liveliest and most up-to-date trends in the present reexamination of the period. The book will be invaluable to all students of the literature, thought, and civilisation of the eighteenth century.

The central theme of this book is the changing experience of childhood in nineteenth-century France.

First published in 1987. This study describes and analyses the published writings of the French philosopher Antoine Destutt de Tracy. The author focuses on the three decades from the calling of the Etats-généraux to the early years of the Restoration – the period of Tracy’s entire literary production, and the period of his greatest influence and reputation. This title will be of great interest to students of history, philosophy and politics.